Seattle DSA votes to shut down debate on Kshama Sawant’s independent socialist campaign
The Seattle chapter of the Democratic Socialists of America (DSA) has voted 91-67 against allowing even a debate on endorsing Kshama Sawant’s independent socialist campaign for Congress. The vote happened following a “debate” at the Seattle DSA convention on March 21, during which only six people were allowed to speak and local leadership came out heavily against.
This is yet another example of DSA refusing to challenge powerful Democrats, despite reaching a record membership of 100,000 earlier this year.
In November, DSA members in New York voted not to endorse DSA member Chi Ossé, who was running against Democratic Party leader Hakeem Jeffries in the party’s primary. NYC Mayor (and DSA member) Zohran Mamdani subsequently endorsed Hakeem Jeffries.
Like Chi Ossé, Kshama Sawant is running against one of the most powerful Democrats in Congress. Her opponent, Adam Smith, has taken over $1 million from AIPAC and the Zionist lobby. He is the ranking Democrat on the House Armed Services Committee, which drafts the $1 trillion military budget and sent tens of billions to fund the genocide in Gaza.
At the same convention where DSA members rejected an endorsement for Kshama’s campaign, they voted to endorse Jaelynn Scott, a Democratic candidate for State House, after strong urging from the local leadership.
Scott will be yet another Democratic Party politician. She has already employed a consulting firm named Upper Left Strategies for her campaign, which consults corporate Democrats like AIPAC-backed Congresswoman Marilyn Strickland.
Socialists need to be open about our disagreements, but we can’t let those disagreements get in the way of efforts that can advance the workers’ movement. The attempt to block Kshama’s campaign fundamentally represents an attempt by DSA leadership and the most conservative section of the organization to save their relationship with the Democratic Party.
If DSA continues to cling to the Democrats, it will do enormous damage to the socialist movement. It will also demoralize the organization’s own membership.
This demoralization has already set in. Seattle DSA has over 2,000 members on paper, yet not even 160 of them participated in the convention — less than 10 percent.
To reverse course, socialists — including the 67 DSA members who voted against this decision, and the hundreds of others who disagree — need to get organized together to challenge the status quo in DSA and the socialist movement. We need to break from the Democrats and build a socialist party.