Phone numbers had allegedly been changed and fake email addresses submitted, meaning that some hopeful candidates could not contact Labour members to vote.

Seven swing states account for one-sixth of vulnerable US jobs, representing $119.5bn in income. In a close national election, that’s enough for AI-driven turbulence, especially with the likes of Bucks County, Pennsylvania, Gwinnett County, Georgia, or removedpa County, Arizona in play, where a few thousand votes can sway national outcomes. This bloc could turn out en masse in the 2026 midterms; by 2028, they could be decisive.

cross-posted from: https://news.abolish.capital/post/43334

With 93.34% of the ballots processed by the ONPE, blank and null votes in the Peruvian presidential elections exceed each of the candidates.

Blank and null votes in Peru’s presidential elections have surpassed 3 million, a figure higher than the votes received by right-wing candidate Keiko Fujimori, who leads the official count by the National Office of Electoral Processes (ONPE) with 93.34% of the votes tallied.

Between these two categories, 3,142,121 votes have been registered, equivalent to 16.63% of the total cast, while Fujimori has obtained 2,685,995 votes (14.22% of the total), representing 17.05% of valid votes.

The breakdown indicates that blank votes reach 2,197,516 (11.63%) and null votes total 944,605 ​​(5%). This situation was influenced by the field of 35 presidential candidates, which fragmented the electorate to the point that the sum of blank and null votes exceeded the individual votes for each candidate.

Blank votes alone surpassed 34 of the 35 candidates, and null votes exceeded 29 candidates. Peruvian electoral law establishes that elections can only be annulled if null votes reach two-thirds of the total votes cast, a threshold not reached in this process.

Text reads:

“The Electoral Observation Mission of the OAS recognized the effort made by the electoral bodies to remedy the operational deficiencies presented on election day”.

Analyst Laura Arroyo: ‘There Is No Longer Democracy in Peru, Only Power Structures Ruling the Elections’

Turbulent ElectionsMore than 27.3 million Peruvians were called to elect authorities for the 2026-2031 term, in a context of political instability marked by eight presidents in the last decade.

The election day saw delays in the opening of polling stations in Lima due to logistical problems in the distribution of electoral materials, forcing thirteen schools to open on Monday. These incidents prompted accusations of fraud by the far-right candidate Rafael López Aliaga (Popular Renewal), though no evidence was presented. Electoral observation missions determined that the setbacks did not affect the outcome, deeming the process credible and transparent.

So far, only Fujimori has secured his place in the second round, scheduled for June 7. The final race will be between the leftist Roberto Sánchez (Together for Peru) and the ultraconservative López Aliaga, according to official vote count data.

(Telesur) by HGV

From Orinoco Tribune via This RSS Feed.

cross-posted from: https://news.abolish.capital/post/42743

New York City mayor Zohran Mamdani has announced a historic new tax on owners of luxury second homes which are worth $5m or more, in a bid to raise $500m for the city. 

The ‘pied-à-terre tax’ will apply to people who do not live full time in the city but reap the rewards of investing in the New York real estate market.

Mamdani called the new tax “specifically designed for the richest of the rich” and said it was aimed at tackling a “fundamentally unfair system that hurts working New Yorkers”, in a video post on social media. 

The new tax was formally proposed by NY state governor Kathy Hochul, who added on X: “New Yorkers show up for this city every day. Some of the wealthiest property owners and foreign oligarchs don’t. It’s time they start contributing like everyone else.”

According to the New York Times, Hochul has been resistant to taxing large corporations and the city’s wealthiest residents. However, she was more open to taxing luxury second-homeowners who do not pay state or city income taxes because their primary residences are outside New York. 

The tax will contribute towards combatting New York City’s fiscal deficit, which is estimated to stand at $5.4bn through the next fiscal year.

Previous attempts to introduce a second-homes tax were quashed by powerful real estate developers, including as recently as 2019. 

Sophia Sheera is a journalist in Novara Media’s social media team.

From Novara Media via This RSS Feed.

cross-posted from: https://news.abolish.capital/post/42784

In a historic vote, 75% of Senate Democrats backed an effort to block weapons to Israel. The resolutions failed, but the vote was the latest sign of Democrats' growing consensus against aid to Israel, as support for the country hits an all-time low.

From Mondoweiss via This RSS Feed.

cross-posted from: https://news.abolish.capital/post/43182

Two months after her primary victory was declared a sign that progressive advocates for the working class can win elections "everywhere" in the US, organizer Analilia Mejia easily won a special election in New Jersey's 11th Congressional District on Thursday after a campaign dominated by big spending by the pro-Israel lobby.

Mejia, an organizer who worked on Sen. Bernie Sanders' (I-Vt.) 2020 presidential campaign and has served as executive director of the New Jersey Working Families Alliance, was outspoken in her support for expanding the Medicare program to the entire US population through the Medicare for All Act, abolishing US Immigration and Customs Enforcement, canceling student debt, and breaking up corporate monopolies.

“In one of the richest nations in the world, middle-class families, working-class families, should not find themselves falling behind in greater and greater debt, while billionaires consolidate their stranglehold on every aspect of our economy,” said Mejia in her victory speech.

The race was called by The Associated Press within minutes of polls closing Thursday night. With 94% of votes tallied as of early Friday afternoon, Mejia was nearly 20 points ahead of her opponent, Republican Joe Hathaway.

Despite the resounding victory, Hathaway insisted in his concession speech that the "broader electorate" is not enthusiastic about "the kind of far-left policies embraced by Ms. Mejia.”

Journalist Ryan Grim of Drop Site News noted that, as with other races in which progressives have challenged more moderate Democrats like former Rep. Tom Malinowski, whom Mejia ran against in the primary, "the argument was that candidates like Mejia couldn’t win this district."

Mejia is one of several progressive Democrats also running in the 2026 midterm elections, in which the Democratic Party is hoping to take control of at least one chamber of Congress to weaken President Donald Trump's grip on the federal government.

In Maine, political newcomer Graham Platner, a combat veteran and advocate for a billionaire's minimum tax, is running against Democratic Gov. Janet Mills in the primary; Mills was pushed by Senate Minority Leader Chuck Schumer (D-NY) to join the race. In Michigan, a new poll from Emerson College this week showed Medicare for All advocate Abdul El-Sayed statistically tied with state Sen. Mallory McMorrow (D-8); El-Sayed was eight points ahead of where he was in the same survey in January, following sustained attacks by McMorrow and a centrist group over his decision to campaign with an outspoken critic of Israel.

The result in New Jersey's 11th Congressional District, said Grim, "suggests a new world is possible."

In addition to pushing for policies to improve the lives of working New Jersey families, Mejia was the only candidate in the Democratic primary election in February who publicly stated that Israel's US-backed assault on Gaza is a genocide.

Journalist Zaid Jilani noted that—with public support for Israel plummeting, including among Jewish voters, as it wages war on Gaza, Iran, and Lebanon—Mejia's position didn't prevent largely Jewish communities in the 11th District from supporting her.

Hathaway accused Mejia of being antisemitic over her criticism of Israel's assault on Gaza, an allegation she vehemently rejected during a debate.

“As a member of Congress, I would use every legislative power at my disposal to protect the rights of Jewish constituents and convene spaces to educate and to fight antisemitism, because I know it’s real,” she said.

During the primary, the United Democracy Project, a super political action committee aligned with the powerful pro-Israel lobby group the American Israel Public Affairs Committee, focused its attention on Malinowski, attacking the longtime supporter of Israel for his criticism of far-right Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu. The group's spending against Malinowski appeared to backfire, benefiting Mejia, who has been more outspoken in her objections to Israel's violent policies.

Mejia was elected to fill the seat left vacant by Gov. Mikie Sherrill, also a Democrat, for the next eight months. She has already entered the race for the November election, and Hathaway has signaled he plans to run as well.

The progressive advocacy group Our Revolution said that by electing Mejia to represent the 11th District, voters "chose people over corporations."

"They chose to send an organizer to Congress," said the group, "to fight for radical change and build a better Democratic Party."

From Common Dreams via This RSS Feed.

cross-posted from: https://news.abolish.capital/post/42758

Sen. Chuck Schumer faced fresh calls to step aside as the Senate Democratic leader on Wednesday after he broke with the overwhelming majority of his caucus and voted against a pair of resolutions aimed at preventing the Trump administration from selling more US bombs and bulldozers to Israel.

"Mr. Schumer, you are out of touch with the base of this party, and with your own caucus," Rep. Ro Khanna (D-Calif.), who first called on Schumer to resign as Democratic leader last year, said in a short video posted to social media following Wednesday's votes. "Step aside."

The two resolutions, led by Sen. Bernie Sanders (I-Vt.), called for halting the sale of around $450 million worth of bulldozers, 1,000-pound bombs, and related military equipment to the Israeli government, which has repeatedly used American weaponry to commit war crimes in the illegally occupied Palestinian territories, Lebanon, and Syria.

Despite facing record opposition from the Senate Democratic caucus—with 40 votes against the sale of bulldozers and 36 votes against the sale of bombs—the resolutions failed to pass, as Senate Republicans united against them.

But strong Democratic opposition to new US weapons sales to Israel was seen as evidence that the party is slowly catching up to its base, which overwhelmingly supports restricting American military aid to Israel.

"The fact that 40 of 47 Democratic senators voted to withhold military hardware from Israel is a new high-water mark in holding Israel accountable for violating US and international law," said Dylan Williams, vice president for government affairs at the Center for International Policy.

Williams went on to rebuke Schumer, who has led the Senate Democrats for nearly a decade, for opposing the resolutions "against the supermajority of his own caucus and Democratic voters."

"It’s well past time for him to step aside for leaders who actually represent the views of the party’s base," said Williams.

The votes on the Israeli arms measures came after the Senate rejected another war powers resolution aimed at withdrawing US forces from the illegal assault on Iran, which President Donald Trump launched without congressional approval—and in partnership with Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu—in late February.

Schumer vocally supported the Iran war powers resolution. But one of his colleagues, Sen. Ed Markey (D-Mass.), said the efforts to end the US-Israeli war on Iran and the push to halt weapons sales to Israel are interconnected.

"A vote to approve arms sales to Israel at this time would be seen as a message of approval for Trump and Netanyahu’s disastrous war against Iran. I will not send that message," Markey said in a statement late Wednesday. "Why would we send American military weapons that could prolong, escalate, or worsen this horrible situation in the Middle East? I say no more."

J Street, the pro-Israel liberal advocacy organization, similarly connected the two fights following Wednesday's votes.

"We continue to oppose Trump and Netanyahu’s war of choice against Iran, and applaud those senators whose principled stand in today’s vote reflects the American public’s strong opposition to both the Iran war and to Israel’s actions in Lebanon, Gaza, and the West Bank that undermine efforts for peace in the region," said Jeremy Ben-Ami, the group's president.

From Common Dreams via This RSS Feed.

cross-posted from: https://news.abolish.capital/post/42753

The US Senate votes down a resolution aimed at blocking arms sales to Israel, but anti-Israel sentiment are markedly growing among lawmakers.

From Presstv via This RSS Feed.

cross-posted from: https://news.abolish.capital/post/41228

A group of Democrats in the US House of Representatives on Thursday demanded that any ceasefire deal to pause the war in Iran must force Israel to halt its operations in Lebanon, and called for the passage of a war powers resolution to help end the attacks.

Although the US, Iran, and Israel agreed to a two-week ceasefire on Tuesday, Israel has continued its bombing campaign in Lebanon, killing more than 250 people on Wednesday alone.

Iran has said it will not abide by a deal to reopen the Strait of Hormuz until the attacks on Lebanon stop, while Pakistan, which helped broker the ceasefire, has insisted that halting strikes on Lebanon has always been part of the agreement.

In a Thursday social media post, Rep. Rashida Tlaib (D-Mich.) promoted a resolution she introduced in late March that called on the US to force Israel to stop its campaign in Lebanon, which has killed and wounded thousands of people while displacing more than 1 million more.

"I didn't wait for the genocidal regime of Israel to kill over 250 people in Lebanon yesterday to file resolutions to stop the US funding of these war crimes," wrote Tlaib. "So for colleagues speaking up now, welcome, but also don't just tweet, support the war powers resolution to save lives."

The call to include Lebanon in any ceasefire didn't just come from progressives like Tlaib, but from centrist members such as Rep. Valerie Foushee (D-NC), who recently defeated a progressive primary challenger who heavily criticized her past support from the American Israeli Public Affairs Committee (AIPAC).

"I am signing Rep. Tlaib's war powers resolution to stop all US military involvement in Israel’s hostilities in Lebanon," Foushee said. "The war in Lebanon has displaced nearly 1 million people and has claimed the lives of thousands. Our federal government must hold itself to higher humanitarian standards than participating in a war that is putting innocent people at risk."

Rep. Debbie Dingell (D-Mich.) didn't explicitly endorse Tlaib's resolution, but affirmed that any ceasefire deal needed to curtail Israel's Lebanon campaign.

"This ceasefire must become a permanent peace. That means including Lebanon," wrote Dingell. "Netanyahu helped walk us into war, but he cannot keep us there."

Tlaib's resolution, which was introduced on March 27, calls for the US to force Israel to end its incursion and to withdraw its forces from Lebanese territory, while providing humanitarian aid and guaranteeing a right of return for all displaced Lebanese people.

Anti-war advocacy organization Just Foreign Policy encouraged Democratic leaders to get on board with Tlaib's resolution.

"Let's hope that leadership of House Democrats can support Rep. Tlaib's war powers resolution—without any delay!" the group wrote.

The group called on voters to demand that House Minority Leader Hakeem Jeffries (D-NY), House Foreign Affairs Committee Ranking member Gregory Meeks (D-NY), and other leaders to "do so—and say they'll support the House floor vote—NOW!"

On Thursday, House Republicans blocked Democrats' efforts to force a vote on a war powers resolution that would halt Trump's Iran war, although the party is expected to try again next week when Congress is scheduled to return to Washington, DC.

From Common Dreams via This RSS Feed.

cross-posted from: https://news.abolish.capital/post/40815

A socialist political earthquake strikes Seattle

Originally published: Socialist Project - The Bullet on March 31, 2026 by Yuly Chan (more by Socialist Project - The Bullet)  | (Posted Apr 08, 2026)

Newswire

In recent years, municipal politics has emerged as an essential and viable arena for building socialist leadership and movements. In 2013, a group of socialists built an electoral strategy and a working-class-led movement to take on the corporate structure in Seattle, which is home to some of America's largest corporations, including Amazon, Boeing, Microsoft, and Starbucks. Jonathan Rosenblum's book, We're Coming for You and Your Rotten System: How Socialists Beat Amazon and Upended Big-City Politics (OR Books 2025) examines how this movement disrupted the political terrain in Seattle and raised the bar for what the Left can achieve, even under the most seemingly difficult times.

The book centers on the coalition of activists and organizations of this movement, led by Kshama Sawant. Sawant, a software engineer with a PhD in Economics, became active during the 2011 Occupy Seattle movement. She was recruited by the Socialist Alternative (SA), an international socialist organization that emerged out of the New Communist Movement in the 1970s. Sawant ran for city council in 2013 against a top Democratic Party member on council at the time, on a platform to raise the minimum wage in Seattle to $15 an hour. Rosenblum, who was former director of the SeaTac Airport workers' Fight for $15 campaign, describes how the momentum between Sawant's campaign for city council and the fight for $15 was synergistic. But even though workers were excited about their win, most of their paycheques went to their landlords.

Like many major cities around the world, the fight for affordable housing in Seattle took center stage in the mid-2010s. As Rosenblum writes, an average of 1,000 people were moving to Seattle every week during the city's tech boom, and developers and big landlords took advantage of this boom by raising rents and gentrifying previously affordable neighborhoods. Between 2012 and 2016, Seattle area rents increased by 29 percent, and homelessness grew by 21 percent to over 10,000 people on the streets. In the Central District, the Black population went from 70 to 15 percent.

Insurgent Politics

Reflecting back on his time as a staff organizer in Sawant's office, Rosenblum argues that the Tax Amazon movement in Seattle embodied a new kind of left politics, which he calls Marxist insurgent politics. It is neither a recipe for organizing nor a policy framework but rather a set of methods and principles for advancing socialist struggles in the twenty-first century that center around three key pillars: 1) a class struggle approach; 2) making bold demands; and 3) building popular movement democracy. When Sawant became councilmember, she immediately refused to participate in back-handed deals between labour union leaders, the Democrats, and corporate executives to undermine the fight for $15. Taking a class-structure approach, Sawant exposed the rifts between labour leaders and their members, as well as elected officials and their working-class constituents. She launched an alternative grassroots campaign for the fight for $15, led by rank-and-file members. The second pillar centers on developing bold demands that signal the need for systemic change, such as the fight for $15 and Tax Amazon, and seeing them through to victory. To be clear, the tax was aimed at large firms, but Amazon was the largest revenue source of the tax given the size of the company. Third, the movement emphasized hard-hitting tactics with grassroots organizing and participatory democracy. Organizing neighborhood and citywide meetings to build consensus, alliances, and demands, and mobilizing for the city's annual budget review were ways in which the movement built democratic participation. For Sawant and the SA, it is not only important what a movement can win for the working class but also how it wins.

Rosenblum claims that Marxist insurgent politics represents a radical departure from the road of incremental reformist politics that has come to dominate much of the Left, particularly among European Social Democrats and in the US, within organizations such as the Democratic Socialists of America (DSA) and the Justice Democrats. To back this claim, Rosenblum covers a lot of ground. From revolutionary parliamentarism in Europe in the 1900s to the beginnings of the international Socialist Alternative in the 1960s, Rosenblum reconstructs nearly 175 years of Marxist political struggles, showing how reformist-minded socialists have retreated from class struggle by making compromises with the capitalist class and demobilizing the working class. The seeds of the Tax Amazon movement were also planted during key moments of Seattle's history of mobilizations against corporate power, from the anti-globalization protests in 1999, to the anti-war movement in the early 2000s, and Occupy Seattle in 2011. This history informed how Sawant and the SA approached struggles over policy and secured important wins, including the expansion of tenant and workplace rights, taxing big business to fund social housing, with the explicit goal of building a working-class coalition that could challenge the ruling class. The book itself is largely told through the voices and stories of key activists in the movement, positioning readers within some of the key debates and conversations at the time.

A New Coalitional Politics for the Left

While Rosenblum's three pillars of class struggle, bold demands, and democracy provide a useful starting point for understanding the general theory and strategy of the movement, as a housing activist in Vancouver during the same time period, I was drawn to the distinct approach that Sawant and the activists around her took toward movement building: 1) building a broad-based coalition; 2) organizing rank-and-file members outside of the labour unions; 3) developing principled socialist leadership; 4) advancing socialist politics at the municipal level.

First, the movement achieved what most housing struggles have not -- it merged struggles for labour, housing, and racial justice (which are often treated as separate primary class struggles in the realm of production and secondary struggles in the realm of consumption). Years of groundwork culminated in a cross-sectoral coalition of activists from labour unions, housing organizations, and Black Lives Matter. The tax was passed at the height of the Black Lives Matter protests in 2021, when BLM activists forced the Democrats on city council to raise the tax rates to $214-million a year to fund at least 750 of new union-built social housing units per year, as well as $20-million for Green New Deal funding, and Sawant's amendment that an additional $18-million be dedicated toward new affordable housing for Blacks. In 2024, the tax's revenue generated an actual revenue of $360-million because of Amazon's payroll income. The victory of the Amazon Tax, as Rosenblum underscores, is thus a victory of the BLM movement.

Second, both the fight for $15 and the Tax Amazon movement organized rank-and-file members outside of the unions. The movement had a clear strategy to reject business unionism -- the practice of unions that solely focus on improving wages, hours, and working conditions within the framework of capitalism rather than toward the achievement of extensive social changes or reforms for the working class. Sawant revealed how labour leaders and Democrats were willing to compromise with corporate CEOs on the fight for $15 as well as the tax on Amazon, with some even defending Amazon as a responsible developer that also pays living wages. But organizing rank-and-file members also comes with significant challenges for the workers themselves. Rosenblum gives examples of how members of the Carpenters' union who joined the Tax Amazon movement found themselves in hostile situations where they faced the wrath of their fellow members and union leaders. This means that it is crucial to identify what Jane McAlevey calls 'organic leaders' -- workers that can influence and persuade other workers -- as well as activists, and for the movement to support and back rank-and-file members.

The third lesson is about building principled socialist leadership -- how to lead as individuals and as a movement -- without compromising on core values. In the US, Sawant's electoral victory in 2013 was part of a wave of high-profile democratic socialists who were elected to office, from Bernie Sanders to AOC to the Squad members, and most recently, Zohran Mamdani. Rosenblum argues that while all of these candidates channeled working-class outrage toward the ruling class, Sawant's leadership differs sharply from progressive Democrats because she is uncompromising and actively builds democratic participation throughout her campaigns.

Rosenblum also highlights what leadership looks like in different phases of a movement -- leadership in the face of defeat as well as victories, and while navigating splits and debates within coalitions and organizations. The key lesson here is about developing a perspective that political disagreements and setbacks are often neither permanent nor necessarily destructive to a movement. The first version of Amazon tax was repealed in 2018 before it was brought back in 2020 and passed at a higher rate. During a crucial wildcat strike that was organized by construction workers, activists also engaged with pro-Trump supporters who were initially hostile toward Sawant, but they were won over by her support of their strike. These events are a reminder that circumstances always change, and contradictions can shift. Socialist leadership has to be attuned to new contradictions as they emerge.

The fourth crucial lesson is that municipal politics is indispensable to advancing a transformative socialist agenda. The Seattle experience was part of a global wave of housing struggles in major cities worldwide, including in Barcelona, Berlin, and Vancouver. These struggles all took up housing in various ways, including housing activists that ran for city council, as in the case with Barcelona, to build municipal socialism. But even without control over the mayoralty or majority over city council, Sawant and the SA shows how labour and housing rights could be expanded at the local level. During her ten years in office, Sawant introduced policies to support workers, including mandating employers to pay for workers' parking, restoring the right to strike and a ban on no-strike clauses in city construction projects, as well as penalties for wage theft.

However, the book also raises additional questions. A demand to tax Amazon is certainly bold, but what is the transformational vision that accompanies this insurgent approach against Amazon? A paradox often accompanies such victories, where workers' livelihoods are improved, but the capitalist firms can continue to operate, and in the case of Amazon, they are expanding exponentially into various sectors of the economy and our lives through healthcare, courier services, groceries, online data management, and media content. Further, while Rosenblum insists on organizing new activists to take on insurgent politics, what is the political vehicle that they can join, especially after the campaign or movement? The book also raises a key issue that plagues the Left, which is how to build and sustain alternative working-class organizations, outside of mainstream unions and political parties, which can then control the state from outside as opposed to trying to change it from within.

Rosenblum provides a crucial starting point to reflect on these questions and has written this book to encourage -- even insisting -- activists to take up creative and confrontational approaches to class struggle. Activists will find this book to be an important read, particularly those who are organizing against Amazon, as well as social housing activists. But those who are supporting electoral campaigns and running for city council as progressives will also find many insights.

Yuly Chan was a community organizer in Vancouver, BC, for over a decade. She is a post-doctoral fellow at New York University studying housing and labour struggles.

Monthly Review does not necessarily adhere to all of the views conveyed in articles republished at MR Online. Our goal is to share a variety of left perspectives that we think our readers will find interesting or useful. ---Eds.

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cross-posted from: https://news.abolish.capital/post/39706

Sen. Bernie Sanders endorsed socialist New York State Assembly Member Claire Valdez on Thursday in a Democratic primary shaping up as a test of how factions of New York City’s progressive wing will work together under Mayor Zohran Mamdani.

The race to replace retiring Rep. Nydia Velázquez in New York’s 7th Congressional District has put major progressive organizations and figures at odds. Hoping to capitalize on growing national frustration with conservative Democrats and lingering momentum from Mamdani’s win in November, national progressives and their counterparts in New York are fighting to succeed Velázquez with an ally in Congress.

They just haven’t agreed on who it should be.

Sanders, the Vermont independent, is giving a boost to the socialist wing behind Valdez’s campaign, which includes Mamdani and the New York City chapter of the Democratic Socialists of America, the campaign shared with The Intercept.

“Claire Valdez is a union organizer who worked minimum-wage fast food jobs and understands firsthand how this economy fails working people,” Sanders said in a statement to The Intercept. “In my view, Congress needs more voices who come from America’s working class. Claire has the experience and vision we need to take on the oligarchy and fight for unions, Medicare for All, and affordable housing. I’m proud to endorse her campaign for Congress.”

Velázquez has endorsed Brooklyn Borough President Antonio Reynoso, Valdez’s main competitor. Reynoso also has backing from leading progressive officials and groups in New York City like Public Advocate Jumaane Williams and the New York Working Families Party.

Already facing losses this cycle in races where competing progressive candidates did not consolidate their support, national progressives like Sanders are picking sides in the battle to define the future of the electoral left under Mamdani.

[

Related

Nydia Velázquez Hears Calls for Generational Change, Setting Up a Fight on the Left in New York](https://theintercept.com/2025/11/22/new-york-democrats-nydia-velazquez-retire/)

Velázquez endorsed Reynoso shortly after Valdez launched her campaign in January standing alongside Mamdani and United Auto Workers President Shawn Fain. Some local observers saw Velázquez’s move as a rebuke of the mayor and a harbinger of a fight between factions of New York City’s left, endangering a relationship Mamdani and Velázquez had built since she became the first member of Congress to back his mayoral campaign.

Velázquez left little room to speculate on that question in comments she made to the New York Times in January, when she said Mamdani had opened up conflict between groups in his coalition by involving himself in primaries; that she was unfamiliar with Valdez, who is originally from Texas; and that she was skeptical of newcomers to the city who think they know who should represent New Yorkers in office.

In a statement to The Intercept, Valdez named Sanders as a key inspiration for her political beliefs and career.

“Three things made me a democratic socialist: shitty jobs, the labor movement, and Bernie Sanders’ runs for president,” Valdez said. “His political revolution changed my life — and showed millions of Americans what’s possible when working people organize. I’m grateful for this endorsement and ready to join the fight in Congress against the oligarchs and for economic democracy.”

On Wednesday, the Valdez campaign announced that it had raised $750,000 from 11,200 donors in the filing period that just ended, though the Federal Election Commission has not yet processed and verified the figures. Reynoso had raised just over $317,500 by the end of 2025, before Valdez launched her campaign, according to available FEC data. His campaign has not yet announced its most recent fundraising figures and did not immediately respond to a request for comment.

Valdez’s endorsements include PAL PAC, the new pro-Palestine group opposing the American Israel Public Affairs Committee; Justice Democrats; Leaders We Deserve PAC; Jewish Voice for Peace Action; attorney and political advocate Zephyr Teachout; Democratic New York state Sen. Jabari Brisport; and several members of the New York State Assembly.

Reynoso’s backers include Make the Road Action; New York Communities for Change; several powerful local unions including 32BJ SEIU and DC-37; Attorney General Letitia James; New York Democratic Reps. Jerry Nadler and Pat Ryan; and several New York City Council members.

The post Bernie Sanders Backs Claire Valdez in NYC House Race Dividing Left and Progressives appeared first on The Intercept.

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cross-posted from: https://news.abolish.capital/post/39675

Jeremy Corbyn’s Your Party (YP) and Zack Polanski’s Green Party appear to be making moves towards rehabilitating Zionism. Instead of opposing its colonialist ideology, they seem more inclined to support it.

A recent landmark motion which declared Zionism as a form of racism was railroaded by pro-Israel members at the Green Party’s spring conference. The blatant filibustering on display has devastated the huge proportion of the Green’s membership who rightfully demand an anti-Zionist stance.

However, disappointment for progressives does not end there. Corbyn’s YP appear to have taken heed of the subsequent fallout. Furthermore, an elected member of the Central Executive Committee (CEC) for Wales has suggested the new party entirely abandon its anti-Zionist pledge.

Once again, leaders appear to be choosing to give in to pressure rather than stand firm in recognition of Palestinians inherent and inalienable right to their own sovereign territory. After all, no ideology should afford anyone the right to dispossess, disavow, or displace another. Whether peaceful or violent, Zionism is an existential threat to Palestinians and frankly, anyone who stands in their way.

Host of Palestine Declassified Chris Williamson confronted Polanski’s “catastrophic error” on X:

I've been very complimentary about @ZackPolanski's stance on the economy, and I still believe an electoral agreement necessary for the next election. But he's making a catastrophic error in trying to appease Zionists. Jeremy Corbyn made that mistake, yet they still destroyed him.… https://t.co/D2oscA3aAS

— Chris Williamson (@DerbyChrisW) April 2, 2026

Destroying Polanski’s suggestion that this is a ‘nuanced debate’, Williamson wrote:

There is nothing “nuanced” about Zionism, Zack and it’s not “complicated” either. Zionism is a Jewish supremacist ideology. This turbocharged racism normalises apartheid and genocide. It must be confronted and defeated. You cannot dodge this question, Zack. The Zionists are coming for you no matter what you do.

So your only realistic option is to fight them. If you don’t, then you’ve already lost.

We’ve been here before

The 2019 antisemitism crisis in Corbyn’s Labour left socialists across the country demoralised and politically homeless, as the party purged Jewish anti-Zionist members over the contentious claim that their anti-Zionist beliefs were antisemitic.

Polanski himself has spoken about lessons he learned from his own poor behaviour at the time, in which he unquestioningly jumped on the antisemitism bandwagon pushed by the right-wing, pro-Israel, billionaire-owned media.

Yet when push comes to shove, both leaders seem unable to stand up against Zionism. Polanski, in particular, goes to great lengths to sanitise the ideology. He portrays it as though pro-Palestinian activists object only to its violent methods rather than its core principles.

As already mentioned, he isn’t alone in his apparent wilful ignorance. Corbyn, despite the destructive impact of Zionists within Labour, is now being asked by another elected official in Wales, Maria Donnellan, to abandon YP’s anti-Zionist pledge. Time will tell if Corbyn will resist but history suggests that concessions are his default response.

In protest at what they see as a move toward capitulation, members are reminding their leaders that they must confront Zionism at its roots.

Matthew Walker shared Donnellan’s messages following a leak from the YP WhatsApp group:

Shocking leaked Whatsapp messages show Your Party CEC member Maria Donnellan (@Maria4CEC4Cymru) arguing that YP shouldn't adopt an anti-zionist policy.

She describes zionism as "Jewish peoples movement for self-determination in their historic homeland."

This is liberal zionism pic.twitter.com/C500Jji99g

— Matthew Walker (@matthewjswalker) March 29, 2026

It’s funny how Palestinians never seem to have an inalienable right to their own homeland, as is afforded to Zionists. This comes regardless of the fact that Palestinians have lived on that land—their land—for generations. Ignoring the mass murder, dispossession, terrorism and oppression they have lived under for nearly 80 years, it seems some seek to rehabilitate ‘softer’ versions of this settler-colonialist ideology.

Cambridge YP’s divisive Kika even deplorably sought to argue that CEC members should be ‘exempt from scrutiny’:

More disgusting zionism from the Your Party whatsapp group today in response to the member petition to recall @Maria4CEC4Cymru from the CEC.

In defense of Maria, Kika claims that jewish people have a right to self-determination on stolen Palestinian land because of the holocaust https://t.co/999UJHCr0b pic.twitter.com/eXhSpEM5Qn

— Matthew Walker (@matthewjswalker) March 31, 2026

Doomed to repeat old failures

Of course, no one wants their racist views unearthed. Still, their hurt feelings do not equate to the sustained suffering and murder of Palestinians due to Zionist policy.

On the other hand, YP and Green members are standing firm and refusing to be deterred. They are demanding stronger leadership. In addition, they insist that Palestinians’ suffering under Zionism cannot be ignored — whether it comes from the political left or the right.

Connections co-founder Anwarul Khan did not mince his words as he expressed his disgust at YP’s direction of travel. He posted on X:

Ffs. Did not take long for zionist poison to infiltrate the party. With what happened in Greens yesterday and this. Its really depressing that this racist ideology is allowed to fester anywhere, let alone YP.

Journalist Paul Holden published “The Fraud” last year. He unearthed the scandal that purged so many socialist members and destroyed Labour’s chances in the 2019 general election.

Writing in the Canary, Holden wrote:

Broadly, the ‘antisemitism crisis’ wove a series of discrete allegations of anti-Jewish rhetoric or discrimination, levelled against individual Labour members as well as the party’s leadership and institutional practices, into a comprehensive indictment: that Corbyn’s Labour Party was deeply antisemitic, and that this antisemitism flowed from the left-wing ideology Corbyn espoused.

Polanski’s stewardship of the Greens appears set on a similarly troubling trajectory. An open letter sent to the party just yesterday details how actors are levelling allegations of antisemitism against anti-Zionist members.

We wrote about the open letter, in which Hamza Egal—chair of Global Majority Greens and elected SOC member—said:

A serious dimension of this pattern has been the repeated use of accusations of antisemitism — deployed not only against me but against many members of this party who oppose Zionism and its racist ideology and practice. For a Black Muslim man raising concerns about racism, governance, and Palestine solidarity, these accusations have taken on a particularly targeted character.

Another antisemitism crisis appears to be brewing

It is clear that Zionists are hard at work in the Greens and YP after recognising the huge support amongst members for the liberation of our Palestinian brothers and sisters. It has long been clear, amidst over 30 national demonstrations opposing Israel and its genocide, that the British public believe in international law and the importance of doing what is right; not what is easy.

After all, authorities have not made speaking up for Palestine easy, repeatedly using lawfare to shut down advocacy for Palestinians’ fundamental rights whilst working to restrict freedom of speech in the UK.

Anti-Zionism is not antisemitism. In fact, many argue that Zionism in itself is antisemitic.

Andrew Feinstein, son of a holocaust survivor who lost her family to Hitler’s true antisemitism, refuses to sit back and watch the continual dilution of antisemitism:

People like Heidi Bachram do more to render antisemitism meaningless by regarding criticism of Israel as antisemitic. To suggest that all Jews are of one mind about Israel or anything else is deeply offensive. To many such as Stephen Kapos or my survivor mother, the lesson of… https://t.co/WvkDntMNxj

— Andrew Feinstein (@andrewfeinstein) March 31, 2026

Featured image via the Canary

By Maddison Wheeldon

From Canary via This RSS Feed.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=iGeuojm7Wp4

https://xcancel.com/DropSiteNews/status/2039144844791050567#m

　清瀬市Hiromi Harada (50), the former vice-chairman of the city council, was elected on the 29th, and the unaffiliated incumbent, Mr. Keiji Shibuya (52)LDP, recommended by the former deputy chairman of the city council, defeated the incumbent, Mr. Keiji Shibuya (52) LDP, Komei recommendation, and decided to win the election for the first time. The number of voters on the day was sixty-two hundred and sixty-six. Voter turnout was 40 and 18% (39 and 41% last time).

　Mr. Harada, who decided to win the election, said, "We were able to win with the power of the citizens. I thought it was difficult with a high wall, but there was a voice of citizens who wanted to change it somehow," he said.

　A former hospital worker, he was first elected to the City Council in 2003 by the Communist Party. He served until his sixth term.

　During the election campaign, he emphasized his experience in enhancing medical care and child-rearing environments, and emphasized the idea of "creating a town that makes use of the voices of citizens." He appealed for the reopening of the closed municipal library, and criticized the current municipal government, saying, 'The closure was a failure.' He also aimed to establish a branch office of the city hall around Kiyose Station and enact the Children's Rights Ordinance, and expanded support.

linky to tweet

well, the source is pro-entity rag, but they were correct about obamdani pivots in summer, so take under advisement

linky