This Democratic National Convention evokes more fuzzy feelings than a Hallmark movie.
From the heartwarming story of a teenager learning his stutter to control stuttering to the enormous testament of Joe Biden who fell in love after losing his first wife and daughter in a car accident, the narrative arc of the Democratic Party longs for a return to American character and bourgeoisie.
Yet for many progressives, the week was also lit up with fear.
A number of Republicans received invitations to speak, while progressive star Rep. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez was given a chance to change things around. A story reported in the Hill suggested that Democrats might step up to push for a public option, even as a pandemic looms through the nation. The Huffington Post then noted that the DNC “fell language that demanded an end to subsidies for fossil fuels and tax attacks from its party platform.” Biden had made exercises for progressives, but she began to question whether he, as president, could exchange progressive ambitions for politics. saving.
So it is here, between skeptical support for Joe Biden and overwhelming opposition to Donald Trump, that progressives are charting their future. For two presidential cycles, Senator Bernie Sanders ignored and expanded the progressive left. Now organizers and activists are trying to build on that working-class coalition by harnessing the energy of a national anti-racist protest movement and an increasingly diverse bourgeoisie. It is a political strategy that was considered in advance by rep this week. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez at the DNC.
The short speech by Ocasio-Cortez described the left as a mass movement that fights not only for “guaranteed health care, higher education, living wages, and labor rights”, but also “striving for recognition and repair of the wounds of racial injustice, colonization” , misogyny, and homophobia. ”
AOC – a young, progressive economic populist – stands amid a cohort of movement-based officials and candidates such as Ilhan Omar, Rashida Tlaib, Ayanna Pressley, Cori Bush, and Jamaal Bowman (no one except AOC was invited to speak on ‘ the Convention), which create a newer, more diverse class of progressive politicians. In both 2016 and 2020, the main criticism of the leftist Sanders was his shortcomings in mobilizing enough people of color, especially Black voters.
Now, in the midst of America’s racial reckoning, progressives are trying to fix that. But just as urgent is her desire to oust Trump.
For progressives, Biden is not ideal, but Trump is catastrophic
From the Blue Dog Democrats to the Democratic Socialists, many agree that Donald Trump is an existential threat to American democracy. It was a consistent theme for the DNC.
“I urge you to believe in your own ability – to embrace your own responsibility as a citizen – to ensure that the basic tenets of our democracy are upheld,” former President Barack Obama said in his remarks. ‘Because that’s there right now. Our democracy. ”
Sanders himself claimed that “at its most basic, this election is about preserving our democracy.” In a debriefing after its remarks, the AOC said the vote for Biden was also about “stopping fascism in the United States – that’s what Donald Trump stands for.”
They form an alliance, however restless, with founding Democrats to defeat Trump.
“Elect Biden enables us to move from defense to crime,” said the working campaign director of the Working Families Party, Joe Dinkin. “Living in America’s America lives every day to stop the latest attack on constituencies we care about – on working class people of color.” Dinkin describes choosing Biden as “a door, not a destination” that allows groups like WFP to grow a movement and demand more comprehensive policies.
“The very next task is to end the Trump era,” he continued. The Trump administration’s political disaster has united the party behind Biden for now, the scale of the devastation extends so far – a deadly pandemic, lynchings, bilingual unemployment levels – that progressives believe the left will remain highly mobilized, even as Biden wins.
“Some of the richest people in the world are still getting richer, and millions of people are on the verge of eviction or neglect or hunger,” says Dinkin Vox. “The dramatic crisis we are facing is causing people to embrace the kind of policies that the WFP, AOC, and our allies have been working on.”
The left believes his future lies in organizing various coalitions
The Democratic Socialists of America, which stands to the left of the WFP, have a similar theory of the case about holding a future Biden administration accountable and expanding the power of progressives.
‘It was a myth that you just vote in November and then your job as a political actor is done. That’s not what we’re seeing right now in the DSA, ”said Maikiko James, a member of the group’s National Political Committee. “People are very animated and want to be involved and do more than vote. As far as the administration is concerned – the energy I see, I’m not afraid of dissipation. ”
Following the protests over the killing of George Floyd’s police, James says DSA has worked to support Black Lives Matter activists and organizations to “pursue progressive politics in a way that is in real solidarity with all communities. “
“We must actively defend Black life in material ways,” he continues. “Standing up to protest is a great step, but how do we fight now as leftists to build coalitions, listen to Black leadership, understand that there are incredible moments of opportunity for young Black leaders to emerge, but also our consulting elders who have been in this moment of civil rights and beyond. This is a crucial moment to understand what real solidarity and collective organization means in creating an anti-racist society. ”
However, as groups such as DSA workers expand their profession, they face an uncertain environment. Alliances have been signed and re-signed by Covid-19, an unpredictable president, and the economic collapse. These shifting political currents create a difficult sequence in the long run.
Yet this kind of multiracial coalition building is something that Ocasio-Cortez, who describes James as “a really important leader” for DSA, has voiced in her congressional career. Regularly advocating for anti-racism, reparations, police reform on her social media platforms and on the Hill, she has made comparisons with activists such as Martin Luther King Jr. and politicians like Shirley Chisholm.
Their ease with Black activists and thinkers is a coveted asset for progressives who have long struggled to win over Black voters from mainstream Democrats. Progressives are often accused of forging a reductive analysis of the role of racism in American society in relation to class.
For all the good Sanders did the progressive movement, his approach with Black voters did them no favors. Berkeley law professor Ian Haney López wrote in Left Fusion: Fusion of race and class, winning elections, and saving America that Sanders’ approach to race comes at a real cost, blindly blind to how racism works today, and also promoting activities of racial justice that form an influential part of the Democratic base. “
Sanders changed his political outreach in 2020. In 2016, Sanders’ leadership team was all white, and even Sanders admitted that his campaign was too white.
In 2020, the campaign created pressure to diversify and build a leadership with workers of black and South Asian and Pakistani descent, including ethnicities. In the Southwest, the months of the campaign of investing in relational organization lead to enormous profits in the Nevada caucuses, thanks in large part to Latino voters. Sanders had lost the state to Clinton in 2016. While still at the top of the year, Sanders even questioned Biden in Reuters’ poll in late February among Black voters. Yet despite the campaign shifts, Sanders was enthroned as the race moved through the South, where Black voters brought Biden back.
Today, still with the goal of diversifying, groups like DSA have thrown themselves into coalition building with black activist organizations. So far, they have used local chapters to help support Movement for Black Lives agenda items such as defending the police.
“There is a lot of talk going on about how we are building coalitions over a very racial divide in this country,” James Vox said, adding that there is currently talk of investing in local-level campaigns for municipal funding. to redirect from police to municipal security initiatives and training opportunities in Black communities.
For years, Sanders has kept organizations like DSA on the progressive left. He attracted young fans. He helped political legitimacy. However, Sanders will be 79 in September. It is “very, very unlikely” that he will run again.
A new generation of left-wing advocates, rooted and fluent with the language and living experience of racial injustice, are ready to take its place. In so many ways, the future of Bernie’s movement looks a lot like AOC.
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