Stand Up or Shut Up Time for City Councilmembers and Candidates
Eugene Green and Oliver Thomas’s expansive surveillance ordinance is returning to City Council this Wednesday. This dangerous ordinance would make New Orleans the first and only city in the country to allow live facial recognition of its residents. That means the cameras you see all around town will be identifying your face everywhere you go, and checking it against law enforcement’s target database.
The people have made ourselves clear: surveillance doesn’t make us safer. Giving the state the tools to track every immigrant, every labor activist, and every person who opposes the genocide in Palestine doesn’t make us safer. Paying for a technology proven to be biased against Black and brown people, with ever mounting costs for cameras, software, and data storage, that’s bound to result in millions in payouts for wrongful arrests and civil rights violations, does absolutely nothing to make our city better for its working class residents. All it’s going to do is make every demonstrator an easy target for white nationalist Proud Boys in military cosplay.
That’s why Eye on Surveillance, Unión Migrante, Jewish Voice for Peace, New Orleans for Community Oversight of Police, Indivisible Nola, and New Orleans DSA all oppose Ordinance 35,137. After delaying it multiple times this summer to wait out public opposition, Green and Thomas are bringing it to the City Council Criminal Justice Committee, 1300 Perdido St, 2nd Floor West, this Wednesday, August 20. We need you to contact the council and tell them to stop Ordinance 35,137.
Our privacy is under attack. Our elected officials are on the cusp of handing over massive surveillance powers to fascists. It’s time for council members and candidates to stand up or shut up - if you can’t find the courage to vote against this, then don’t bother asking us to vote for you.
Empty ‘Resistance’ to Rising Fascism - Bob M
President Trump’s deployment of the National Guard and federal agencies in Washington, D.C., over invented hysteria is causing justified anxiety amongst anti-fascists across the political spectrum. The spectacle of our local election season has unfortunately been a distraction from a critical fight in our historical moment - defending what little democratic rights we have and fighting against authoritarianism at the federal, state, and local levels.
During my campaign, I have continually brought up this urgency. On WDSU, I highlighted the need to come together to fight for democracy, and I explicitly called out the rise of fascism at the Urban League’s forum. Few other local Democratic candidates have mentioned Trump or Landry, and the narrative focus on roadwork and economic development feels like someone staring 6 inches ahead of their feet while walking towards a cliff.
What frightens me is that these candidates want to give police more weapons, technology, and money without any recognition that Trump or Landry will inevitably push the boundaries of our laws. When Jim Crow comes back, do you honestly think Louisiana State Police are going to care about protecting us after they got away with murdering Ronald Greene? How confident do you feel in NOPD and OPSO, who are still under federal consent decrees for violating constitutional rights? The facial recognition technology they’re trying to sell us next week in City Council - you honestly think they won’t use that against political targets or foreign-born residents? The Real Time Crime Center admits having a Department of Homeland Security intelligence agent embedded within the city-run panopticon. For all the genuine concern I hear from residents about Trump and fascism, I hear nothing from my fellow District A candidates.
I am grateful for my fellow DSA candidates who continue to call out the reality around us and say, “No more!” Lock in and become a DSA member or renew your membership today. Get to public demonstrations. Support mutual aid efforts. Organize your workplace to build solidarity and the capacity to strike. There are more of us than them, and we are stronger together. Solidarity forever.
Fall 2025 Voter Guide Team Weekly Meeting Tomorrow
Every election, New Orleans DSA publishes our voter guide analyzing the key issues in each race through a socialist lens. This is a volunteer effort by comrades in the chapter, and we want you to join us!
Come to our first Saturday morning work session, where we'll be crafting themes and assigning candidates to our team members for the Fall 2025 Voter Guide. Tomorrow, we’ll be on the back patio of Coffee Science, 410 S Broad St, from 10:00 am to 12:00 pm. Bring your laptop and all of your longstanding grudges against our local oligarchs. Get in touch with Aaron Z for more info.
Solidarity Forever - Andy L
The heartbreaking news that Planned Parenthood will cease operation in Louisiana September 30 reminds us that we’re living under the dictatorship of the bourgeoisie: a ruling elite that needs vulnerable, exploitable workers. Planned Parenthood Gulf Coast provided cancer screenings, birth control, pregnancy and STI testing, gender-affirming care, and more to the community. Even this attempt to support the working class was too great a threat to their patriarchy.
A hegemon can’t allow anything to challenge its supremacy. It must destroy any perceived threat. This is why Israel smashed Syria into sectarian clusters and assassinated dozens of Iranian leaders and scientists in June. Right now, Israel and the US are forcing the Lebanese government to destroy itself in an attempt to disarm Hezbollah, turning an Arab vs. Zionist conflict into an Arab vs. Arab conflict. The resistance of the Palestinians is a challenge to the perception of Israel as an undefeatable power, so they are being exterminated.
The way to counter hegemony is with solidarity. The BRICS organization is attempting to counter the US’s military-backed hegemony with a cooperative economic system. It’s a race between the US encirclement of China and BRICS completing a trade network free of the US, but no one knows how it will all play out. The fact that the BRICS nations are working together is the only reason that they have a chance.
Applying these lessons locally, our path forward is to build solidarity with those who fight our class enemies. This involves organizations that have been doing the work for decades and groups and individuals who are finally putting all the pieces together. We need everyone to change everything: we will build the future together or not at all.
Red Rabbits Recommendation - Get Moving
We all know about the fight-or-flight response to a stressful situation. One thing that both options have in common is motion. Rather than sitting on your couch and doomscrolling about the state of the world, get up, get out, and get active.
We talk about getting active all the time, and usually that’s about organizing conversations or attending protests, but we shouldn’t neglect the physical benefits of motion. Even a leisurely walk around the block is good for you. You’ll get fresh air, see your neighbors, and lubricate your joints. The motion is the lotion, as the old-timers say. Deep breathing activates your parasympathetic nervous system, which calms your mind and reduces your body’s stress hormones.
You don’t have to start running marathons or doing a hundred pushups a day. Every body is different, with unique limits and abilities. Start with what you can do, and what you want to do, then work from there. You can exercise alone, with friends, or with total strangers. Group activities help build relationships, which can make the whole process more enriching.
The chapter is large enough that undoubtedly there are comrades who enjoy the same kinds of activities that you do. If you’ve been wanting to post on the Discord but don’t know what to say, then throw your hat in the ring and see if anyone wants to toss a frisbee around or do some yoga.
Our good friend Dialectical Materialism tells us that quantitative changes (swimming every morning) will lead to qualitative changes (you become a morning person or don’t get so out of breath when you take the stairs). Find your fun, find your people, and get going!