View the Weekly Update in browser

UP FRONT

• Supporting Park Morton residents - Tuesday, Aug 25 at 3:30 PM
• Red Rabbits Interest Meeting - tonight at 6 PM
• Digital action in support of Graduate Student Workers - TODAY at 1 PM

--

This Tuesday, August 25 at 3:30, Park Morton residents are rallying to stop the DC Housing Authority (DCHA) from displacing longtime Park Morton families during the Covid-19 Pandemic. Families at the location want to return families to a redeveloped Park Morton with longterm Community Equity! Residents of Park Morton have been organizing to prevent relocation for some time. But DCHA has decided to start pushing residents from the site to gentrify the community when there are working families on this site.

The demonstration will convene at Park Morton Resident Council Bldg at 615 Morton Street NW on Tuesday, August 25 at 3:30 PM. This will be a SAFE (Stay Away Far Enough) Protest. Masks are strongly encouraged & advised at all times, social distancing is a mandate, please bring hand sanitizer, posters & banners will be provided, however you can bring your own that you’ve created.

Extended coverage of what’s been happening at Park Morton can be found in this WAMU story. MDC DSA’s Steering Committee voted for the chapter to sign on in support of the Park Morton Equity Plan, which has been crafted by the Park Morton Residents Council to prevent future displacement of Park Morton residents, many of whom are multi-generational Black residents, during redevelopment of the housing unit (see on map). And if you haven’t already, we ask that you sign this petition created by Park Morton residents in support of the Residents Council.

Red Rabbits Interest Meeting
Direct action is essential in demonstrating our collective beliefs and demands and for agitating authorities. The Red Rabbits, a model that was created nationally, will be a cadre of members trained in the roles of marshaling, jail support, de-escalation, and police liaison work. In these roles, they will be able to assist and promote the safety and effectiveness of direct actions, and help protect other members and our comrades from various movements. Want to learn more about these roles or have experience in any of them? Come hear about the Red Rabbits and share your thoughts on the future of this group at our interest meeting tonight, August 21 at 6 PM!

BRIEFS

MDC DSA Electoral Update
The campaigns to elect Janeese Lewis George in Ward 4, and Ed Lazere at-large continue on. Thanks to DSA’s work over this summer, we were able to assist in unseating a corporate backed incumbent in the Ward 4 primary. Now, if Ed wins his at-large race, there will be two Democratic socialists on the District Council, providing a legitimate path to the policy prerogatives of our chapter.

To make it across, we’ll need the continued support of members to engage in this city-wide effort. Here’s where we need your help:

• New to phonebanking? We’ll help get you started! Join a DSA for Ed Phonebank Training!
• Phonebank hero? Join ony of our flexible phone-banking shifts!
  

DC Tenants Union Makes Headlines
The DC Tenants Union has been doing great work organizing tenants across the city. Recent abuses from property developers brought the DCTU to the doorstep of Chris Donatelli following harrassment of Park 7 canvassers by MPD officers. The actions of the DCTU have been covered in detail in this Washington City Paper article. A great anecdote of outlining DCTU’s effectiveness - an exec at NOVO Properties stated that organizing from DCTU dropped rent collection rates from ~95% to 50%.

This Sunday - Medicare for All Group Meeting
DSA has a new working group! Right now, as people are losing their employment-tied healthcare during the worst pandemic in modern history, there has never been a more pressing time to demand Medicare for All! Please join our #m4a Slack channel to see what we’ve been working on and join one of our new campaigns! Register here.

MDC DSA comrades made calls to voters yet again this past Wednesday to get out the word out about Montgomery County Charter Amendment B, which would primarily benefit the wealthy and corporations and force cuts to the public health department, schools and other county services. Tell your friends, family and neighbors in Montgomery County to vote no on Question B and join us for a training and phonebanking session next Wednesday, August 26 at 6:30 PM. We plan to ramp up our phonebanking program as we get closer to the election. To sign up to volunteer and get updates about this session and other future sessions, sign up here.
– Nicole Z

Our comrades at Baltimore DSA next week begin a study circle on police and prison abolition. The first session will be this Tuesday, Aug. 25. See our Allies Calendar, below, for details and remote access. You can also review the topic by checking out our Socialist Night School session on police abolition on the website.

Following attacks fired at the NYC-DSA by Democrats in the state legislator of NY, now is a good time to remind folks that DSA has an active Palestine National Working Group. If you are interested in partiicpating in the group, please fill out this survey to get involved.

NoVA Branch Updates

NoVA had their monthly meeting last night, you can find the meeting notes here. We were given updates on the NOVA tenant organizing and the ongoing evictions crisis in VA, discussed Rosa Luxemburg and the question of Reform or Revolution, migrant justice organizing to aid those in ICE detention and upcoming political education events.

There are also some NoVA Meetings coming up:

• The Migrant Justice Working Group will be meeting on Saturday at 5 PM. At the meeting, we will discuss future strategy for the group.
• the NoVA Tenant Organizing Working Group will be meeting on Saturday at 1 PM. The meeting will have updates on court records research, tenant canvassing, the current status of the eviction moratorium being discussed by the VA General Assembly and a training for having organizer conversations with tenants.
• the next meeting of the VA DSA chapters will be on August 27th at 7 PM. Please email [email protected] to RSVP.

Can you administer first aid? Do you support rent control? Can you juggle? Speak Klingon?

We need to know about your SKILLS & INTERESTS! So hurry and complete our Member Interests and Activism Survey if you haven’t yet done so. This survey is one of the many ways we plug you in to get you involved in one of the various campaigns and initiatives our busy chapter is engaged in! All supporters are welcome to participate.

MDC DSA CALENDAR OF EVENTS

EVENTS FROM OUR ALLIES IN THE DMV

NATIONAL DSA EVENTS

Tuesday, Aug 25 | 8:00 PM EDT
The End of Policing with Alex Vitale
“The Police do not prevent crime. This is one of the best kept secrets of modern life. Experts know it, the police know it, but the public does not know it. Yet the police pretend that they are society’s best defense against crime.” Alex Vitale elaborates.

INFO ACCESS

Washington Socialist for August and Labor Day
The most recent articles in our long-running online monthly newsletter are here. Our upcoming Labor Day issue of the Washington Socialist is always a big annual effort stressing our dedication to the primacy of the class struggle in bringing socialism to all members of US society and ending inequality. The deadline for articles is Saturday, August 29. Campaigns and working groups: write action reports for this strange year so far to be included in the Labor Day issue. They need not be of full article length. Our Pubs WG editors will wrap these into one or more article-length reports on the impact MDC DSA members have collectively had on the politics and activism of this tumultuous year so far – and what you/we plan for the next few months or more. Chime in at the length you can manage. Submit your contribution to [email protected]

We are repopulating our archive of articles going back to 2012 - newly liberate from several previous MDC DSA web platforms. Watch for that as the Washington Socialist migrates soon to its own website in tandem with updates to our home site.

GOOD READS

• NYT Account of how Marxist scholar Adolph Reed and NYC DSA ran into issues about a planned speech. The event has ignited a debate across DSA universe (including on our own Facebook group). Here’s one take from Class Unity DSA.
  
  

• With the DNC over, what do we do now? We’ll likely be debating this for sometime, so here are a few articles to start. Jacobin’s just-published new issue, headlined “After Bernie” leads with this: “The Two Paths of Democratic Socialism: Coalition and Confrontation.” And another view about how the Left should orient ourselves toward the 2020 election in Portside: “The right tactical call for activists is to elect the politicians they’re most able to cajole, persuade, and pressure.”
  
  

• From The Intercept: Mick Mulvaney is back in action on his favorite deregulatory turf, using the CFPB to deploy predatory lenders as “first reponders” to the pandemic.
  
  

• Teachers’ unions around the country, with new clout and confidence from their widespread and successful rebellions against (often Red-state) cutbacks, are rallying again to make sure that they and their students are safe as some of those same governors desperately attempt to make schools open – despite rising infection rates – for in-classroom learning. An extensive and detailed report from Politico.
  
  

• A good summary of the way Democrats are organizing their anticipated reassumption of power, and the unaddressed issues that got us to this point, in The Week. A sweet read for the Biden skeptics among us, topped off with a controversial title (“Joe Biden is already planning for a failed presidency”).
  
  

• Finally, a republished interview with Karl Marx, in Portside.

Ages have come and gone, kingdoms and powers and dynasties have risen and fallen, old glories and ancient wisdoms have been turned into dust, heroes and sages have been forgotten and many a mighty and fearsome god has been hurled into the lightless chasms of oblivion.

But ye, Plebs, Populace, People, Rabble, Mob, Proletariat, live and abide forever.
- Arturo Giovannitti