Enjoy your December Dispatch. Read on to get involved. And stay tuned for details on our upcoming railroad strike strategy call! Details will be on our calendar soon. To make sure you get our newsletters in your inbox, sign up here! Each one features action alerts, upcoming events, political education, and more.

• From Maria — Reflecting on the Year
• Saturday 12/10 — Join Author Olúfẹ́mi O. Táíwò for Multiracial Organizing and Identity Politics Call
• RSVP for Learning from bell hooks Call Thursday 12/15
• Socialist Forum Fall 2022 Issue Out Now!
• Sign Up for Our Democratic Left Newsletter
• Welcome New Chapters and Organizing Committees

From Maria — Reflecting on the Year

How do we measure success? By our wins, yes. But I also measure success by survival.

Three years ago COVID changed our lives forever. I’m not sure we’ve all fully reckoned with that. Comrades and family have passed, millions have debilitating long COVID, and the owning class has forced us to continue working (without universal healthcare). The physical and emotional toll is deep.

Yet as we draw close to the winter solstice and the new year, I’m incredibly grateful to have DSA and incredibly proud of you and everything we’ve done together in 2022. To name just a few:

• Our spring recommitment drive built chapter capacity to engage and recruit members for our work.
• Our nationwide Roe rapid response and subsequent organizing in Kansas, Kentucky and Montana helped protect abortion in red states.  
• Our cross-chapter Green New Deal work brought us within striking distance of making the New York state grids renewable and publicly owned.
• Our Labor Solidarity Fund strengthened already strong workplace and solidarity organizing from Starbucks to the logistics sector.
• Our first Multiracial Organizing Committee Institute brought together 39 participants and facilitators from around the country to deepen our multiracial organizing.
• Our National Electoral support supercharged local campaigns in primaries and the general election, so we had a bigger red wave than the GOP in November.
• And we close the year after Regional Organizing Retreats in Las Vegas, Washington D.C., Cleveland and Atlanta brought together 100+ chapter leaders to rebuild and form new in-person relationships, train on key organizing skills, and share strategies and lessons to build the mass movement we need to win against the owning class.

Some organizations didn’t make it through the pandemic, but we’re still here to keep fighting. DSA’s collective action and community with purpose is something to celebrate.

You give me hope for the future.

In solidarity,

Maria Svart
DSA National Director

Saturday 12/10 — Join Author Olúfẹ́mi O. Táíwò for Multiracial Organizing and Identity Politics Call

Join DSA’s Multiracial Organizing Committee (MROC) for a conversation with Olúfẹ́mi O. Táíwò, author of Elite Capture and Reconsidering Reparations, Associate Professor at Georgetown University, and member of Metro DC DSA and Pan-African Community Action.

The call will be held on Saturday 12/10 at 2pm ET/1pm CT/12pm MT/11am PT. RSVP today! Together with Táíwò, we’ll discuss identity politics and the horizon for building mass, multiracial, socialist political space and movements.

RSVP for Learning from bell hooks Call Thursday 12/15

bell hooks gifted us innumerable ideas and convictions with which we might organize and build an anti-racist, anti-capitalist, and anti-patriarchal world.

One year after her passing, join the Religion and Socialism Working group as we revisit hooks’ valuable legacy for organizers today, paying special attention to the forms of religious and spiritual wisdom that appeared in her thought.

This teach-in/memorial will be held on Thursday 12/15 at 8pm ET/7pm CT/6pm MT/5pm PT. Join us! The call will feature a range of panelists drawing on various elements of hooks’ teachings, and will include plenty of time for Q&A and open discussion.

Socialist Forum Fall 2022 Issue Out Now!

The Fall 2022 issue of DSA’s Socialist Forum is now live! The new issue features ten articles covering a range of topics, from the recent national DSA Recommitment Drive, to the practice of labor internationalism, to one DSA member’s struggles with navigating America’s inefficient and confusing disability program. As always, members are encouraged to submit responses to any of our articles at [email protected].

Sign Up for Our Democratic Left Newsletter

Sign up to receive Democratic Left in your inbox to see fellow DSA members’ perspectives on current events and stay up to date on what chapters are doing across the country.

Welcome New Chapters and Organizing Committees

A warm welcome to our newest chapter and Organizing Committees!

New chapter:

• Frederick DSA (Maryland)

New Organizing Committees: 

• DSA Salina (Kansas)
• Yakima DSA (Washington)