Centrists Fear Socialist Wins in Swing States Will Lead to a DSA President in 2028

As incredibly encouraging as it is to see so many electoral victories for socialists and socialist adjacent leftists, I don't think we should be arrogant enough to conclude that we're unstoppable because obviously that is not the case. Now, don't get me wrong, we should be proud of the progress that we've made because the progress that we've already made has been genuinely shocking. A poll conducted by SSRS found that a third of democratic voters already identify as democratic socialists. And this trend is being driven primarily by younger people. But that doesn't necessarily mean that socialism is the future or is inevitable obviously because trends change. And my expectation is that things are only going to get more difficult for us here on out. especially because the establishment is already [ __ ] their pants about the prospect of a socialist becoming president in 2028. So, I wish I had the confidence in our ability to win as they do. But, I'm going to be cautiously optimistic because things can change and we do live in a latestage capitalist hellscape after all. But the reason why I'm not going to be overly confident or the reason why I'm less confident than they are, we'll say, is because these people are not just going to let us steamroll them. The New York Times reports that Third Way, the right-wing flank of the Democratic party, vowed to spend $15 million to discredit the DSA movement between now and 2028 because they fear that Dr. Elsa is paving a path for a progressive to seize the party's presidential nomination in 2028 and then go on to lose the general election. Now, Jonathan Cowan, the president of Third Way, says it is deeply troubling to see radical far-left candidates winning in places that are potentially presidential swing states. Now, to be clear, their fear isn't that a socialist or progressive would lose a presidential election. Their fear is that they'd win because they've made it abundantly clear that that is the worstc case scenario. They prefer fascism to socialism. Literally. I say this because as the Times explains, Cowan said that the effort would include opposition research into DSA polling, social media programs, whatever that means, and educating democratic activists and leaders. It would target both proud Democratic socialists and those such as Dr. Elsed, whom he derided as performing the DSA dodge, flirting with the Democratic socialists enough to get their organizing manpower and support while remaining distant enough to avoid the explicit label. They add how this discrediting campaign will affect the current midterm cycle, potentially undercutting Democratic nominees in swing state races and undermining the party's chances of retaking Congress remains unclear. So, it's easy to see what's happening. It's an act of self- sabotage. These are conservative Democrats spending money not to elect more Democrats, but to make progressive Democrats lose so they can blame a potentially negative outcome in the midterms on the left. This is the calculation that they're making. Lose the midterm election to snuff out this movement in its crib in order to better position a moderate to win the Democratic party primary for the presidential race in 2028. And I don't think it's hyperbole to call these Democrats fascist collaborators because that's exactly what they're doing. At a time when authoritarianism and fascism has taken control of our entire government, these people are focused on bolstering the narrative that it's actually the left who's gone too far, not the far-right extremists who are in control of everything. Anyone who contributes to this particular narrative, and I mean anyone, is a useful [ __ ] idiot for fascism, period. But to be real, $15 million isn't really that much in the grand scheme of things, especially considering how we already have millions and millions being spent against us by Apac and, you know, corporate lobbies. So 15 million over two years is chump change comparatively speaking. But this story speaks to how terrified they truly are. Because if AOC or Roana can win the Democratic nomination in 2028, then it's game set match for the moderate wing of the party, at least in the short term, the left gains control of the party apparatus. It gains control of party operations within the DNC. And more importantly, it gains control of the money faucet. and moderates probably fear that the left would marginalize and sideline them in the same way that they marginalized and sidelined the left. Hence why they're trying to team up with fascists to stop the left from ascending because to them a short-term electoral loss in the midterms is preferable to an alternative situation where the left actually has some real power within the Democratic party. But I say all this to say that they're not just going to stand back and let us crush them. They're not going to allow themselves to be steamrolled. And that's the point that I really want to drive home with this video. If they can't defeat the left by running moderate candidates with the message to compete with what we're pitching to voters, then they're going to find different ways to undermine the movement. And when they have the entire political establishment and capital, every corporation, foreign governments and Republicans on their side, they're going to be able to concoct a bunch of different ways to rat [ __ ] the left out of power. I mean, all we have to do is look to the past to see the types of strategies deployed against the left that crushed the left. They worked. There was Cointelpel Pro, a covert initiative initiated by the Federal Bureau of Investigation in 1956 aimed at surveilling, infiltrating, and disrupting various political organizations deemed radical in the United States. Initially, they focused on the Communist Party. The program expanded throughout the 1960s to include a range of groups such as the Black Panther Party, civil rights organizations, feminist groups, and various anti-war factions. Cointel Pro employed a variety of controversial tactics, including misinformation, illegal break-ins, and harassment to discredit and undermine these organizations and their leaders. Now, as many of you know, organizers like Fred Hampton, the chairman of the Chicago chapter of the Black Panthers Party, was assassinated by the FBI after he managed to bring together a working-class coalition of people across racial lines. Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. was spied on everywhere that he went. His hotel rooms were even bugged. And in an effort to splinter the movement, the FBI actually sent him an anonymous letter pretending to be a black man who called Dr. Martin Luther King a fraud and told him to kill himself because his movement was supposedly hurting black people. And in a book by Aaron Leonard and Connor Gallagher called a threat of the first magnitude, they explain at length how FBI informants actually managed to gain leadership roles in the Black Panthers in the Communist Party as well as the Revolutionary Union all throughout the 1960s and 1970s. And things haven't really changed that much since the days of Cointelp Pro. Trump's McCarthyist NSPM7 is treating all of his political opponents on the left and in the center, mind you, as potential terrorist suspects in a blatant attempt to crush all of his political opposition. But a key difference from the Cointtail Proday is that leftist organizing now isn't as strong as it was back then. Thankfully, that is starting to change, but there's a lot less political and labor organizations now that the intelligence apparatus is able to infiltrate because I mean, let's face it, we're all kind of in our own digital little bubbles and we just don't really talk to each other in the real world anymore. But that doesn't mean that they're not able to still divide and conquer because you can bet your ass they've adapted to the digital age. And this Tik Tocker gave us an example of clever new ways that the establishment is going to try to splinter the left. Castro's in for the surprise of his life when he tries signing something with my poison pen. Well, what have Palestinians done for the Black Lives Matter movement? >> And it's a humorous example, but we've all seen this kind of [ __ ] online from bot accounts who are deliberately trying to drive a wedge between groups to pit people against each other. How many of my queer viewers have been told that they shouldn't support Palestine because if they went to Gaza, they'd be thrown off a roof? I've heard that like three or four times. Now, not everyone who parrots that line of horseshit is some secret CIA or FBI plant, but I think that we need to be mindful of a deliberate attempt to destroy solidarity among regular people, especially now that the progressive left is fostering solidarity across diverse groups of people again. And my goal isn't to scare people or conspiracy monger. The takeaway is that we all just need to be a lot more savvy going forward because the establishment isn't just going to be like, "Oh, well, shucks. we lost another election to the socialists. We'll just have to try again. They're not going to do that. Okay? They're not going to play by the same set of rules that we play by. They're going to engage in subtuge and rat [ __ ] to stop us by all means necessary. That doesn't mean that we put up walls and express skepticism towards everyone. It just means that we have to recalibrate our [ __ ] detectors a little bit. If a large anti-left account like DSA Watch, for example, just comes out of nowhere and gains 176,000 followers on Twitter, even though its account was only created in June, perhaps we question whether or not there's money or some sort of intelligence apparatus behind that particular account. That doesn't mean that we should engage in bad jacketing and start accusing each other of being spies. It just means that we make mental notes of certain things and be more cautious. We don't just tweet out everything that we're thinking these days because odds are there is somebody that's watching. Big brother is always watching and I need to take my own advice because sometimes I uh I meme a little bit too close to the sun and I say things that could be used against me. Not in the court of law per se, but just to discredit the movement which I'm a part of. Now, here's another example. If somebody like David Axelrod is defending us on CNN all of a sudden and pretending to be an ally, maybe we should question whether or not he's offering the advice he's offering us in good faith because he tweeted, "It would be good for Abdul Elsa if Francesca Hong loses her bid to become the Democratic nominee in Wisconsin next week. He is a serious person. She is a font of zany liberal faculty lounge exotica." But the Republicans hoping to deflect attention from an unpopular pus who hangs from them like an anchor would surely try and link Abdul and Hong as philosophical kin. So this is suspicious as [ __ ] and it's not unreasonable to question whether or not he has ulterior motives because he has never been an ally to the left. And all of a sudden I don't think that him offering us this advice is being done in good faith. and we're going to come across a lot of fake friends like this who conspicuously get on board with a cause or a candidate and then suddenly start to make us draw arbitrary lines. That right there is conspicuous. That right there needs to be sused out. Like this is somebody who you should not trust. Now whether it's deliberate or not, it's still an attempt to divide the left and we should reject that. Another thing to look out for is candidates who just kind of come out of nowhere who try to represent the movement even though we don't really know much about them. If they don't have a history as an organizer or in labor and there's not even a record on social media of them professing their leftist ideals, that doesn't necessarily mean that they can't be part of the movement. But it does mean that we're going to need to have some additional evidence that they are who they say they are. They're going to need to acquire some bonafides if they want to be representatives of the movement they're all of a sudden claiming that they want to be a part of. And this is especially important these days because Apac was buying ads on behalf of anti-ionist progressives in an effort to get the left to split votes in the ninth congressional district of Illinois. This was Kat Abu Gazelle's race. And it worked. They were calling Bushra Amiwala, who was also a progressive running in the same race that Kat Abu Gazella was running in, somebody that was a progressive champion who supported Medicare for all. Apac doesn't give a [ __ ] about Medicare for all, but their goal was to split the votes between leftists. So, if they can do that and if they're doing this already, it wouldn't also be beneath them or any other corporate pack to hire someone to just run as a progressive in a particular race where you see a DSA backed candidate gaining steam so that way they can split the votes between the left and pave the way for a moderate victory. It's deceitful, but like it's not illegal for them to do something scummy like this, right? So, if they have the ability to do this, they will do it. That's all I'm saying. Which is why I think we really need to get better at properly vetting every single candidate that we come across. And more importantly, we take red flags seriously. And look, I hate to beat a dead horse, but if a candidate comes along and we don't really know much about them, but we do know that they have a Nazi tattoo and they used to work for Blackwater, I think that we should exercise more caution in the future. Now, I'm not saying that Graham Platiner was an OP. Maybe he sincerely did change aside from the rape that he did, but like maybe he thought he was progressive. Simply saying that we need to end the genocide and that you support Medicare for all is not sufficient anymore. Okay, candidates are going to get more savvy. They're going to want power and that's all that they care about and they're going to say what we want to hear. We need to make them prove themselves before they become leaders of the movement. That's all that I'm saying. But even if you are a movement leader, it doesn't mean that you're infallible. You can [ __ ] up, too. So, we also have to know when to cut our losses, at least temporarily. For example, William Lawrence, the co-founder of the Sunrise Movement, who just won his primary on Tuesday, already pivoted away from the DSA. >> When did you leave the Democratic Socialist of America? >> It was within the last month I let my membership lapse. I've got a lot of respect for DSA um and the work that they're doing around the country, but uh I've felt a need to make it very clear that uh the platform we're running on here is the one that has um come up uh based on the conversations we're having across the seventh district. >> So, did you let that membership expire because of the general election? >> No, it's just because I want to make clear to my constituents that I'm here to represent them. Now, he's very clearly doing this because he's running in a swing district that Donald Trump won and he is afraid that his DSA affiliation is going to bring him down in the general. So, some might think that the strategy is logical, but quite frankly, the opposite is true because as Charlotte explains, Republicans are still going to call him a socialist, but now he's just not going to get any of the benefits that come with being a socialist. Meaning, he's not going to get the organizational support that comes with their endorsement. And DSA members who helped him get elected might feel betrayed. And voters across the political spectrum, regardless if they're DSA or not, are going to view what he did there as dishonest. Because if you're able to get elected and then you immediately shapeshift like that after winning your primary, people are going to think, okay, this guy is just an opportunist. He's just seeking power. And it also doesn't help that William Lawrence once said that he wouldn't support Hakee Jeff as speaker, but he also changed his tune with regard to that as well. >> And one of the members of the Congressional Black Caucus is Hakee Jeff. Have you spoken with him since you won? Do you plan to vote for him to be the next speaker of the house? >> I do plan to vote for him to be the next speaker and I look forward to speaking with him soon. >> Jesus Christ. Now, to be fair, I fully expect every single socialist that was just elected to fall in line and vote for Hakee Jeff. As nauseating as it is to see them do that, I fully expect it. But you gain nothing by giving up your leverage before you even [ __ ] talk to him. at least have a conversation with him and get him to promise you a particular committee assignment or a vote on some bill before you kiss his ring. But now he could just sideline you because you already fell in line before getting anything in return. And I'm not saying that this guy is going to be the next Julie Gonzalez or Shri Tanadar. But I've already seen enough to say peace out. I wish you luck in the general. I hope you win, but you're on your own. the money and resources that we'd otherwise use on you can go elsewhere because we simply have seen enough to conclude that you're at least an opportunist. I hope that you really are as progressive as you say you are, but this immediate pivot is a really bad look and it fments a lot of distrust. Now, I'm going to contradict what I said because even though I think that it's reasonable to have a healthy dose of skepticism towards new candidates, it doesn't mean that we should be overly cynical and purify ourselves into oblivion because I don't think that that would be wise. We really have to do a balancing act, right? Find the right balance between skepticism and offering allies grace. And I think that we should air on the side of being more charitable because even though I said what I said about William Lawrence just now, I think that we should try to do our best to be graceful where we can. For example, Mad Curios was criticized by journalist Sana Sahed for an interview that she did with PBS where she said that her biggest concern was how Israel was losing support across the political spectrum, which is obviously a very bad thing to say if you ran on your opposition to Israel. But thankfully, she responded to criticism by admitting that she [ __ ] up, writing, I fumbled this line, plain and simple. To be clear, my foreign policy priority is ending Israel's occupation, apartheid, and genocide in Palestine. I also reject the notion that anti-ionism is anti-semitism and it's important that we distinguish the two in order to combat actual anti-semitism. She later says, "I was being asked about rising anti-semitism in this interview and I was trying to say that my concern is while voters across the political spectrum wake up to Israel's atrocities and our government's complicity in it. The Democratic Party is failing to meet this moment. And when the party refuses to lead morally on this issue, they are letting anti-semmites on the right co-opt the movement for Palestinian liberation. while giving fodder to Apac talking points. But Sana is right. A movement for liberation must center the Palestinians being oppressed, occupied, and systematically exterminated. And the Islamophobia and anti-Palestinian racism used to justify genocide is too often ignored. And that's enough for me. I think sometimes we need to take yes for an answer. And that right there was phenomenal. We have to acknowledge that nobody's perfect. And I think that these candidates deserve time to learn and grow. and you know, understand just from a human perspective, these kinds of interviews are very intimidating if you've never done them before. So, I think that everybody needs a little bit of time to adjust to being in the public spotlight because it is a very weird thing for a human to experience. Now, I would extend that same level of grace to William Lawrence if he came out and said that he was a little too hasty in making his general election pivot and he was just trying to make sure that he wasn't alienating voters who would be turned off by the DSA. Like I'm fine letting people grow and giving them space to [ __ ] up and learn from their mistakes. Like even though I'll never not be critical of politicians because that's my job. Part of us growing and insulating ourselves from subversion is just not automatically going on the defensive every single time, especially if we see a headline about one of our own that seems a little bit suspicious. For example, politics and poll tracker tweeted Bernie Sanders to pod save America on whether he'll endorse Franchesca Hong for Wisconsin governor. I don't think so. Now, if you see this headline, you would think that Bernie Sanders is being a little bit [ __ ] and deliberately snubbing Hong, but when you get the full context, that's not necessarily the case. >> I noticed um you haven't yet endorsed in the Wisconsin governor's race. Uh what's your thinking there? And and might you endorse or >> I don't think so. I met Francesca a couple of years ago. I was in Wisconsin uh and she seems very very nice. But again, this is a race I just am not that familiar with. We have not gotten involved in many governor's races. I think we did one in Maine with Troy Jackson. You know, obviously my major concern right now is seeing that we have a Senate and a House uh that is going to stand up to Trump. That's really where my focus is. So, as of now, we have not been involved in that race. >> Now, to be clear, I think he's making a mistake. It doesn't take much to offer an endorsement. You don't have to stump for her. Just give her your credibility. That's the bare minimum. But it's very clearly not the disc that you expected it to be based on the framing from that account. And I don't want people to think that I'm putting on a tinfoil hat and assuming that every single comment uttered about the movement is in bad faith by somebody who's not part of it as some sort of, you know, attempt to divide us because that's not always going to be the case. But just be cognizant of the things people say and the motivations behind them. Social media accounts in particular would love to publish salacious headlines about leftist infighting because that would get clicks. But we need to not be so quick to take the bait. And I'm trying to take my own advice here too. Like if you see a headline about AOC or Daria Alisa that makes it seem like they're betraying their principles in the movement, all I'm asking is that we go one step further and we read the article to get the full context before jumping to conclusions because we don't want to attack each other if it's not warranted. All right? Because we owe that to our allies. But on the other hand, that doesn't mean that we should refrain from criticizing each other because I think it's important that we do hold each other accountable. So, I'm kind of contradicting myself again, and it kind of speaks to the balancing act that we have to do. But I think that there's a real difference between constructive criticism and destructive criticism. Hassan, for example, offered a better way for Franchesca Hong to respond to her old tweet about wanting to cancel Thanksgiving that the media is currently beating her over the head with. He says, "I love Fran. This was an opportunity to turn this back on how Thanksgiving is about to be unaffordable due to Trump's wars." And I think that that's really good advice. Social media has conditioned us to just call people dumb [ __ ] if they say something that isn't necessarily savvy or politically astute. But I think that especially when it comes to our allies, we need to be more constructive in our feedback. And on Pod Save America, Bernie Sanders, he was asked about some of the more extreme positions of the DSA like defund the police. But he offered a very norm friendly approach where he basically said defund the police without defunding the police. He said, you know, rather than defunding the police, I want to divert resources into mental health and elsewhere so the police aren't forced to be pseudo social workers. I'm paraphrasing, but like basically he said, I don't support defund the police, but the policy prescription he offered was effectively defunding the police. That's great. Zoron also spun the same policy as pro police by saying, "Look, it's really unfair to overburden police with so much work when social workers should be the ones to respond to mental health health crisis and housing should be how we respond to homelessness." Like, police have too much on their plate. They don't have to police everything. We don't have to criminalize everything in society. We can shorten the burden that they already feel by, you know, expanding our repertoire of responses to societal issues. And I think that's the kind of things that we need to come up with. And uh that's how we're going to grow. We're not going to be able to focus group test certain slogans. Okay? It's got to be a group project. And that means that we're going to have to get comfortable with constructive criticism even if we feel strongly about a particular approach. Like accepting criticism is going to be how we grow and become more savvy because if we stop viewing every little thing as an attack, then I think that makes us much more stronger in the long run. But please don't assume that like I view myself as some sort of oracle of wisdom because I'm not an oracle of wisdom. Just because I have a platform doesn't mean that I know more than the average person. Okay? I'm just as liable as anyone else to get duped by propaganda. I'm not insulated from, you know, all the things that I'm talking about because I'm bringing them to your attention. Like I just want people to know that if the establishment thinks that a socialist presidential candidate is a possibility in 2028, they are gearing up to rat [ __ ] us like they have never ratfucked us before. We're about to see something that we've never seen in the modern era. And that is a campaign of subturfuge to divide and conquer the left. And I'm not creative enough, nobody is, to anticipate all of the innovative new ways they're going to try to crush the movement. But I'm confident that they are going to try as hard as they can to do just that. So that means we've got to wise up and be capable of adapting if we want to solidify our place in American politics.