Dear David,

The Democratic Party is a party of the billionaires and war. How else can we explain their decision to force the longest government shutdown in history, with dire consequences for federal public-sector workers and millions of poor people, and gain absolutely NOTHING for us? They held the shutdown just long enough for the 2025 elections to get done, to win some electoral battles against Trump. Then they picked a group of Democratic Senators who are either retiring or are not up for re-election in 2026 to be the ones to vote to allow the Affordable Care Act (ACA) subsidies to expire, which will cause working people's healthcare premiums to skyrocket.

The Democratic Party had multiple chances to make the ACA tax credits permanent when they had Biden in the White House and a majority in both the House and the Senate. They could have voted in Medicare for All, but they didn't because they represent the billionaires and multimillionaires and the health insurance industry.

This shutdown sellout of our healthcare comes at a time when Zohran Mamdani’s victory in the New York City Mayoral election shows that working people support working-class demands to address our basic needs, like the demands that Mamdani brought up in his campaign: rent freeze, and universal childcare and free public transit funded by taxing the rich. It's notable that Mamdani won with a campaign focusing on these core demands, while other progressive candidates from the Democratic Party, like Omar Fateh in Minneapolis, did not have a focus on clear working-class demands. This should be a lesson to anyone who intends to be a fighter for working people and oppressed communities: it is not a winning strategy to shy away from publicly raising big proposals to address people's basic needs.

This is exactly what Congressional Democrats did NOT do in the shutdown fight over working people's health insurance costs and Medicaid funding. Democrats could have forced a war on the health insurance industry, putting forward demands to tax the rich to fund free healthcare for all. Instead, not only did the Democrats do nothing for universal healthcare, they even sold us out on ACA subsidies and Medicaid funding.

Mamdani's election also brings up crucial questions of strategy for the working class. How should elected representatives use their positions in order to win working-class victories? In 2018, AOC was elected as a Democrat to the U.S. Congress based on extremely popular and crucial working-class demands like Medicare for All, a Green New Deal, and a national $15/hour minimum wage. However, since then, AOC has repeatedly refused to build any kind of fightback to win any of the demands she ran on. Likewise, Bernie Sanders ran for President on similar demands, including taxing Wall Street to fund free higher education, and called for a political revolution against the billionaire class. Instead of using their elected office to build any mass movements and posing a threat to both the Democratic and Republican parties, AOC and Sanders have abandoned working-class people and completely capitulated to the pro-wealthy agenda of the Democratic Party.

Throughout his campaign, Mamdani has met with numerous corporate executives and wealthy elites from Wall Street and other big industries, reassuring them about his plans. His priority has been to seek “partnership” with politicians like New York Governor Kathy Hochul, who has made it clear that she is opposed to any increased taxes on the rich. He is making these overtures to the establishment rather than what Kshama Sawant, the founder of Workers Strike Back, did when she was the lone socialist on the Seattle City Council — build mass movements of working people to go to war against the rich to win for working people.

Come out TOMORROW in Seattle to discuss and hear from Kshama and others who helped win historic victories, such as the nation's highest minimum wage. Both the Democratic and Republican parties have backed the genocide in Gaza for two years, and both are parties of the billionaire class that carry out vicious attacks on working people all around the U.S. and internationally. The huge anger at both parties creates a historic opening for working-class struggle, and the potential for breakthrough victories. Let's discuss the results, and talk about next steps to build our independent movement of working people in the fight against the rich.

Although I have my own opinions about the best strategy and tactics of resistance, I have no interest in denigrating other ideas for concerted action. For whatever it is worth, my opinion is that people should make direct demands to the current "leadership" of our government. We need to back that up with direct action, starting with marches and rallies and such, and escalating to non-violent civil disobedience echoing the tactics of Ghandi and King.

Sawant and her organization are not avoiding the electoral process, but it is fair to surmise that she expects to be a lonely voice in Congress if she wins and direct action will be necessary.

I intend to keep an open mind about tactics, because unity is a necessity.