In their first national meeting since Election Day, power hungry socialist leaders — including three newly elected “Squad” members of Congress — ignored populist issues such as cost of living, trumpeting instead their radical plans to “break the US-Israel relationship” and disrupt ICE.
On a Thursday night mass call by the Democratic Socialists of America dubbed “The socialist surge: DSA, the midterms and beyond,” six winning candidates and national DSA leaders gloated that the organization just had its “biggest election ever.”
“We’ve quadrupled our presence in Congress,” exclaimed national DSA Co-Chair Ashiq Saddique, wearing a black and orange “Democratic Socialists” soccer jersey with the words “Solidarity Forever” on the collar.
“Millions of people voted for socialists,” he gushed.
Instead of focusing on affordability issues that helped propel Democrats into office in Tuesday’s “blue tsunami,” the DSA jumped straight into ideological and geopolitical debates like Israel-Palestine, declaring it was planning a human arms embargo, despite President Trump this week saying the US will end $4 billion in annual aid to Israel.
“We are going to implement an arms embargo from below, a people’s arms embargo,” declared DSA National Political Committee member Francesca Maviglia.
Several DSA chapters have started working on a National Arms Embargo Campaign, targeting Elbit systems, an Israeli arms manufacturer with a subsidiary in Texas, and United Airlines, said Maviglia.
“Instead of pleading with policymakers, we’re going to disrupt the production and shipping of weapons ourselves,” she threatened.
Another leader, fresh off a trip to the Middle East, talked about how a recent DSA delegation to Jordan was stopped by the Israeli Defense Forces from crossing the Palestinian border.
“It’s only strengthened my resolve to fight against Israel,” said Kareem Elrefai, a DSA National Political Committee member, as his comrades in the chat cheered and wrote “f–k the IDF.”
Elrefai introduced Congresswoman-elect Rep. Claire Valdez (D-NY), who just won a seat representing New York 7th District of Brooklyn and Queens, promising she would take that fight to Congress.
“Claire is a DSA member to her core, and that’s somebody who’s going to ensure Palestine is not forgotten and that we’re fighting to break the US-Israel relationship, from the federal level on down,” said Elrefai.
Valdez, Chris Raab (D-Pa.) and Angela Gonzalez-Torres (D-Calif.) were the three newly minted DSA members of the House of Representative on the call.
“Socialists are leading the way, and we will have huge fights in Congress in the new year to come,” vowed Valdez.
Power-hungry Texas DSA leaders meanwhile talked up their plan to make Houston a sanctuary city.
“We can not only eliminate the local police collaboration with ICE, but we can make Houston a sanctuary city,” said Houston DSA Co-Chair Jasmine Khadem Gonzalez, adding Texas chapters fought against flock cameras.
“Today I saw videos of the cameras being deactivated and taken down — a beautiful sight to see.”
“Texans don’t want to see our neighbors kidnapped,” added Clarisse Manuel, a leader of the Austin chapter of the DSA. “This is the time to fight harder than ever…sky is the limit.”
In all, the DSA won 74% of its called races these midterms, with 8 House winners, 62 state lawmakers, 22 municipal lawmakers, including three DSA mayors — in Los Angeles, Washington, DC, and Ann Arbor, Michigan — and 34 ballot measures.
“We’re indomitable,” bragged Pennsylvania’s Raab, wearing a broach with the face of Shirley Chisholm, the first black woman elected to Congress.
“I wasn’t supposed to have won. I wasn’t the frontrunner. But people showed up for me. And at the end of the day, that’s what this is about.”
