Dear comrades,

In case you haven't heard, Sen. Bernie Sanders has just been endorsed for president by Congresswoman and DSA member Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez (NY), and by Congresswoman Ilhan Omar (MN). It is exciting to see both congresswomen stand up to the corporate Democratic Party that surely pressured them not to do so. Courage is contagious, and may their courage spread to millions! You can read more in this statement by the DSA National Political Committee (NPC).

This Sunday is the Medicare for All town hall in MoCo, hosted by the Maryland Progressive Healthcare Coalition (of which MoCo DSA is a member). It will feature DSA member and state delegate Gabriel Acevero and others, at the Gaithersburg library. More details are below!

We're planning a field trip to Greenbelt, MD and the Greenbelt Museum on Sunday, Oct. 27. Greenbelt was the very first co-operative New Deal town created by federal government in 1935 - with a walkable town center, co-operative businesses, and New Deal housing (much of which is now co-op!). Please RSVP here if you'd like to join us!

All MoCo DSA members should expect to receive a phone call from a fellow comrade over the next couple of months. The calls will be about getting to know our members better, and kicking off our campaign for rent control in MoCo. Stay tuned for even more next steps on our fight for affordable housing in our county!

Wondering about renewing your DSA membership? As of now, *all* membership renewals and new memberships must be done through national DSA (here). One can make donations to our Metro DC DSA chapter, but those donations can no longer be used for membership renewals. Confused? Unsure if your membership has expired? Just ask us!

Upcoming DSA events:
 Sunday, October 27 from 1-5 pm: Trip to Greenbelt Museum
Please RSVP here to join our field trip to the first New Deal town, Greenbelt, MD!

 Sunday, November 3 from 2 pm-4:30 pm at Silver Spring library: MoCo DSA Branch meeting
Please join us at our monthly branch meeting to continue planning our rent control fight and hear updates on other DSA initiatives and events! Details and RSVP here.

 Check out the Metro DC DSA Meetup page to find many DSA events throughout the Washington Metro region!

Upcoming community events:
Saturday, October 19 from 10 am-1 pm in Rockville: Progressive MD canvass for Rockville candidates James Hedrick and Virginia Onley
DSA member James Hedrick is running for Rockville City Council, and Progressive Maryland is canvassing for him and mayoral candidate Virginia Onley this weekend. To join them, RSVP here.

Sunday, October 20 from 2-4 pm at Gaithersburg Library: Medicare for All Town Hall
Join a number of panelists, including DSA member and state delegate Gabe Acevero, to discuss the fight for Medicare for All, in Maryland and nationwide! Details can be found here.

 Sunday, October 24 from 6-8 pm in DC: ICE Out of DMV Teach-In
Join this teach-in to learn more about the criminalization of immigrants and how to fight back. ICE wants to build migrant detention centers in DC, Maryland, and Virginia. Plug into the campaigns against these ICE jails and against local cooperation with ICE. Details can be found here.

Good Reads:
 From Commune: "Who Owns Tomorrow?" by Chloe Watlington. "We have to start by calling these deaths what they are: deaths of despair, yes, but more precisely capital punishment for those who fall down in a winner-takes-all society... We must go to war against our own decline. No one else will do it for us."

From the Boston Review: "The Making of the American Gulag" by Stuart Schrader. "During the Cold War, the 'police apparatus' was held up as a prime example of Soviet repression. Yet in its efforts to fight subversives, the United States ended up with its own carceral state."

 From Jacobin: "Why Voter Turnout Is So Low In The United States: an interview with Alexander Keyssar" by Adele Oltman. "In New York City in 1906, elections were held on the Sabbath because so many Socialists were observant Jews. They were getting elected to the city council so New York City suppressed the vote. In the South, the white primary emerges because the other methods of disenfranchisement of blacks were inefficient and difficult to administer. You don’t have to administer tests - you can only vote in the Democratic Primary if you’re white. Remarkably, the Supreme Court uphold this for 50 years.”

In solidarity,