Socialists Are Hijacking Democratic Party

The Democratic Socialists of America, once a fringe club that met in people's basements, has morphed into a mushrooming force in Democratic Party politics. This election season socialists have scored a string of upsets in the primaries, an impressive record for a nascent political party founded in 1982.  

As recently as 2016, the DSA had about 8,000 members.  However, the ideological group has blossomed into an energetic, political juggernaut with 120,000 members.  Although its finances and membership are dwarfed by the Democratic Party, the DSA is muscling its way into the mainstream. 

The party's roles exploded after the 2016 presidential campaign of avowed socialist Senator Bernie Sanders.  Today, the party claims more than 250 members in elected offices from Texas to Missouri, and Pennsylvania to Utah.  Its highest profile officeholder is New York City Mayor Zohran Mamdani.

Nationally, DSA endorsed members include Representatives Alexandra Ocasio-Cortez of New York and Rashida Tlaib from Michigan.  Both were elected in 2018, a year when 50 DSA-endorsed candidates won Democratic Party nominations at the national, state and local level.  

The socialists' success in the Democratic Party has ruptured unity ahead of the key midterms.  Socialists have unseated several moderate Democrats in primaries this cycle, winning 35 races at local, state and national levels.  And they have set their sights on running a presidential candidate in 2028.  

Democrats have tried to put lip gloss on what is a messy food fight within the party.  They brush off the schism, assuring critics socialists are part of the "big tent" embraced by Democrats.  Their disclaimer notwithstanding, mainline Democrats are clearly worried about a fissure within the party. 

Although the DSA party platform has echoes of Maxism, lately their candidates have rejected the label of Communism.  Socialists eschew the characterization because they fear it may scare off some voters. But their views are hiding in plain sight on their website and in pronouncements by DSA apparatchiks.

The DSA platform calls for radically restructuring American government and institutions in ways that would shift political power to an elected dictatorship. Many of their ideas are unconstitutional and beg the question about how peaceful implementation could be achieved. 

The group's doctrinal manifesto includes the following:

• Ending corporate control of the economy in favor of social ownership, effectively abolishing capitalism while mandating a 32-hour workweek.
• Replacing the President and the Supreme Court with bodies that would be "subordinate to Congress."
• Getting rid of the United States Senate.
• Massive public housing construction; universal rent control; and, tenant protections.
• Reparations and investment in communities affected by racism and or colonialism.
• Abolition of police and prisons.
• Expanding voting rights to non-citizens and incarcerated persons. 
• Opening borders to migrants and granting amnesty to illegals in the country.

In their races this year, DSA candidates have avoided talking about most of the group's extreme positions in an effort to soft pedal socialism. Instead, socialist candidates deliver sermons about affordability and economic inequality wrapped in the politics of envy, jealousy and resentment.

Their message drips with the Marxism's doctrine of class struggle. They advocate for raising taxes on billionaires and millionaires, giving workers more control in the workplace, replacing capitalism with a fairer system, free universal healthcare, housing as a human right and free education for all.

Every DSA candidate rails against Israel and condemns U.S. support for that country.  They are the shrill voices supporting Palestine, Hamas and Hezbollah.  Their militant anti-Zionism bent is not only the organization's defining cause, it crosses the line into being unequivocally anti-Semitic. 

Despite the Communist tenets embraced by the DSA candidates, incumbent Democrats are loathe to criticize candidates or their message, lest they become the next target in a primary.  But there is another more pragmatic reason for their recalcitrance.

A Pew Research poll found one in three (32%) of Democrats and those who lean Democrat view socialists leaders and ideology positively.  The survey, conducted in January, found that among those Democrats who describe themselves as "liberal," an astounding 52% have favorable views of socialism.    

Democrats who are white, younger, female and college educated are the most likely to have a positive view of socialists.  This is the same demographic showing up in primaries to lift the fortunes of Democratic Socialists of America candidates. They are also supporting the DSA financially. 

According to its website, the DSA is primarily funded by its members through regular dues and individual contributions. They claim to take no funds from Political Action Committees (PACs). The group, however, has a separate non-profit entity--the DSA Fund--that accepts charitable contributions.

Publicly available records show the fund collected $586,000 from 2019 to 2024.  That is a pittance in today's political financial arms race.  But there is a murky trail of like-minded groups supporting DSA candidates, which is funded by an American-born tycoon with ties to the Chinese Communist Party.

The multi-millionaire, Neville Roy Singham, lives in Shanghai.  He has bankrolled a string of nonprofits including, CodePink, the Party for Socialism and Liberation, People's Forum and a the anti-Zionist group American Priorities. The later group spent millions electing DSA candidates this cycle.

The U.S. State Department has identified the Singham network of tax-exempt groups as a tool for Chinese propaganda.  House Ways and Means Committee chairman Missouri Republican Jason Smith has issued subpoenas to delve into the Singham backed organizations.  

Democrats' strategy is to compare the socialists wave to the Tea Party uprising in the Republican Party in 2009.  It's just a trendy fad, they claim.  There is no comparison.  The Tea Party demanded fiscal responsibility, limited government and free markets.  Those ideals are far from Communist theory.  

The DSA has already demonstrated more staying power than the forgotten Tea Party. Socialists are gaining members and political power. The longer Democrats avoid putting distance between the party and socialists, the bigger the risk the Democratic Party becomes a safe haven for socialists.  

For their part, Republicans need to tie every Democrat running for office to the socialists.  Run ad campaigns about the "new" Democrat party's socialist ideas. Make Democrat candidates either endorse or refute the DSA.  Don't let them off the hook with "big tent" euphemisms.  

Democrats want to make the midterms a referendum on President Trump.  The GOP should turn the tables and make the election about capitalism versus Communist-style socialism.  That may keep the Democrats from overturning Republican majorities in the House and Senate.