Twin Cities DSA Statement on the 2022 Election

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FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE 

November 10, 2022

Contact: steering@twincitiesdsa.org

We want to start by congratulating our TCDSA-endorsed candidates: Zaynab Mohamed, Omar Fateh, Samantha Sencer-Mura, Athena Hollins, Mai Chong Xiong, and Aaron Wagner all won their elections! They and all of the dedicated folks who made their victories possible should be proud of the organizing they’ve done. Each of them across Minneapolis, Saint Paul, and Robbinsdale join over 100 DSA-affiliated officials who won races across the U.S. — from Los Angeles and New York to Duluth, Milwaukee, Denver, and more. Their victories are a sign of the mounting passion and determination across the nation to build a movement that transforms society by centering working class people. But we can’t be complacent. 

The fact that all expectations indicated that conservatives were headed to a sweeping victory is something we can’t ignore. Despite our gains, we remain poorly equipped to combat the white supremacist and fascist forces that threaten us all. We see a Republican Party with the capacity and intent to continue their assault on hard-won rights and demolish the last vestiges of the New Deal’s social safety net. We see the inadequacy of a Democratic Party nationally that — instead of fighting hard for measures that would address inflation and improve people’s lives, such as price controls on basic needs and taxes on the wealthy and corporations — is beholden to billionaire donors and unable to push back. This leaves our democracy vulnerable and positions the Republican party to demonize working people and marginalized communities while rolling back our civil liberties. 

Despite gaining control of the State Senate in Minnesota, the response of DFL leadership has not been to fully commit to delivering for everyday people, but that they need to be tempered, that people gave them a directive to compromise. A disaster was averted on Tuesday because people recognize the danger we are in and are demanding action. The conservative movement is organized, and as we see with the Supreme Court, they know how to use the structures of power to their advantage. Tuesday night showed us that “business as usual” is insufficient for stemming the conservative assault. 

Crucial to Tuesday’s push-back were efforts by a movement with the potential to save and transform both our democracy and our society. Across the country, workers are waking up. In less than a year, thousands of employees at over 250 Starbucks locations have voted to unionize to improve their working conditions and gain a say on the job. Crushing working conditions across industries are pushing workers — from baristas and warehouse workers, to nurses, railroad workers, and educators — to demand better. Long-established unions are fielding grassroots demands for reform and action from their membership and the resurgence of the labor movement should give us all hope that progress is possible — if we organize.

Because there is no shortcut to building that better world, and for all the importance of elections, the day after an election is not when the work ends. The narrow victories of this election cycle must be — and are — a wake-up call. Twin Cities Democratic Socialists of America is committed to strengthening and broadening people’s sense of power and potential both in and beyond elections. We stand with multi-racial working class organizers in the work of empowering average Americans, as workers in every industry demand a voice, demand their worth, and demand power both in their workplace and in society.

Join us in this fight and the work to improve people’s lives, to reduce the power of the ruling class to divide and control us, and to enable everyone to play a part in building the just world we all are seeking.

– Twin Cities DSA Steering Committee