Come What May: Preparing DSA For November 6th

With the election rapidly approaching, DSA must prepare for what happens on November 6th and beyond.

Election Incoming

With just one week to go until the US election, it is important for socialists to think through what will happen if Trump or Harris comes out on top. 

The election continues to be increasingly close, with Trump seeming to have gained ground on Harris over the last few weeks. This was marked especially in the presidential betting markets, widely considered to have some utility in predicting outcomes, which suggested Trump had taken a large lead. However, this discrepancy proved to be the result of just four mega-bets, all possibly from the same source, skewing the odds in Trump’s favor.

The election has also been marked by the increase of billionaire activity on both sides, most notably through Elon Musk’s support for Trump. Musk is spending upwards of $100 million in support of Trump, including by giving away million dollar prizes to voters who sign conservative-leaning petitions aligned with his America PAC. The investment by the world’s richest resident makes sense, considering $100 million is just 0.04 percent of his previously-reported $240 billion net worth, and only 0.29 percent of the $34 billion his wealth increased by in a single day earlier this month. Meanwhile Bill Gates is reported to have quietly contributed $50 million to Harris. While the two candidates are far from identical, the striking commonality of their campaigns in the last week has been the tremendous influence of billionaire money.

DSA Paralyzed

While election day nears, DSA remains paralyzed by division and indecision. 

On the one hand, the moderate caucuses failed to win a tactical endorsement of Kamala Harris at the National Political Committee. Instead, they launched a semi-independent campaign Socialism Beats Fascism which calls for a tactical vote for Harris in swing states, but does not call for a third party vote in safe states.

On the other hand, a large number on the DSA left oppose any endorsement for Harris, in solidarity with the No Votes For Genocide campaign. But these comrades have mainly not called for a vote for Jill Stein or another third party candidate, instead abstaining from the election either as a tactic to pressure Kamala to support an arms embargo, or simply out a moral rejection of Democrats complicity in genocide.

This approach does serve the purpose of giving the anti-war movement a political orientation in the election and has an appeal to the growing sections of society, especially among the youth, who are horrified by the war. But unfortunately, No Votes For Genocide does not provide a bridge from the anti-war movement to the larger layers of who are concerned about other issues like abortion access, favorable labor law, environmental regulation, or blocking the far right.

Somewhere in the middle, Bread and Roses put forward an approach which rejects the No Vote For Genocide approach put forward by MUG, as well as the Socialism Beats Fascism approach but forward by SMC and Groundwork. Instead, they write that “either a protest vote or a tactical vote is a reasonable choice given our miserable options.” 

Rejecting both the approaches of SMC/Groundwork and of MUG, Bread and Roses calls for the promotion of the DSA Workers Deserve More 2024 platform. However, there are no clear actionable steps presented in the article which actually lay out how to promote DSA based on this program.

Our own caucus is divided on the question of what to forward in our public orientation, with some favoring the approach of declining to take a position on how to vote, with others, including this author, supporting the approach of a protest vote for Jill Stein in safe states paired with tactical vote for Harris in swing states. However, we are all in agreement that orientating meaningfully in the election does not mean simply taking this or that position, but rather engaging actively with the public. Whether on the basis of a Jill Stein endorsement or instead focused on the Workers Deserve More platform, we all agree that the point of such a tool is to facilitate active engagement with the public in person.

Although it is now too late to carry out such a plan of action for all of DSA, campaigning on the basis Workers Deserve More in a meaningful way could have meant at the very least one or several national days of action to conduct mass postering and tabling in our communities, with a clear target of recruiting 1,000 or more members to DSA before election day. Strategies mean little if they are not made concrete through proposals for actionable tactics.

It is also worth noting that while Workers Deserve More is surely a powerful tool to engage large layers of the public, its formulations remain semi-reformist. Although it calls for a new constitution where government and industry is run democratically by workers, it confines itself to improving the bourgeois form of democracy, parliamentary elections, rather than a qualitative expansion of democracy based on the direct participation of working people in running all aspects of society through the adoption of the council (soviet) system of government. Furthermore, it does not lay out clearly that a fundamental break with the ruling order — that is, a workers’ revolution — is necessary to achieve worker control of government and industry. 

Overall, this election has perhaps been uniquely paralyzing for DSA. The DSA left has grown strong enough to block direct opportunism, but not strong enough to break with opportunism wholeheartedly. And this vacuum in the middle is not filled with a nuanced and actionable synthesis, but truisms which do not lay out a clear plan of action.

What is clear is that such paralysis will not suffice in the months and years ahead. The future will be profoundly different whether Trump or Harris wins in November – but one thing that will remain true is that DSA needs a clear perspective and strategy in order to intervene forcefully in the upcoming struggles.

If Harris Wins – Breaking With Complacency

It seems that most on the left are expecting Harris to win the election, despite the closeness in the polls. This is quite a different mood than in 2020, when there was a real concern and interest in Biden winning, even on the far left.

If Harris does win, then DSA and the left will face a similar set of problems as were faced under the Biden administration. How do socialists distinguish ourselves from Democrats, resist efforts at cooptation, and build the forces necessary to stand up our own alternative political movement?

The inability of DSA to fully resolve these questions over the last four years is tied closely with the paralysis noted above.

Although these challenges will largely endure, we can expect two major differences. The first is that the Trump threat will likely be substantially diminished, with Trump almost certainly too old to run in 2028. While Trump, the MAGA movement, and Trump’s mark on the Republican Party won’t vanish overnight, it is not clear that a successor would be able to hold the movement together to the same extent as Trump. This will likely lead to a decreased perception of Democrats as a safeguard against the worst of the right wing and open up more breathing space for the left as an alternative.

On the other hand, the Harris administration is likely to be at least somewhat to the right of Joe Biden. Biden is the last of a dying breed of Democrats, a relic from a time before the takeover of the party by the neoliberal, billionaire funded movement; instead, Biden’s politics were forged alongside the post-Watergate liberals. That doesn’t mean Biden has been an opponent of the worst of the Democratic Party – he was long in the pocket of the credit card lobby and is as guilty as any in supporting Clinton’s mass incarceration programs. But in general, Biden is a convener, not an ideological zealot; he prefers to stand comfortably in the political center of the Democratic party. This meant that the impact of the Bernie campaigns and the labor revival were able to pull Biden somewhat to the left in more than just a performative way, leading him to put forward domestic policies which were quite to the left of the Obama administration.

Harris, on the other hand, is much more a prototype of the neoliberal Democrat, a champion of the forces which have largely dominated the party since Bill Clinton and Third Way took power in the 1990s, alongside the cynical appeals to identity of the 2016 Hillary Clinton campaign, with Harris’ past as a cop thrown in for good measure. Harris is tied closely to the forces of Silicon Valley capitalism which dominate the California Democratic Party, including through her brother-in-law Tony West, Uber’s top lawyer and a Democratic Party operator in his own right. Harris has enjoyed the support of high-ranking Democrats since receiving Dianne Feinstein and Nancy Pelosi in her run for California AG in 2010. 

Since taking over for Biden, Harris has tacked to the right, emphasizing support for small businesses over Biden’s more direct support for workers. Earlier this month Branco Marcetic correctly noted in Jacobin that Harris has abandoned most of the progressive proposals which Biden took on to make peace with Bernie voters, jettisoning universal pre-k, free community college, childcare subsidies, and paid leave and keeping only plans to expand Medicare and the child tax credit. Of course, these commitments by Biden were mostly only rhetorical pandering to begin with; but all the more so, that Harris is moving away from even toothless recognition of this platform underlines the extent of her move to the right.

Instead, Harris has increasingly sought to appeal to the crypto lobby, using Mark Cuban as a major surrogate. She has campaigned with the Cheneys and, after a brief period of success running negative against Republicans, refocused her attention on appealing to conservatives through tough on crime and anti-immigration rhetoric and equivocating stances on trans rights. 

In addition to abandoning even pandering to social justice causes and failing to deliver any meaningful improvements for working people, a Harris administration may launch renewed attacks on social programming. The growing debt crisis suggests that sooner or later the US ruling class will be forced into a new austerity offensive, or risk crippling debt payments at a time when it needs dramatic investments to stave off economic and military competition from China.

If Trump Wins – Prepare For Mass Fightback

If Donald Trump wins a second term the focus of DSA and the larger left will shift dramatically. It is very likely that current concerns and campaigns, maybe even the antiwar movement, will be quickly deprioritized if Donald Trump launches aggressive authoritarian actions like a mass deportation of 10 million undocumented residents. The urgency of such a moment would quickly take the air out of any other campaigns.

First, it is not at all clear what a second Donald Trump term would look like. It is possible that Trump will simply aggressively pursue the interests of the billionaire class with only his typical bombastic attitude and consistent pandering to racist and xenophobic elements. 

However, Trump and those around him are signaling that his second term could be quite different than his first (at least before Jan 6) by taking steps which far more directly enter the terrain of authoritarianism. Deputizing local police to help round up, detain, and deport millions of undocumented people would be a dramatic step in this direction. And if this wouldn’t amount to outright fascism, as is probably true, the distinction will mean little to those long-time residents — our neighbors and friends, many of whom know no other country as home — who are ripped from their communities and shipped abroad with little ceremony. 

Trump has also made clear his plans to seek retribution on his Democratic rivals, and also to stack the federal executive with political loyalists at ten times the usual level. For the antiwar movement, the most pressing concern may be whether Trump will make good on his threat to deport “pro Hamas” radicals active on college campuses. On the flip side, however, criticism of US support for Israel may broaden to include the more moderate liberal layers of society if it comes to be seen as a policy tied to Trump.

The Supreme Court has made clear that any actions Trump takes that are “official acts” are legal. This suggests that the only barrier to Trump’s actions will be his own strategic thinking and self-control. The question our theorists must consider in order to predict, to the extent possible, Trump’s potential escalation of authoritarianism is this: to what extent does increased authoritarianism help secure the interests of the ruling class and/or Trump’s personal interests?

It is not a guarantee that there will be a widespread mood for immediate fight back following a Trump victory. It is possible that a wide section of the progressive left will feel profoundly demoralized and even scared. If Trump wins, there will immediately be a large degree of fear-mongering about what a second Trump term will bring, and not all of these fears will be baseless.

The more that DSA can intervene in the anti-Trump movement in a unified manner with a clear and bold message calling for militant struggle and the building of a long term alternative, the quicker can the progressive forces be aligned to build the strongest possible resistance against Trumps attacks.

However, there will likely be both an increased appetite for and heightened risk of engaging in adventurism, black bloc tactics, civil disobedience, and other forms of illegal action. Some sections of the left and the youth, without a clear and productive political alternative, will likely take to these tactics whether or not they are the most strategic options available. Trump will likely seek out any rioting or violence both to score political points and to bring down repression on the leadership of the anti-Trump resistance. Even relatively minor civil cases, if widespread, could seriously hurt DSA’s resources and distract and demoralize our activists.

It cannot be entirely ruled out that Trump could pursue repression against DSA as a whole. There are no serious legal obstacles to such an action, and if DSA does coalesce as the main center for resistance to Trump, it would obviously be in Trump’s interest to neutralize our efforts. We are of course totally unprepared to face serious repression or to operate in an underground fashion. If Trump does win, we must soberly consider these risks and, based on a realistic approach which neither over-estimates nor under-estimates the danger of repression, quickly think through plans and contingencies for operating in a radically harsher political environment.

What Happens On November 6th

The results of the election may not be obvious right away.

As we wait for results, DSA should be prepared to take to the streets in defense of democracy in case there is some serious provocation which undermines the legitimacy of the results, or if there are right wing mobilizations which need to be actively countered.

If Trump does win, there may be a mood for mass anti-Trump demonstrations right away. If DSA’s national leadership reads the mood correctly and acts with authority, it can have a meaningful organizational and political role in shaping this struggle.

If Harris wins, we should channel the same urgency to strategize internally from election day to inauguration day on how we can escalate our challenge to the corporate Democrats and their genocide-enabling administration.

Either way, paralysis is not an option. It is time for action.

Photo Credit:

• Featured: Photo by Wendy Maxwell: