Organizing the Democratic Capacity for Transformative Change: The 2020 Election and Beyond

Samir Amin: This twin reality – capital’s exploitation of everybody and the diverse forms and violence of this exploitation – is a challenge for the left, which cannot ignore “the contradictions among the people” and yet cannot give up on moving toward a convergence of objectives. This, in turn, implies a diversity in forms of organizations and actions by the new generalized proletariat. The ideology of the “movement” ignores these challenges. Moving to the offensive requires an inevitable reconstruction of centers able to think about the unity of strategic objectives.¹

Noam Chomsky: The most remarkable thing about the last election was actually Bernie Sanders not Trump. Bernie Sanders broke with a century of American political history. In American elections back to the late 19^th century, elections are basically bought, literally. You can predict with remarkable accuracy electability simply on the basis of campaign funding and also policy. There is very substantial political research on this. Sanders came along with no support from the corporate sector, no support from the wealthy. The media dismissed him as ridiculous. He was basically unknown. He even used the scare word, socialist. And he would have won the Democratic nomination if it hadn’t been for the shenanigans of the party managers.² 

In the wake of Bernie Sanders’ 2016 historic run for president, numerous progressives ran for office at all levels of government in the 2018 Democratic primaries. For the most part, corporate-backed candidates won the elections, but, there were several stunning progressive victories.³ Some went on to win the general elections, most famously, congressional representatives Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez, Ilhan Omar, Ayanna Pressley, and Rashida Tlaib.

In the 2020, Sanders is again running a vigorous grassroots campaign. Sanders volunteers have organized 11,000 events and as of October 2019, Sanders has received $74 million in campaign donations, more than all other Democratic candidates, mostly from small donations (less than $200).⁴ However, progressives are not united behind Sanders. Some fear Sanders is too radical to be elected. Some prefer Elizabeth Warren. In this context of an activated but fractured Democratic base, how can the U.S. working class build on the success of this burst of progressive electoral activism and organize the class power and unity needed to actually implement sweeping progressive policies such as Medicare for All and the Green New Deal?⁵

To build on these victories and organize at the scale necessary to contest for power with the capitalist oligarchs, the working class needs an institutional home, a mass party, to forge a multicultural, multiracial, collective identity based on a democratically-determined united vision of a just society and a strategy to realize that vision. Fragmentation is the Achilles Heel of an oppressed majority. The capitalist class dominates the majority working class in large part because the working class does not have the institutional capacity to democratically plan, coordinate and act in unison. Though there have been many efforts, the U.S. working class has never organized a political party on the scale necessary to actually become a majoritarian party.⁶ Over the last century, the U.S. Left has been embroiled in a recurring debate about whether to organize politically inside the Democratic Party or form a third party. Both strategies have repeatedly fallen short of building a mass working-class party. The corporate-dominated money-driven winner-take-all two-party system in the U.S. has effectively prevented a mass working-class party from forming.

A Historical Opportunity and a Plan to Build a Working Class Proto-Party

In an essay published in Jacobin entitled “A Blueprint for a New Party”, Seth Ackerman laid out a strategy for breaking the two-party handcuffs and building a mass working-class party in the U.S.⁷ Ackerman argues that ballot access laws in the U.S. are “uniquely repressive” compared to other democracies and are designed to maintain the two-party capitalist-dominated status quo. He states that activists organizing a new party in the U.S. face a “soft-authoritarian system, like those of Russia or Singapore.” The Left must adapt to the circumstances. He argues a new organization could incorporate as a “social welfare” organization, a 501(c)(4), and members could adopt a platform and make case-by-case decisions about whether to run candidates “in major- or minor-party primaries, as nonpartisan independents, or even, theoretically, on the organization’s own ballot line.” Ackerman proposes an activist party which would engage in both electoral politics and movement organizing and education. He emphasizes the importance of on-the-ground organizing particularly in marginalized communities, both urban and rural. He also stresses the importance of working people leading the party through participation in the democratic governance of the party. The successes of Sanders in 2016 and the progressive victories in the 2018 congressional elections demonstrate the viability of a progressive agenda energizing the working-class base of a corporate-dominated political party.

Many on the Left have argued that it is a fool’s errand to try to reform the Democratic Party. The Party is dominated by corporate money and historically efforts to change the Party have always failed. In the wake of Trump becoming President, a group of former Sanders activists argue that now is the historical moment to form a new third party, a People’s Party.⁸ They point out that there are more Independents than either Democrats or Republicans and that Independents tend to endorse progressive policies. Furthermore, they argue that if Sanders left the Democratic Party he would bring more than 50% of the party with him and, when joined by the progressive Independents, the new People’s Party would be a new majoritarian party. They cite the quick four-year rise of the Republican Party leading to the election of Abraham Lincoln as a historical precedent.

However, Ackerman’s plan for a working-class party has strategic advantages over both the People’s Party plan and previous historical attempts to change the Democratic Party. First, there is no evidence that a grand realignment in which progressive Democrats are going to leave the party in mass is imminent. Sanders and other progressives are already running in the Democratic primary. The first rule of good organizing is to meet people where they are. Ackerman’s proposal is also superior to previous attempts to reform the Democratic Party in that it creates a worker-controlled institution with the capacity to work inside the Party but independently from the Democratic corporate hierarchy.⁹ Through such an institution, the U.S. working class can democratically create a collective identity, will, agency and solidarity. Moreover, in the context of the current two-party winner-take-all electoral system, it allows the working class to fight for power with its two traditional political opponents, the Democratic and Republican corporate oligarchs, sequentially, in the primaries and then general elections. The path to victories is viable and self-evident, and does not require working people making a historically unprecedented leap of faith and risk a division giving elections to Trump and Republicans. Moreover, in 2016 and 2018, the working class experienced political victories implementing this strategy.

The Sanders 2020 presidential campaign is an opportunity to move towards implementing Ackerman’s plan. Following the election, progressives could create a Working Democrats Caucus, a proto-party organizing in the Democratic Party, grounded in grassroots activist organizations. In fact, Sanders knows that in order for his “political revolution” to be successful, progressives need an organized mass movement. He has called for millions to organize and become activists.¹⁰ His campaign slogan is “Not me. Us.” However, to realize the potential of working-class power, the movement needs to be grounded in a democratic institution. Legendary activist A. J. Muste wrote that a union “combine within itself two extremely divergent types of social structure, that of an army and that of a democratic town meeting.”¹¹ The Working Democrats Caucus can potentially incorporate these two elements. The Caucus can be the institutional home for the working class to engage in mass deliberation, decision-making and collective action.

For the time being, the decision to work within the Democratic Party has already been made. Thus, I call the proposed organization a “Caucus.” Over the last several years, a vast majority of on-the-ground progressive electoral activism has happened in the context of the Democratic Party, and that activism has resulted in some astonishing victories. In the 2020 elections, millions of people are organizing, donating and campaigning for Sanders and other progressives. This is an opportunity to organize the organizers to create the mass working class political institution for which progressives have been yearning for decades. A Working Democrats Caucus could help exponentially scale progressive electoral and movement activism by providing an institutional home for the working class facilitating the mass fundraising, multilevel electoral organizing, and the mass actions necessary to vie for power. A Caucus would also enable the working class to organize its politics around a platform rather than candidates, which is necessary for the long-term struggle ahead. Moreover, the Working Democrats Caucus will be needed after 2020 to realize the aspirations of the Sanders platform, whether he wins or loses.

In the future, a strong Working Democrats Caucus can revisit the decision whether or not to remain in the Democratic Party. Any decision to separate from the Democratic Party would be made democratically by Caucus members.

In the remainder of this essay, I will argue the following. First, forming a Working Democrats Caucus (WDC) builds on the progressive electoral activism done since 2016. Second, we should plan big and imagine scaling electoral activism and fundraising to actually compete with corporate parties. Third, a well-organized working class in which everyone votes has the potential to overcome the rigged electoral system and vie for power with the capitalist class. Fourth, to win, the WDC will need to organize a comprehensive fight for our democratic rights. Through tactics such as gerrymandering and voter suppression, the Republicans are seeking to institutionalize a “New Jim Crow” electoral reality systematically disenfranchising working people, especially people of color. We must not only stop this assault but expand democracy. Fifth, to be successful, the WDC must model an innovative mass participatory democracy. The Caucus will need to be a member-controlled institution managed by a scaled internal democracy in which millions of engaged members participate in on-going mass decision-making about goals, strategies and tactics. Sixth, to inspire mass participation, the WDC Platform will have to be both bold, envisioning a transformational, environmentally sustainable political economy grounded in democratic egalitarian principles, and specific; the nuts and bolts of the platform need to be understandable and doable.¹²

Scaling the Lessons Learned from the Sanders 2016 Presidential Campaign

Perhaps the most exciting aspect of Bernie Sanders’ 2016 presidential run was that movement activists were able to move into the electoral arena and quickly organize a competent, credible national campaign grounded in social-democratic politics without corporate funding.¹³ This was groundbreaking and historically unprecedented.¹⁴ In U.S. elections, donations from the rich and corporations have been a prerequisite for winning elections. For example, in 2012, 91% of the congressional candidates who raised the most money won elections.¹⁵ The Sanders campaign refused corporate donations and raised 229 million dollars from 7 million mostly small donors, 28% of whom were unemployed or retired!¹⁶ By contrast, the Green Party’s presidential candidate, Jill Stein, raised $3.7 million. Moreover, the Sanders campaign was able to organize hundreds of thousands of volunteers.

In their book, Rules for Revolutionaries: How Big Organizing Can Change Everything, organizers Becky Bond and Zack Exley, gleaned 21 “rules” that contributed to the success of the Sanders’ campaign.¹⁷ Bond and Exley state that Sanders’ unapologetic progressive campaign proposals such as the $15 minimum wage, free college tuition and Medicare for All excited his working-class constituents, especially young voters. People are motivated to be part of “something big.” Sanders’ choice to run inside the Democratic Party also contributed to his success. His run for the presidency seemed viable to his supporters, worthy of investing time and money.

Beck and Exley describe how a small group of professional organizers and many activist volunteers worked to grow a complex, federated, volunteer-led outreach campaign that quickly scaled up: “The result was a national volunteer apparatus capable of distributing the work to hundreds of thousands of volunteers, giving a large number of people leadership roles, holding people accountable, and making it efficient for people to engage in high-impact voter contact no matter where they lived.”¹⁸ For example, phone outreach is critical for success in an election campaign. The Sanders campaign hosted “barnstorming” organizing events in which they aimed to get 10% of attendees to become volunteer leaders and 70-80% of attendees to volunteer to join activist teams. Then they provided the script and automatic dialing service for volunteer teams to plug into. As they identified leaders based on who did the work, they integrated activists into leadership positions.

Planning to Scale: Millions of Activists, Billions of Dollars

Let’s imagine a Working Democrats Caucus, representing the 99% of people that have to work for a living, which could inspire millions of citizen activists to join, organize in coordination, and raise a billion or more dollars annually to fund movement and electoral organizing. To raise a billion dollars a year from small donations, 10 million people would need to donate $100 annually to the Caucus and its candidates. This might seem like an outrageous goal but the WDC would need to inspire donations on that scale to break free of corrupt pay-to-play politics and fund a comprehensive local, state and national organizing and electoral strategy.

The best solution to replace buy-a-politician institutionalized corruption is public financing of elections. However, transformative electoral reform ending the corporate capture of the electoral process will not happen until the working class elects a strong progressive majority. Thus, the working class needs to figure out a way to raise billions of dollars now to compete with the capitalist class in the current rigged system.

To put this in perspective, in the 2016 election cycle, Hillary Clinton raised 1.4 billion dollars and Donald Trump raised just under a billion dollars. According to the Center for Responsive Politics, in total, the Democrats and Republicans spent 6.5 billion dollars on all federal elections in the 2016 2-year election cycle.¹⁹ In 2016, the average winner in the House and Senate spent 1.5 million and 13 million dollars on their campaigns, respectively.²⁰ The cost of elections is increasing. The 2018 elections were the most expensive midterm elections in history, costing a total of 5.7 billion dollars with 47% of the total coming from large individual donations (defined as greater than $200), led by billionaire mega-donors such as Sheldon and Miriam Adelson, who gave $123 million to Republican candidates, and Michael Bloomberg who gave $90 million to Democrats.²¹

The large sums of money needed to run credible campaigns insulate corporate Democrats from progressive challenges. For example, in 2018 neoconservative corporate Democrat New Jersey Senator Robert Menendez was vulnerable after barely escaping conviction in a corruption and bribery trial due to practically unenforceable federal bribery statues.²² He was “severely admonished” by the Senate Ethics Committee. However, the corporate Democratic machine continued to back him. He raised 12.5 million dollars in the 2018 electoral cycle making him practically untouchable by a progressive challenge.

Can a WDC raise money on that scale? It is doable. That is, there are enough people who share progressive values who can donate money. Most Democrats now self-identify as “liberal.”²³ In fact, a majority of Americans endorse many progressive policies (e.g., Medicare for All, free college tuition, affirmative action for racial minorities and women, and the Green New Deal).²⁴ It is affordable. To put the cost in perspective, the average U.S. household spends $2500 on entertainment annually. Even households that make less than $23,000 a year spend an average of $1000 on entertainment annually. In addition, there are examples of mass membership organizations in the U.S. that raise over a billion dollars annually. The AARP (previously the American Association of Retired Persons) has 38 million members and in 2017 had an annual revenue of 1.6 billion dollars.²⁵

Thus, it is a matter of organizing and inspiring mass sustained commitment to the WDC and creating a new working-class social norm to give money to promote our common political interests. Less than 10% of people have ever given money to a political candidate.²⁶ The Sanders campaign demonstrated that if people believe in the mission and effectiveness of a campaign, they will give their time and money to the cause.

Recent Progressive Institution Building: The Seeds for a Working Democrats Caucus?

In the wake of Sanders’ inspiring campaign and Clinton’s stunning defeat, there has been a burst of electoral activism with the expressed goal of electing progressive candidates running inside the Democratic Party. A variety of new organizations have formed and some established organizations rededicated themselves to electoral politics. Our Revolution, Justice Democrats and the Democratic Socialists of America (DSA) are examples of progressive political organizations that helped elect progressive candidates in 2018. Our Revolution and Justice Democrats are 501(c)(4) political action committees (PACs) that formed in the wake of the 2016 election. Both recruit and endorse candidates that promote progressive platforms, provide training and logistical support for the campaigns at cost, and donate to the campaigns. Justice Democrats focuses primarily on congressional races and played a critical role in recruiting Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez to run for congress. Our Revolution endorses both federal and down-ballot state candidates. In addition, Our Revolution has over 500 affiliated grassroots organizations and encouraged progressives to run for leadership positions inside the Democratic Party.²⁷ They have already won 7 state Democratic Party chairmanships and “helped hundreds of people become precinct and state central committee people.”²⁸ Our Revolution has worked to make the governance of the Democratic Party more democratic and transparent.²⁹ For example, they were instrumental in forcing a rule change in the Democratic Party limiting the power of “superdelegates,” the unelected party insiders (usually politicians and lobbyists) who were allowed to vote for the Democratic nominee for President at the Democratic Convention.

The Democratic Socialists of America (DSA) “is the largest socialist organization in the United States.” DSA describes itself as “a political and activist organization, not a party.”³⁰ Since the election of Trump, DSA has grown from 6000 to 60,000 members.³¹ Their three political priorities are Medicare for All, labor solidarity and electoral work. They are focusing on building local capacity for activism including electoral work. DSA activists did the day-to-day work of grassroots electoral campaigning such as door-to-door canvasing which was a key to victory for a number of new progressive politicians.³²

The work of the Sanders’ campaign, Our Revolution, Justice Democrats, DSA, and other grassroots progressive organizations has resulted in political victories and injected social-democratic policies into the political discourse. It is quite exciting. However, to fight for power at all levels of government, the working class will need to scale up its institutional capacity exponentially. For the WDC, this means developing the financial capacity to compete in electoral campaigns at all levels as well as the on-the-ground activist capacity rooted in community WDC chapters to organize thousands of elections annually. To put the scope of the challenge in perspective, there are over 90,000 state and local governments and over 500,000 elected offices in the U.S.³³ In 2018, Our Revolution, Justice Democrats and DSA endorsed 296, 78, and 42 candidates, respectively. According the Federal Election Committee, in the 2017-2018 election cycle, the Justice Democrats raised $2,726,957. According to their tax return, Our Revolution raised $3.42 million in 2016 and $3.45 million in 2017.³⁴ These are impressive numbers for new organizations, but to build independent power, working class progressives need to exponentially scale up the institutional capacity to fundraise.

How the Working Democrats Caucus Can Scale Up Fundraising and Electoral Organizing

To discuss how the Caucus could scale up campaign financing, some background information is necessary. There are two principal types of election spending: “hard money” and “soft money.” Hard money is traditional electoral spending in which organizations and individuals give money to a candidate’s political campaign. Hard money is transparent in that the organizations and individuals must disclose their contributions. There are four primary sources of hard money: political action committees (PACs) which are groups organized for the purpose of influencing electoral campaigns, large individual donations (greater than $200), small individual donations (less than $200) and candidate self-funding.³⁵ There are legal limits to hard money donations. In the 2019-2020 election cycle individuals are allowed to give up to $2800 to an election campaign. PACs can give $5000. In congressional races, individual donations account for about half of the money raised. In Senate races, they account for approximately two-thirds. And although, a little less than .5% of people in the U.S. give more than $200 in any election cycle, large individual donations are the dominant source of funding. Unless a politician can self-fund her elections, most candidates need large donations to run viable campaigns. It is through campaign funding that the rich dominate politics. If politicians don’t promote corporate interests, they will get little money from wealthy donors for their campaigns.

Soft money, also called independent or non-coordinated money, refers to money spent by organizations other than the political campaign on political activities to influence an election.³⁶ Most of these groups are organized by corporations or business groups and are often called Super PACs. Legally these organizations cannot coordinate their actions with those of the campaign. However, in practice, they are run by people close to the campaign, and so formal coordination is not required. The amount that can be donated to these organizations is unlimited and often anonymous. Anonymous donations to these organization are called “dark money” because the donations cannot be traced back to their sources. Recent Supreme Court rulings such as Citizen United v. FEC (2010) have enabled corporations and the rich to spend unlimited amounts of money anonymously to influence elections. This lack of transparency is highly problematic for the functioning of democracy. It is difficult for voters to evaluate the intent and veracity of political advertisements if they do not know who produced the ad. In addition, corporations and the rich cannot be held accountable for their political positions.

Online donation platforms such as ActBlue have enabled working people to easily give donations to political campaigns, creating the possibility that mass small donations can free politicians from being beholden to corporations and rich donors.³⁷ Since 2004, more than 3.3 billion dollars has been raised through ActBlue.³⁸ This is how Bernie Sanders raised more than $200 million in 2016.

In the “A Blueprint for a New Party” article, Ackerman stated that as a result of Citizen United and a subsequent court case in 2011 (Cary v. FEC) a new party could organized as a new type of 501(c)(4) which operate like a hybrid PAC/Super PAC organization. That is, the WDC could maintain two separate accounts- one that could give directly to campaign committees within the legal limits and another that could accept unlimited donations, which could be spent on “political education” like a Super PAC. Thus, the WDC could potentially scale up the electoral strategies already developed by groups like Justice Democrats and Our Revolution. If the WDC can inspire tens of millions of people to donate annually, it can free Caucus-backed politicians from reliance on capitalist money. This would radically change politics in the U.S.

How can the Caucus organize on the ground? Since the election of Trump, thousands of local grassroots political groups, mostly led by college-educated women, have formed.³⁹ For example, local affiliates with Our Revolution and DSA have been organizing for several years. The Sanders’ campaign states there were over 4000 local campaign kick-off meetings in April 2019. A WDC could be an institutional home for these groups facilitating democratic coordination, organizational scale and the potential for longevity past the 2020 election.

The WDC will have an integrated movement and electoral strategy. Time and resources are limited so the Caucus would need to prioritize campaigns. The first priority would be organizing existing on-the-ground Caucus-affiliated organizations and starting new locals where they do not exist. Disenfranchised communities, both urban and rural, would need to be prioritized. The Democratic Party has essentially ceded many of the “fly-over states” and much of rural America to the Republicans. The WDC would need to prioritize organizing communities in these areas.

The WDC will have to hire and train organizers rooted in their communities. As described by labor organizer Jane McAlevey, the role of organizers is not to lead the community but to identify local community leaders and help them organize and empower their communities to participate in actions.⁴⁰ Local chapters will develop power and skills by participating in both activism and electoral campaigns. People will be attracted to the WDC not only because they like the Caucus’ values but also because they see the Caucus taking concrete actions in their communities to contest for power. Moreover, a united WDC will make mass action tactics such as boycotts, strikes and protests more effective. The Caucus would also need to organize educational, cultural, arts and social events to cultivate a culture of solidarity, camaraderie and joy. To paraphrase Emma Goldman, “If I can’t dance, it’s not my revolution.”

Local WDC chapters can elect people to run for office and the Caucus can provide training and logistical support for both candidates and their campaign teams. If the Caucus can finance election campaigns through guided mass donations, candidates can focus on running for office instead of fundraising. The start-up phase of a progressive candidacy is particularly difficult because in most places in the U.S. a new candidate has to learn skills for organizing a political campaign and create a fundraising program with little assistance.⁴¹ If candidates cultivated by the WDC can plug into an existing electoral activist and grassroots financing network rooted in a Caucus, they will be much more likely to succeed.

With training and the organizing of on-the-ground local caucus chapters, it is likely that a WDC campaign can out-organize corporate Democrats in local elections. The Democratic Party provides little training or support to potential candidates at the local level. The Party is a centralized organization. It does not have membership-based chapters but relies on professional consultants to run campaigns. ⁴² With a relatively modest amount of investment and persistent organizing, the WDC candidates could be competitive in Democratic primaries across the country.

Overcoming the “New Jim Crow” Electoral System: Everyone Must Vote In Every Election!

Some corporate Democrats assume Donald Trump and the Republicans are so repulsive that Democrats are going to sweep back into power in 2020. However, there are a number of reasons Trump will likely beat another uninspiring corporate Democrat such as Joe Biden. First, corporate Democrats are estranged from their potential working-class base. Another “I am not Trump” Democrat will have difficulty turning out voters. In a Washington Post/ABC News Poll from April 2017, two-thirds of survey participants said the Democratic Party “is out of touch with the concerns of most people in the United States today.”⁴³ The fundamental contradiction of the Democratic Party is that it is difficult to excite its potential working-class base when the Party is funded by corporations and pushes a corporate/militarist legislative agenda ignoring the day-to-day needs of ordinary people.

Second, the Republicans are strategically rigging state electoral systems in Republican-governed states, institutionalizing a “New Jim Crow” form of minority rule.⁴⁴ In the original Jim Crow system, segregationists could not overtly make it illegal for African Americans to vote due the 15^th Amendment passed following the Civil War. Therefore, they worked around the 15^th Amendment by devising laws to restrict voting such as poll taxes and literacy tests. In the 21^st century, the Republicans are now enacting legal strategies to limit the influence and participation of Democrats, particularly people of color, in elections and in government.

After their 2008 electoral loss, the Republican implemented a long-term electoral strategy called REDMAP, an acronym for Redistricting Majority Project.⁴⁵ The plan was devised by Republican operatives including Chris Jankowski and Karl Rove. The primary goals of REDMAP were, first, to capture state legislatures in 2010 and, second, to gerrymander electoral districts, guaranteeing Republican victories for a decade or more. In gerrymandering, the partisan “mapmakers” draw the lines defining political districts so as to mass their opponents in as few districts as possible, all but guaranteeing that the partisan’s party will win a majority of the districts. This rigging of district maps allows a minority party to constitute a majority in legislative bodies such as Congress.

The REDMAP plan worked. In 2010 the Republicans gained 63 Congressional seats, the largest gain in 60 years, and added 680 state legislative seats. The rout was due to two primary causes. First, in the wake of the 2008 financial crisis, the Obama administration quickly retreated from the progressive tenor of the campaign. Its recovery policy bailed out corporate capitalists and left millions of working people in financial ruin. Second, the implementation of the REDMAP strategy was supercharged by a flood of dark money into Republican campaigns enabled by Citizen United v FEC. Once in office, Republican mapmakers used sophisticated demographic mapping software called Maptitude to redraw electoral districts to practically guarantee Republican majorities for years to come. This strategy worked. Only 33 of 435 congressional races in 2016 were competitive, having a margin of victory of 10% or less. The results of gerrymandering were evident in the 2018 congressional races. For example, in North Carolina, Republicans received 50.4% of votes in House races but won 9 out of 12 congressional seats.⁴⁶

In addition, Republican politicians have implemented voter supersession strategies such as photo ID laws, ex-offender bans, targeted voter purges, and limiting polling places and times to prevent likely Democratic voters, especially people of color and young voters, from voting.⁴⁷ A study by Priorities USA suggests that voter ID laws successfully suppressed the vote of likely Democratic voters, particularly African Americans. Between the 2012 and 2016 elections, in states where voter ID laws did not change, voter turnout increased by 1.3%. In states where new strict ID laws were enforced, turnout decreased by -1.7%. African American turnout was down by -2.2% in no change states and -5% in states with new strict voter ID laws. In Wisconsin, which implemented a new strict voter ID law, turnout dropped -3.3%.⁴⁸ If Wisconsin had the same turnout as states with no change in their ID laws, over 200,000 more citizens would have voted in the presidential election. Trump beat Clinton by 20,000 votes in Wisconsin.

In this New Jim Crow electoral reality, the WDC is going to have to capture super majorities to win elections. In 2016, a U.S. District Court ruled that the Republican majority of the Wisconsin legislature had unconstitutionally gerrymandered the legislative districts of the state.⁴⁹ The court found that in order for the Democrats to capture a majority in the legislature in the gerrymandered districts, they would need to win 55% of the vote. On June 27, 2019 the partisan Supreme Court ruled that “gerrymandering cannot be challenged in federal court.”⁵⁰ Thus, though gerrymandering rigs elections, the Supreme Court will not do anything to stop the assault on democracy.

Can a Working Democrats Caucus Win Super Majorities? Yes, But To Do So Will Take Unity and a Massive Persistent Voter Registration/Get-Out-the-Vote Campaign

How does the 1% continue to rule in a democracy? A part of the answer is disenfranchised groups are less likely to vote, especially in non-presidential elections. Among eligible voters, participation rates in the U.S. tend to be in the high 50^th percentile in presidential elections, around 40% in midterm elections, and 20 to 40% in local elections. In 2016, a report by Nonprofit Vote on the 2016 presidential election indicated that 60.2% of eligible voters cast ballots.⁵¹ In the 2018 midterm election, the turnout was 50.3%, the highest midterm election turnout in over 100 years. Groups that are more likely to vote Democratic have lower participation rates. Wealthier citizens are more likely to vote than poorer citizens.⁵² In 2016, eligible White voters (65.3%) were more likely to vote than eligible Black (59.6%), Asian (49.3%) and Hispanic (47.6%) voters.⁵³ Black voter turnout fell from 66.6% in 2012 to 59.6%. The voter turnout of young voters, ages 18-29 (50%), was lower than voters 30 or older (66%).⁵⁴

The good news is that if all working people did vote consistently, progressive candidates would win office often. Demographic groups which are more likely to vote for progressive policies are the majority and make up a growing percentage of the electorate. According to a study by The Voter Participation Center, in the 2016 election the “Rising American Electorate (RAE) – unmarried women, Millennials (ages 18-34), African Americans, Latinos, and all other people of color” represented 59.2% of the eligible voting population.⁵⁵ This is up from 44.6% in 2004. The main reason Republicans have turned to subverting democracy is that these demographic trends make it very difficult for them to win on a level playing field. Non-voters are more likely to endorse progressive policies such as “making union organizing easier,” “federal assistance for schools,” “government should guarantee jobs” and “government should provide healthcare.” Moreover, states in which low income voters already vote at higher rates have more progressive policies.⁵⁶

In order for the WDC to win super-majorities, it will have to organize a massive ongoing get-out-the vote and voter rights movement. The goals of this movement need to be that everyone votes in every election and that every vote is counted. Caucus activists will have to make a “big organizing” plan to do voter registration and get out the vote on an unprecedented scale. The most important organizing tool will be a policy platform that excites the working class. Voting has to be seen as a tool for the working class to take control of its destiny. Thus, creating a new ethical norm for the social responsibility to vote goes hand-and-hand with having a WDC that fights for economic and social justice.

To complement the get-out-the-vote effort, WDC needs to demand reforms enabling all citizens to vote in every election. Same-day registration is the most effective way to improve turnout. States with same-day registration have a 7 to 13% greater turnout than those without it.⁵⁷ Automatic registration, in which voters are registered to vote when they get a driver’s license or other forms of state ID, also improves voter turnout. Other reforms include online voter registration, preregistration of 16- and 17-year-olds, vote by mail in which ballots are sent to each voter’s residence, opening voting polls on weekends, and allowing prisoners and ex-offenders to vote. The WDC should also advocate for universal voting, in which citizens are required to vote. Countries with universal voting have higher turnout rates.⁵⁸ If traditionally Democratic municipalities started passing universal voting laws, traditional Republican municipalities would likely pass similar legislation trying to keep up.⁵⁹

The WDC will also need to organize to rectify the anti-democratic flaws in the Constitution such as the Electoral College. The Electoral College gave Donald Trump the presidency despite the fact he lost the popular election by almost three million votes. A national popular vote for the Presidency can be accomplished in one of two ways: either with a constitutional amendment or an interstate compact between states with a total of 270 electoral votes or more agreeing to give their electoral votes to the popular winner. According to the voting rights group National Popular Vote, the law has already been enacted in 16 states with 196 electoral votes (CA, CO, CT, DC, DE, HI, IL, MA, MD, NJ, NM, NY, OR, RI, VT, WA).⁶⁰ A national popular vote is achievable if it became a priority of progressives.

Can the Left Unite and Do Democracy to Scale?

“This is what democracy looks like!” is a common chant at progressive political rallies. Democracy is a core value of the Left. The Left emphasizes the importance of participatory democracy in which everyone’s voice is heard equally in decisions that affect their lives. However, the values of participatory democracy are inherently difficult to scale up. Even with a modest number of people in a group, it is impossible for everyone to weigh in on every decision.

Grassroots progressives have adapted to the structural problem of democracy by organizing into many relatively small like-minded, issue-oriented, activist groups. Moreover, historically, progressive groups have often split when confronted with conflict.⁶¹ In coalitions, the Left is able to periodically mobilize collectively for primarily defensive battles but does not have the unity to go on the offense and do strategic large-scale long-term organizing for fundamental progressive changes. However, the fact that millions quickly organized around a progressive platform in the Bernie Sanders’ campaign demonstrates that people are yearning to build the capacity to organize on a scale necessary to govern.

The WDC will have to “make the road by walking” and prioritize building unity through cultivating a theory, practice and culture of democracy to scale. In his book After the Revolution? Authority in a Good Society, democratic theorist Robert A. Dahl discusses the challenges of maximizing democracy in a large complex society.⁶² He states there is no one-size-fits-all solution for realizing democracy in large groups. The quality of democratic decision-making involves a balance of three criteria: personal choice (allowing everyone affected by a decision to participate in making a decision), competency (incorporating expertise in decision making) and economy (taking into consideration the scarcity of resources, in particular people’s time). Since large democratic groups cannot conduct their business face-to-face, they have developed other forms of democracy: representational democracy, referring decisions to committees, referendum democracy, and delegating authority to professionals. Some have argued that large-scale democracy is impossible- that large groups produce oligarchy. In the U.S., for instance, large progressive organizations such as unions tend to have top-down structures with professional bureaucracies organized in hierarchies similar to corporations.

In order for the WDC to lead the struggle for expanding the realm of democracy in the U.S., it will have to vigilantly work to create a structure, process and culture which maximizes the democratic potential of the party. One structural solution to the problem of scaling up democracy is to organize large groups into a federated hierarchy of subgroups (national group, state group, city group, etc.) and then to defer democratic decisions to the smallest association that can address the issue effectively. However, there are a variety of democratic models that can be considered. For example, the Democracy in Europe Movement 2025 (DiEM25), a group started by Srećko Horvat and Yanis Varoufakis with the goal of democratizing the European Union and implementing a European New Deal, has adopted a structure with both horizontal and vertical organizational links and the utilization of participatory, representational, and referendum decision-making.⁶³ The group has a twelve person Coordinating Committee with no president elected by all DMiE25 members. There is also an Advisory Panel of invited activists and experts. All members of DMiE25 vote on policies at all levels (local, regional, nation and pan-European) through the group’s digital voting platform. There is also a Validating Council consisting of 100 randomly chosen DMiE25 member volunteers for reviewing Coordinating Committee decisions that need “broader validation” of the membership for relatively quick action. DMiE25 also has Spontaneous Collectives throughout Europe organized both regionally and around policy themes. The Spontaneous Collectives are small, ideally 15 people with a maximum of 50 people, to encourage participatory democracy. The Spontaneous Collectives can act autonomously as long as they further DMiE25 goals and adhere to the group’s principles. DMiE25 also has municipal, regional, and national collectives.

Dahl states that one of the biggest impediments to functional democracy is inequality. People with few resources are less likely to participate in democratic deliberations or to vote. The WDC will have to make a concerted effort to include groups which are structurally disenfranchised in our society. This means actively creating spaces in disenfranchised communities for people to organize and providing supports such as translation and childcare to enable people to participate. It may also mean that traditionally disenfranchised groups are guaranteed representation on various committees. For example, DMiE25 requires gender balance on all its committees.

The WDC will also need to cultivate a respectful democratic culture. We can expect that different factions will form in the Caucus, and people will have strong opinions about issues. In addition, if the Caucus is successful, provocateurs will attempt to create schisms. If the Caucus splits the first time that it is faced with a tough decision, the Caucus will not be able to organize to scale. Thus, it is essential that there be an institutional commitment to working through differences in a timely and respectful way. Also, approaching problems with a spirit of experimentation can help individuals and groups work through conflict. Oftentimes the best course of action is not obvious, and different “solutions” can be tested on trial bases. In order to create a culture of mass participation, the Caucus can consider mandatory voting in referendums on major issues.

In sum, addressing the problem of bringing democracy to scale will be an ongoing challenge to the Caucus. Some activists dedicated to small-D democracy will be ideologically opposed to organize a mass party.⁶⁴ They cite the long history of “left” organizations which lacked democracy and lost touch with ordinary people, devolving into authoritarian organizations and governments.⁶⁵ However, the working class is in an existential struggle with the most powerful ruling class in history, which is leading humanity towards omnicide.⁶⁶ Leaders such as Reverend William Barber of the Poor People’s Campaign and Varshini Prakash of the Sunrise Movement have called for a united front.⁶⁷ Yet, ad hoc coalitions will not result in the organizational cohesion necessary to contest for power and govern. Moreover, movement politics are designed to put pressure on corporate politicians not to take power. To win, the working class needs institutional capacity—a party such as the WDC—to forge a democratic consensus on a strategy for taking power and the united discipline to put into action plans informed by that strategy. The strategy will integrate movement politics and electoral politics. Activists need to embrace the challenge of creating participatory democracy to govern a mass organization of millions of people.⁶⁸ The development of a well-functioning democratic mass political institution in and of itself will undermine the conservative assumption that rigid hierarchies are necessary to govern large organizations. The experience of mass participatory democracy will also embolden the working class’ vision of the possible.

Towards a People’s Platform: A WWII-like Mobilization to Create a Democratic, High-Quality Education, Full Employment, Clean Energy, and a Peace Political-Economy⁶⁹

The most important organizing tool for the WDC will be a democratically developed platform that presents a concrete common-sense plan for realizing a just, equitable and sustainable society. The platform will need to be created through a democratic process. However, based on the platforms of a number of progressive groups and parties, there is an emerging consensus regarding many values and goals (e.g., Sanders Campaign Platform, Green Party Platform, the Platform of the Movement for Black Lives, Jeremy Corbyn’s British Labour Party’s Manifesto, Reversing Runaway Inequality Now, DMiE25, Poor People’s Moral Budget and the Next System Project’s “Reversing Inequality: Unleashing the Transformative Potential of an Equitable Economy).⁷⁰

The economic cornerstone of the platform must be a Green New Deal, a government-led industrial/financial plan to create a clean energy, full-employment economy.⁷¹ Economist Robert Pollin and his colleagues at the Political Economy Research Institute (PERI) at the University of Massachusetts Amherst have developed a detailed industrial policy for building a full-employment green economy.⁷² First, the government needs to create a research infrastructure to drive the technological development for the new economy. Paradoxically, this research and development (R&D) plan can in part be modeled on the Pentagon’s R&D program. The foundation of the U.S. economy is military Keynesianism in which aggregate demand is bolstered by military spending. The Pentagon has funded more research and is responsible for more technological development than any other institution in history. By providing long-term research funding and guaranteed markets, the Pentagon has birthed technological advancements that are beyond the capacity of the private sector. For example, the internet was created by the U.S. military over a 35-year incubation period. However, military Keynesianism is notoriously corrupt (e.g., no-bid cost-plus contracts), inefficient and reinforces the current class and imperialist hierarchy.⁷³ Instead of investing in technology built for military domination and class control that can be indirectly spun off for commercial applications, the nation can develop an R&D program to invest directly in creating humane, environmentally sustainable technology, with the goal of meeting the material needs of all humanity in a sustainable manner.⁷⁴ An R&D for the 99% program can focus on clean energy, energy efficiency, mass transportation, high-end manufacturing, sustainable agriculture, public health, public education, environmental stewardship, etc.

Second, to encourage long-term investment in the clean-energy economy, industrial policy needs to create guaranteed markets for clean energy. This can be accomplished in several ways. First, both federal and state governments could mandate that the energy purchased by the government be clean energy. Second, utility companies can be required “to purchase electricity from private renewable energy generators at prices fixed by long-term contracts.”⁷⁵ Preferential tax treatment for clean energy investment can also provide incentives for capital investment in renewable energy. Third, carbon emissions must be priced to include their externality costs. This can be accomplished either through a carbon cap or carbon tax. A carbon cap sets a hard limit on the amount of carbon pollution that can be emitted by corporations such as energy companies. A carbon tax will increase the price of all fossil fuels, creating an incentive to cut fossil fuel use and develop clean energy. A number of policies could be devised to make sure the tax falls primarily on high users. Also, long term incremental increases in CO₂ emission standards will encourage the transition to renewable energy. Fourth, government policy must ensure that the clean energy sector has access to low-cost long-term financing. This could be accomplished by the creation of a democratically controlled national investment bank. Germany’s state investment bank has played a central role in making Germany a world leader in clean energy development. Through direct investment, loans, subsides, and loan guarantees for private investors, governments around the world (including China, Brazil and India) have modelled strategies for stimulating investment in clean energy and energy efficiency.

A Green New Deal can also spur the growth of alternative ownership models in the energy sector such as municipal and public companies, community and worker cooperatives and small business energy producers. Already in the U.S., one in seven U.S. citizens (49 million) receives their energy from community-owned not-for-profit public utility companies. Some of these public utilities are in large cities such as Los Angeles and Orlando, but most serve small rural communities. On average, the electricity bill of homes powered by public utilities is 13% less than those powered by corporate power companies. Community-owned power companies are competitive because they can operate with low profit margins.⁷⁶ For example, publicly owned wind farms have been successful in Western Europe for two decades. The key to realizing the potential of alternative ownership models of clean energy production is access to development capital.⁷⁷

To finance a Green New Deal, the U.S. will need to create a progressive tax system. The Poor People’s Moral Budget (PPMB) proposes 11 specific taxes on the rich, corporations and Wall Street.⁷⁸ In addition, we will need to make large cuts in the military. The current military is designed to project U.S. hegemony and not ensure security. The PPMB estimates the U.S. government can save $350 billion dollars annually with policy changes such as closing 60% of the over 800 U.S. overseas bases, ending the wars in Afghanistan, Yemen and elsewhere, cutting unnecessary weapons projects, and dismantling nuclear weapons. Current U.S. military policy undercuts security by starting wars, inciting terrorism, and diverting precious collective resources to imperialism.⁷⁹ U.S. citizens will be more secure if the U.S. builds a foreign policy based on diplomacy, mutual aid, and peaceful conflict resolution.

Creating a more egalitarian society will entail many other reforms. In a position paper for the Next System Project entitled “Reversing Inequality: Unleashing the Transformative Potential of an Equitable Economy,” Chuck Collins divides needed policy reforms into four categories. ⁸⁰ First are policies that guarantee the rights to minimal material standards for all citizens. These policies include mandating that the minimum wage be a living wage, universal healthcare, humane labor standards, a guaranteed minimum income, government-guaranteed employment, and humane “safety net” policies to protect families from catastrophes. Second, are policies to “level the playing field,” that is, eliminate power advantages based on class, race and gender, and universalizing the opportunity for people to realize their human potential. This includes eliminating the power advantages of corporations and other organizations which represent the interests of the oligarchs. Policies include: cradle to grave access to free quality education, public financing of elections, and fair trade rules guaranteeing the rights of workers and the environment. In addition to universal policies, targeted policies will be needed to address specific structural inequalities in local communities and of historically oppressed groups.⁸¹ For example, there needs to be specific programs to address racial discrimination and segregation in health, criminal justice, education, employment, housing and finance.⁸² Third, highly concentrated wealth needs to be “deconstructed” and redistributed. The start of the 21^st century is characterized by record levels of inequality not seen since the Gilded Age.⁸³ Collins proposes policies to dismantle the legal structure of wealth accumulation of the moneyed aristocracy. Some of the proposed policies include a variety of progressive income and wealth taxes, eliminating monopolies and enforcing antitrust laws, breaking up too-big-to-fail banks and expanding public and community banks, eliminating the off-shore tax haven system, and leveling the corporate pay structure with defined limits on the discrepancy between CEO and worker pay.

Lastly, Collins proposes policies to reorganize the workplace, finance and corporations to make these economic institutions more equitable, sustainable and democratic. First, he advocates for greatly expanding worker ownership and worker control of businesses. Second, in regard to democratizing investment, Collin proposes establishing a national infrastructure bank and a network of state public banks such as the Bank of North Dakota. Third, Collins states that the ethical and legal charters of corporations need to be fundamentally reorganized so that corporations are transparent and accountable to all stakeholders affected by their business, including workers, communities, nations and the environment.

Seizing the Historical Moment

The success of Sanders (and other progressives) in 2020 will depend on whether voters believe progressives are electable.⁸⁴ People like Sanders’ progressive agenda, but will ask, “Can he actually win?” The question can be rephrased: Do working people believe the working class is united enough to challenge the capitalist class for power?

In loosely organized coalitions, it is unlikely that the activist working class can organize the power necessary to either win the 2020 election or the larger struggle for power with the U.S. capitalist class. The ruling class is too powerful.

To organize the power necessary to confront the crisis, the working class needs an institutional home such as the proposed WDC. In the context of an enduring institution, the working class can organize the democratic capacity to coordinate and act in mass solidarity at the scale necessary to enact transformational change. Exercising mass solidarity can potentially catalyze a positive feedback loop. Successful mass electoral and movement actions can bolster class confidence emboldening the working class to organize and act in exponentially more effective ways. Many activists may be reticent to join a mass party fearing the possibility it will degenerate into a hierarchical bureaucracy. To allay this fear, the activists will have to build a party grounded in participatory democracy values.

Trump personifies the insanity of 21^st century capitalism. Humanity is recklessly creating and denying climate catastrophe. The imperative for action is clear. This is the time to organize working-class democracy to scale.