I had a text message exchange with a member of East Bay DSA who had contacted me to try to get me to campaign for Jovanka Beckles, yet another liberal Democrat they are supporting. We had the following exchange:

EBDSA
Hi John, it’s J___ from EBDSA
Our endorsed member & state senate candidate, Jovanka [Beckles], is being voted on now!

Can we count on you to canvass with us this Saturday?

self:
When will EBDSA ever put any effort into running independent, working class candidates, outside of and opposed to the Democratic Party? Until then, DSA will remain nothing but the youth wing of the Democrats.

EBDSA
When we have the capacity and ability to do so, we’re working on building an independent platform and running slates, but at the moment in East Bay most candidates we endorse are also endorsed by the democratic party.

We do work with non-Democratic party endorsed candidates such as Gayle McLaughlin up in Richmond though, so we are not tied to the Democrats, it’s just that most of the candidates seeking our endorsement also seek Democratic party endorsements. 

Self
I have seen this argument for 30 years inside the union movement. It was always an excuse to do nothing to break from the Democrats. Look at what happened in the 2022 Oakland elections. There was no reason in the world that EBDSA could not have organized to run its own candidates as working class socialists who were running on a platform of opposition to the entire Democratic Party, which in Oakland is the creature of the real estate developers. This was proven by the fact that every single candidate for mayor supported the Howard Terminal real estate boondoggle – with one single exception: Myself. I ran as the working class socialist candidate campaigning on the need for a working class party. I asked EBDSA to consider endorsing my campaign but didn’t even get the courtesy of a reply and EBDSA as a whole completely ignored my campaign. There is no reason whatsoever that EBDSA could not take the initiative at this time and run such candidates in Oakland this year. Well, there is one reason: It would run afoul of such liberal Democrats as Beckles.

EBDSA
I’m sorry that your request for endorsement was ignored, that is not something the current Electoral committee would do.
I disagree that we have had the capacity or candidates to organize our own slate right now, but that is what we are working towards.

….

I think the main thing holding us back is the lack of interest in electoral work right now though, as a whole the chapter agrees we need to do this and move away from the Democrats, but there are only a few of us in the Electoral committee.

Self
The problem is that EBDSA and DSA as a whole is deeply embedded in the liberal wing of the Democratic Party, and that leaves you with a problem: How can you campaign for somebody like Beckles while at the same time explaining that the liberal wing of the Democratic Party is just bait for the trap? How can you campaign for working class candidates and a working class party and explain that the Oakland Democratic Party in essence is based on the real estate developers, while you campaign for some of these exact same Democrats? The proof is in the pudding. Take for example the #1 issue that was roiling Oakland politics for years – the Howard Terminal (Oakland A’s) project. It, along with gentrification, which is huge in Oakland, were central in Oakland’s black working class community. Every single Oakland Democrat supported that scam because it was the issue of the day for the real estate developers. And what was EBDSA’s position? They pointedly ignored the issue. Why? Because their candidates supported the project, every single one of them. Yet that would have been the perfect opening to run candidates around and raise the need for a working class party.

Of course, had EBDSA done so, they would have had a sharp conflict with the entire union bureaucracy and the NGO’s as well as the very same Democrats it supported.

[No reply from EBDSA]

Self 2 hours later:
One further point: You talk about a lack of interest in political work. Did it ever occur to you that maybe most members – and Oakland’s workers and working class youth in general – are not really interested in campaigning for yet another liberal Democrat, but if EBDSA struck out on a new path, and really started taking steps towards building a working class socialist alternative they would spark a LOT of interest?