AUGUST 14, 2025 (Prospect.org)<\/p>\n\n\n\n
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ZACH CADDY<\/p>\n\n\n\n
The Democratic Socialists of America meeting in Chicago this month<\/p>\n\n\n\n
https:\/\/trinitymedia.ai\/player\/trinity-player.php?pageURL=https%3A%2F%2Fprospect.org%2Fpolitics%2F2025-08-14-dsa-convenes-argues-and-celebrates%2F%3Futm_source%3DActiveCampaign%26utm_medium%3Demail%26utm_content%3DDSA%2520Convenes%252C%2520Argues%252C%2520and%2520Celebrates%26utm_campaign%3DDaily%2520Prospect%252008-14-2025&GDPR=%24%24GDPR_MACRO%24%24&GDPR_CONSENT=%24%24GDPR_CONSENT_MACRO%24%24&contentHash=9da0e5f6989f0f025ac9bfe511454f5c4e731de923bcf942c199bcce5ddf1811&unitId=2900001720&userId=a143de11-b5db-4fd1-bdec-b0e6b692767c&isLegacyBrowser=false&isPartitioningSupport=1&version=20250806_0a5cc818db4a5e97910f842e941d2c543416f1d1&useBunnyCDN=0&themeId=140&isMobile=0&unitType=tts-player<\/p>\n\n\n\n
CHICAGO \u2013 It\u2019s been a tumultuous decade for the Democratic Socialists of America (DSA), and an even more intense year. So when 1,200 delegates from across the country came to Chicago last weekend for the group\u2019s biannual convention, there was much to debrief. And argue about. And celebrate.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
Most recently, New York City DSA member Zohran Mamdani burst into national attention after winning the city\u2019s Democratic mayoral primary, beating Andrew Cuomo and becoming a national target for Republicans (and some Democrats). It\u2019s impossible to ignore DSA\u2019s hand in his win: The organization created a network of tens of thousands of canvassers who spent months going door-to-door in all five boroughs to bring voters Mamdani\u2019s socialist message, tightly focused on basic economic issues.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
DSA badly needed that victory. Last summer, the organization was hit with three major electoral defeats. First, in the most expensive House primary in history, AIPAC money and corporate Democrats pushed Rep. Jamaal Bowman from his New York seat. Bowman had a complicated history with DSA over his record on Israel (some members had sought to expel him) but nonetheless was endorsed by the group and had been proof that socialists could gain federal office.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
More from Emma Janssen<\/em><\/strong><\/a><\/p>\n\n\n\n Just two months after Bowman\u2019s loss, Missouri Rep. Cori Bush lost her seat in much the same way. The third defeat was the dispiriting presidential campaign and Trump\u2019s eventual election, which left many DSA members all the more disillusioned with American electoral politics and the Democratic Party\u2019s stance on Palestine.<\/p>\n\n\n\n Every two years, DSA delegates from across the country meet to vote on resolutions and elect their National Political Committee (NPC), which largely steers the group\u2019s direction, though local chapters retain a great deal of autonomy. This year, reckoning with the wins and losses of 2024 and 2025 was top of mind, along with crafting the organization\u2019s response to the genocide in Palestine.<\/p>\n\n\n\n Walking around the massive Chicago convention center that housed the convention, I could see the organization\u2019s concerns and tensions just by looking around. Members wore keffiyehs on their heads or draped over their shoulders. Some caucuses (ideological groups within the DSA) had their own hats (green for the electorally focused Groundwork Caucus), T-shirts (the communist Emerge Caucus had a nice cherry blossom design), and bandanas (worn by the moderate Socialist Majority Caucus). I worried at first that some of these caucus dynamics would unfocus the group and push so-called \u201csectarian\u201d debate to the forefront. But I left with a much stronger view of the organization, which emerged united on many of its most crucial questions.<\/p>\n\n\n\n \u201cI think it is a critical juncture for the organization. This moment is clearly very dire,\u201d said Colleen Johnston, who joined DSA after President Trump took office in 2017. \u201cFascism is barreling through the country. And so the urgency is definitely there. And the question for us is: How seriously and clearly are we going to be meeting the moment with urgent, focused power-building demands that are going to unite a broad coalition of people to fight fascism?\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n Though some might be concerned by the infighting they saw at the convention (or on social media), I have a more optimistic view after three days of observing debate and speaking to delegates from across the ideological spectrum. Regardless of what happens at the convention, serious material work is being done on the local chapter level across the country, which builds local power.<\/p>\n\n\n\n One obvious route to power is by winning elections at all levels of government. The majority of DSA members, delegates told me, support its moves into the American electoral system, regardless of their ideological leanings. Many of the group\u2019s furthest-left members, those who might otherwise reject the Democratic Party, actively canvassed for Mamdani, who ran as a Democrat\u2014as have virtually all DSA elected officials who\u2019ve run in partisan elections.<\/p>\n\n\n\n Sammy Zimmerman, a member of the left-wing Emerge Caucus, is one of those members. \u201cI volunteered for several canvassing shifts and petitioning shifts for Mamdani. It was really, really heartening,\u201d they said. \u201cIt was definitely the most helpful I felt about a candidate for office in a long time.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n Expand<\/a><\/p>\n\n\n\n LEV RADIN\/SIPA USA VIA AP IMAGES<\/p>\n\n\n\n Democratic nominee for New York City mayor Zohran Mamdani<\/p>\n\n\n\n That hope helped kick-start a massive growth in NYC-DSA\u2019s membership. Grace Mausser, a co-chair of NYC-DSA and longtime adviser of Mamdani\u2019s, said that the chapter has grown by several thousand members since the June victory. That brings the total number of members in the chapter to 10,500.<\/p>\n\n\n\n These new members are eager to build on Mamdani\u2019s momentum, Mausser said. \u201c[They\u2019re] very excited to see what the organization will be doing in 2026 with our electoral work.\u201d Mausser also noted a number of legislative campaigns built around Mamdani\u2019s agenda, such as their effort to pass revenue-raisers in Albany, which still controls the tax funding necessary to any city initiatives.<\/p>\n\n\n\n Today, DSA is looking to replicate Mamdani\u2019s success across the country. Minnesota State Sen. Omar Fateh is a democratic socialist<\/a> running for mayor in Minneapolis. DSA\u2019s National Electoral Commission has endorsed 12 candidates<\/a> from across the country in municipal elections this year.<\/p>\n\n\n\n And the group made their first 2028 move, passing a resolution called \u201cUnite Labor & the Left to Run a Socialist for President and Build the Party,\u201d which encourages the group to run a presidential candidate in the next election. After Rep. Rashida Tlaib gave a fiery speech to open the convention\u2014\u201cThe working masses are hungry for revolutionary change,\u201d she said\u2014some DSA members both on X<\/a> and in person suggested that she could be a good fit for the role. Whomever the group runs, it will likely be on the Democratic ballot line, in recognition that third parties are not currently viable in the U.S.<\/p>\n\n\n\n Kareem Elrefai, a New York member who was elected to the NPC at the end of the convention, said that resolution was one of his biggest takeaways from the weekend, steering DSA in a power-building direction. He recounted that the body debated whether their 2028 candidate should run as a Democrat or a third-party candidate, but he was happy with the ultimate outcome. \u201cThere was an amendment that would have strongly urged us to go independent. I am very excited that it has kept us on the Democratic Party ballot line, not because I\u2019m a proud Democrat, certainty not by any means,\u201d he said. \u201cThird-party agitational campaigns fail pretty consistently.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n It was a Democratic presidential primary campaign that first brought Elrefai to DSA. While working on the Bernie Sanders campaign in 2020, he met dozens if not hundreds of democratic socialists who were eager to build power together. On the day Sanders dropped out, just as the pandemic came crashing down on the country, Elrefai signed up to join DSA \u201cthrough tears.\u201d He certainly wasn\u2019t alone: The group\u2019s membership shot up by the thousands each time Sanders ran for president (indeed, membership growth had been moribund for three decades until Sanders first declared his candidacy in 2015).<\/p>\n\n\n\n A common criticism of DSA is that its members aren\u2019t serious about gaining electoral power and making material change; the delegates I spoke to fervently denied this claim.<\/p>\n\n\n\n \u201cWe\u2019re more electorally focused than we [were] five, six years ago,\u201d said Mausser from NYC-DSA. \u201cThere are no longer live debates about whether socialists should participate in electoral contests.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n Now, Mausser said, the debates focus on \u201chow<\/em> we engage in those electoral contests.\u201d The question of running candidates as Democrats versus as third-party candidates is still one such debate, as Elrefai mentioned.<\/p>\n\n\n\n Zimmerman believes that there isn\u2019t a one-size-fits-all approach to party politics. \u201cA strategic relationship with the Democrats necessarily looks very different in different parts of the U.S.,\u201d they said. \u201cYou have places like New York where, basically, the Democratic primary determines the mayoral election. That\u2019s very different than somewhere like Idaho, where \u2026 a plurality of people [is] more conservative and wouldn\u2019t vote for a Democrat anyway.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n Some caucuses value electoral politics above other forms of organizing, while others prefer instead to prioritize mutual aid work or labor organizing. But the vast majority of DSA members don\u2019t see these goals as mutually exclusive. \u201cWe want to win and wield power,\u201d Johnston summarized. \u201cOne of the ways we can do that is through the power of the state, by actually changing conditions in people\u2019s lives. I think there are a lot of other ways that can be done that are not oppositional to electoral politics but actually very complementary.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n Ethan, a member from New York, identified some of those other methods of organizing: \u201cOur theory of change is defined by a diversity of tactics,\u201d he said. \u201cWe have members of the organization that are really actively doing labor organizing, running people in elections, doing field organizing in elections and doing street organizing, organizing on college campuses.\u201d The list goes on.<\/p>\n\n\n\n Delegates also debated the criteria that would determine their support for politicians\u2019 views and votes on Israel. One resolution passed by the group, \u201cFor a Fighting Anti-Zionist DSA,\u201d called for DSA members and endorsed elected officials to be expelled from the group if they give material support to Israel or related lobbying groups like AIPAC or longtime two-state advocate and Likud critic J Street. Members could also be expelled for statements like \u201cIsrael has a right to defend itself.\u201d An amendment that would have removed the expulsion clause was voted down. Fully 40 percent of the delegates opposed the unamended resolution, however, and by its criteria, DSA\u2019s NPC could vote to expel Sanders if he were a member, and might also expel Rep. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez.<\/p>\n\n\n\n The resolution\u2019s passage comes after years of public disagreement within DSA about how to approach Israel and Palestine. Both AOC and Bowman faced censure from DSA due to their votes and comments on Israel. In 2021, Bowman voted to fund Israel\u2019s Iron Dome, attended a trip to Israel sponsored by J Street, and met with Israeli Prime Minister Naftali Bennett. These actions prompted DSA\u2019s NPC to re-evaluate their endorsement of him; they eventually decided to publicly condemn his actions but didn\u2019t expel him<\/a> from the group.<\/p>\n\n\n\n Last June, the NPC voted to endorse AOC if she followed a short list of demands on Palestine. Less than a month later, the committee withdrew their endorsement<\/a> (she remained endorsed by NYC-DSA) in part due to her support for the Iron Dome, even as she has consistently joined Sanders in opposing the sale of offensive weapons to Israel and decrying the nation\u2019s bloody apartheid policies.<\/p>\n\n\n\n Expand<\/a><\/p>\n\n\n\n NICK WEBER<\/p>\n\n\n\n Rep. Rashida Tlaib (D-MI) speaking at the convention<\/p>\n\n\n\n After October 7, 2023, some longtime members of the organization left, citing comments other DSA members made in the wake of Hamas killing 1,200 Israelis, as well as the increasingly sectarian politics of many DSA caucuses. My colleague at the Prospect<\/em>, Harold Meyerson<\/a>, was one such DSA member. Since late 2023, when Meyerson left the group, DSA has worked to articulate a clear anti-Zionist position. The new resolution comes in response to the debates around Bowman, AOC, and the nature of DSA\u2019s policy on Palestine and Israel, drawing brighter red lines on the issue for members and elected officials alike, even as a sizable minority of delegates opposed it.<\/p>\n\n\n\n It was just one time of many that Palestine animated the convention\u2019s attendees. One of the most pressing reasons that DSA is looking toward gaining more power in 2028 is Palestine. In 2024, DSA worked with the Uncommitted movement for delegates to the forthcoming Democratic convention as a way to protest the Biden administration\u2019s continued support for Israel\u2019s war on Palestine, and joined the call for a Palestinian American speaker at the Democratic National Convention. That call was rejected by nominee Kamala Harris and her team. In the early days of her campaign, Harris had tried to signal a superficial difference between her and Biden on Israel, but ultimately toed the party line. Now, Trump sits in the Oval Office and, of course, hasn\u2019t put a stop to Israel\u2019s destruction of Gaza, either. Sixty-one thousand Palestinians have been killed<\/a> by Israel, and half a million are living in famine conditions<\/a>.<\/p>\n\n\n\n \u201cI think we as the left really felt the void that was left in 2024 with no presidential candidate,\u201d Elrefai said. \u201cThere was nobody up there to anchor our ideas \u2026 and that was a mistake, especially in the midst of an ongoing genocide.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n DSA is looking to 2028, but also hopes to make change in the three years before then. \u201cWhether we\u2019re talking about the genocide that\u2019s happening in Gaza, the climate crisis, the rise of fascism, [or] the dismantling of civil society, we don\u2019t have the luxury of time to be setting a plan for figuring things out in two or three or four years,\u201d Johnston said. We have to be acting urgently now<\/em>.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n DSA\u2019s debates\u2014whether over Palestine, elections, or anything else\u2014tend to get broadcasted to outsiders (especially over social media). After scrolling on X during the convention, it would be easy to take a cynical view of DSA, whose convention was chock-full of niche arguments, caucus callouts, and oblique and obscure references. But at least some DSA members say that disagreement within the organization is a feature, not a bug.<\/p>\n\n\n\n \u201cEvery organization has this level of dissent and disagreement, and we\u2019re just open about it,\u201d Mausser said. \u201cOur debate and our disagreement [are] intentional.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n And on Palestine, Johnston said: \u201cWe\u2019re not really interested in \u2026 focusing on that inward-facing stuff about who has the perfect position. If you\u2019re against the genocide and you want to stop it, we want to work with you.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n It will remain to be seen if Johnston\u2019s hope for unity comes true, especially due to the newly passed resolution\u2019s expulsion clause. But it seems that years of debate on Israel and Palestine have cohered the organization around a set of guiding principles, including support for the BDS movement.<\/p>\n\n\n\n That\u2019s not to say that all delegates welcomed the disagreements or supported everything the convention did or didn\u2019t do. Elrefai and Mausser both pointed to losses in the convention that deeply concerned them. Elrefai, along with his caucus, Groundwork, wanted to amend the convention agenda to put two issues up for discussion: transgender rights and the Green New Deal. That effort failed.<\/p>\n\n\n\n \u201cThe reason I find that as upsetting as I do is that, at a moment where the Democrats have completely failed to be a bulwark against trans rights, at a moment when they\u2019ve largely stopped talking about climate change, that\u2019s an opportunity for us,\u201d Elrefai said. \u201cAnd if we don\u2019t fill that void, somebody else will.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n Expand<\/a><\/p>\n\n\n\n ZACH CADDY<\/p>\n\n\n\n The NYC-DSA choir leading convention-goers in song<\/p>\n\n\n\n Mausser echoed that frustration. \u201cI am a little disappointed that at the convention we\u2019re not spending a lot of time on the floor talking about some of the biggest existential fights of our time,\u201d she said. \u201cWe\u2019re not spending too much [time] on the floor talking about Trump himself, not spending too much time talking about trans rights, but we do have active programs on those things.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n Paul Garver, a longtime DSA member from the Boston chapter, said that he understands why delegates spent less time talking about Trump than they did about, say, Gaza. When it comes to Trump, he said, chuckling, \u201cthere\u2019s nothing controversial, so people don\u2019t think it\u2019s interesting!\u201d But speaking more seriously, he reflected on his own activism during the Vietnam War and said that he too had had a narrow focus on the atrocities he saw abroad. \u201cIt\u2019s perfectly understandable that Trump didn\u2019t come up\u201d as frequently as some might have expected, he told me.<\/p>\n\n\n\n Mausser, despite her own disappointment about the lack of debate on Trump\u2019s policies, cautioned against seeing convention arguments as definitive statements about DSA. \u201cI think sometimes at convention, we focus on what we disagree on, which is actually pretty small in the scheme of things,\u201d she said. \u201cAnd it seems like we\u2019re deprioritizing [things we agree on], but in reality \u2026 once we go home after this, that\u2019s where most of the work is going to live.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n Marina, a member of the Emerge Caucus from NYC-DSA, said that she came to conference to build coalitions around resisting ICE, work that would follow her back home to New York. After working to pass a resolution calling for action against ICE, she started making connections with kindred members from across the country.<\/p>\n\n\n\n \u201cI was also here to create a national network of immigrant justice organizers, which has now become an ongoing chat and a series of meetings,\u201d she said.<\/p>\n\n\n\n After I left the convention hall, I wondered if I\u2019d been swept up in the excitement of being among so many hopeful people, all striving, roughly, in the same direction. At the end of the convention, the NYC-DSA choir led the thousand-strong ballroom in song. Delegates stood for \u201cThe Internationale,\u201d some taking their hats off, others waving massive red flags over the crowd. Behind me, a man swayed with his fist held high for the whole song. The singers bounced and smiled as they sang; someone strummed a guitar. But I think there was really something there, behind all the singing.<\/p>\n\n\n\n \u201cThings are starting to feel very real,\u201d Zimmerman said. \u201cI think that\u2019s the vibe at this convention. It really feels like eyes are on us right now, and what we do next as an organization really matters.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n And now delegates have made it back to their home chapters, where the outside world awaits them: Metro DC DSA is organizing<\/a> against Trump\u2019s takeover of their city; NYC-DSA returns to canvas for Mamdani; DSA-LA teaches their ranks to resist ICE.<\/p>\n\n\n\n \u201cPeople always say [DSA] is a big-tent organization,\u201d Zimmerman said, \u201cand that really allows it to be this dynamic thing that is able to adapt to the moment and what people are thinking and needing in the moment. So I think what DSA becomes is really always up for debate.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n Emma Janssen is a writing fellow at The American Prospect, where she reports on anti-poverty policy, health, and political power. Before joining the Prospect, she studied political philosophy at UChicago and worked as an editor and freelancer.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":" Energized by Zohran Mamdani\u2019s primary triumph, 1,200 DSA members came to Chicago to chart the group\u2019s future. BY EMMA JANSSEN AUGUST 14, 2025 (Prospect.org) ZACH CADDY The Democratic Socialists of America meeting in Chicago this month https:\/\/trinitymedia.ai\/player\/trinity-player.php?pageURL=https%3A%2F%2Fprospect.org%2Fpolitics%2F2025-08-14-dsa-convenes-argues-and-celebrates%2F%3Futm_source%3DActiveCampaign%26utm_medium%3Demail%26utm_content%3DDSA%2520Convenes%252C%2520Argues%252C%2520and%2520Celebrates%26utm_campaign%3DDaily%2520Prospect%252008-14-2025&GDPR=%24%24GDPR_MACRO%24%24&GDPR_CONSENT=%24%24GDPR_CONSENT_MACRO%24%24&contentHash=9da0e5f6989f0f025ac9bfe511454f5c4e731de923bcf942c199bcce5ddf1811&unitId=2900001720&userId=a143de11-b5db-4fd1-bdec-b0e6b692767c&isLegacyBrowser=false&isPartitioningSupport=1&version=20250806_0a5cc818db4a5e97910f842e941d2c543416f1d1&useBunnyCDN=0&themeId=140&isMobile=0&unitType=tts-player CHICAGO \u2013 It\u2019s been a tumultuous decade for the Democratic Socialists of America (DSA),… Continue reading The Mamdani Effect<\/strong><\/h3>\n\n\n\n
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<\/p>\n\n\n\nElectoral Philosophy<\/strong><\/h3>\n\n\n\n
Red Lines for Palestine<\/strong><\/h3>\n\n\n\n
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<\/p>\n\n\n\nPublic Struggle<\/strong><\/h3>\n\n\n\n
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<\/p>\n\n\n\nGoing Home<\/strong><\/h3>\n\n\n\n
EMMA JANSSEN<\/a><\/h3>\n\n\n\n