Winds in the East: The Fall of the Two-Party System
NYC
Seattle
LA
DC
Some of America's largest cities are embracing Democratic Socialists as their Mayors. Cities on both the East and West coast are electing leaders from the DSA.
Mamdani is absolutely killing it in New York City, honoring his promises with an impressive first hundred days.
Katie Wilson won the mayoral race in Seattle last year as well.
Janees Lewis won the Democrat primary in the District of Columbia, despite Trump's threats to take over the city if she wins. DC has maintained its current council structure since the 70's and not once since then has a Republican won the office of Mayor. So it seems Lewis will almost certainly be the next mayor of our nation's capital.
The Mayoral race in Los Angeles is non-partisan. The incumbent Karen Bass will face off against Nithya Raman in the general later this year since no candidate won 50% of the primary vote.
These are high-visibility positions, and I can only imagine how many DSA members are serving in lower-visibility positions.
The Green Party is another anti-capitalist party, and they've got members holding at least 159 seats across the country; mostly city councils and local boards (school, library, township, etc.). I'm not sure if this is a new phenomenon or something that has just quietly been the case for a long time. Either way, it's invigorating to find hundreds of people in elected positions who share my anti-capitalist values. I really appreciate the depth and specificity of the Green Party platform. And I have more hope than I used to about the prospect of defeating the two-party system America has clung to for centuries. I'm hearing more people talk about Proportional Representation, (something most other democracies in the world have embraced, leaving the US in the dust) which would require a degree of electoral reform that could widen the field for other parties substantially. I've even been able to advocate for such reform in an article I wrote recently, hopefully to be published by GovTrack soon.
Ten years ago, Socialism was a dirty word. A mainstream politician would hardly dare utter the sound. In many spaces it still is, but it's gaining traction. Socialist policies are becoming more tenable, more widely accepted. The word Socialism doesn't have quite the same fear-mongering bite in many spaces. People are beginning to realize (if they hadn't already) that the rich and powerful aren't acting in their interest, and that standing up for the common good is standing up for their own interest as well. The socialist fight is for the working class, and the working class is waking up to their power. Really, I think a lot of people have been aware of the rich's abuses for a long time, but many were doubtful that anything could be done about it—skeptical that anything they could do would make a difference. I think that's changing. I feel a shift in the air, tickling my skin. It feels good to allow myself hope.