National DSA Endorses Sen. Bernie Sanders' Candidacy

Democratic Socialists of America is proud to endorse Senator Bernie Sanders for President

DSA’s National Political Committee (NPC), elected every two years at the national convention, voted to endorse Sanders at a special meeting on Thursday night [March 21, 2019]

The NPC endorsement means members across the country can launch the first steps of our national campaign plan, designed to help Sanders win the Democratic nomination and then defeat Trump. Following DSA’s National Electoral Strategy, our campaign will try to build an organized socialist base at the grassroots — in other words, independent power rooted in our chapters and communities. Our next step is to develop FAQs, campaign materials, trainings and support, and compliance reporting structures for local chapters. This will support DSA’s thousands of activists in developing campaigns that make sense strategically in their local context. Our first FAQ for chapter activists will come out soon.

Sign up here if you want to help DSA to build the democratic socialist movement behind Sanders!

Sanders is the only democratic socialist running for president in 2020, and the only socialist in American history with a serious chance of winning the presidency. His platform — the Green New Deal, Medicare for All, College for All, ending mass incarceration, strengthening unions, and a living wage — would transform American society by ending the worst forms of poverty and inequality while empowering us all to fight for even more.

But as Sanders himself said at a rally in Iowa this month, the billionaires and corporations who control US politics “are so powerful, they have so much money, that no one person, not the best president in the world, can take them on alone. The only way we transform America is when millions of people together stand up and fight back.” No single politician can do this by themself: only by building a massive, multi-racial working-class movement can workers fight back against the billionaires and win a society that puts people over profit.

Since Sanders and his program are popular among a diverse base of millions of people, his run for president offers unprecedented opportunities to build that movement. This week at the UCLA picket lines in California, Sanders made clear that his campaign will be helping to build the class struggle from below: “What we are seeing all across this country is a war being waged against the working people of America. And the time is long overdue for the American people to stand up, to say enough is enough.”

In early March, we conducted an advisory poll of our entire membership on whether to endorse Sanders. The poll received responses from 13,324 DSA members, representing 24% of the eligible membership. Seventy-six percent voted in favor of an endorsement. DSA members participated in lively strategic debates about the Sanders campaign across the country, from debates at chapter meetings and regional conferences, to written dialogue on our national website.

DSA’s endorsement launches our campaign for Bernie and the democratic socialist movement behind him. Be a part of the movement to put people over profit and elect the first socialist president in American history, sign up today!

Message sent Friday, March 22 by

DSAUSA National Director Maria Svart

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