by Amar Ahmad
When I was interning for a self-described progessive member of Congress (Katherine Clark), I saw first hand the tremendous amount of pressure exerted by Democratic leadership (including Clark) on more left-wing members of Congress, such as Ayanna Pressley.
It is only human nature to want to be accepted by peers and colleagues. The degree to which the more progressive members are marginalized by their own party leadership, would be disturbing to most people. While these progressives campaigned in a way that inspired many of us and gave us hope for a better Congress, the new progressive Squad members have been unwilling to challenge Democratic leadership.
If left alone, Squad members will continue to drift rightward until they are ideologically indistinguishable from the Democratic members whom they replaced. That is why it is so important for us to continue to challenge progressive members of Congress to counteract the corrosive, corrupting, establishment culture of D.C.
In the past three years there have been times where progressive members held leverage over party leadership. Rather than use this leverage to push for progressive policies, Squad members capitulated to party leadership time and time again.Far too often, not only do we not challenge our progressive legislators, we shame others for doing so. We fear that challenging progressive lawmakers will alienate them. We fear that it will help Republicans.
One example is the #ForceTheVote campaign. When there was real, grassroots momentum (perhaps over a million people) encouraging progressive members of Congress to withhold voting for Nancy Pelosi as Speaker of the House, unless she supported a floor vote for Medicare-for-all, it was the single-payer organizers at the forefront of denouncing this strategy. As Healthcare-NOW organizer, Stephanie Nakajima notes, the strategy was not supported by “a single organization or union fighting for Medicare for All.” This fact is not an indictment of the strategy, rather it is a failure of the organizations and unions. For organizations and people who constantly fetishize “movement-building,” when genuine grassroots movements form, these organizations do a tremendous job of squashing them through their progressive gatekeeping.
Nakajima goes on to write that backers of #ForceTheVote adopted a “faulty analysis — without significant consultation of organizing groups” and “instead of funneling people into the organizations that are base-building locally, #ForceTheVote became a purity test that distracted from the less-glamorous work of organizing and perhaps even undermined it.” The self-aggrandizing piece is basically telling the ignorant masses to fall in line behind the all-knowing “grassroots organizers.” With such a condescending and paternalistic attitude, is it any surprise why so many Americans have disdain for progressives?
With Democrats controlling the White House, and Democratic majorities in the House and Senate, progressive priorities such as Medicare-for-all, ending wars, and more, can never pass — or even get voted on — without the support of Democratic Party leadership. Every congressperson knows this, and thus all the co-sponsorships, progressive rhetoric, letters to Biden, tweets, and media appearances are all theater. When Republicans retake the House or Senate or Presidency, Democrats and progressives will pivot to once again blaming the Republicans for why we can’t pass progressive legislation, even though Democrats don’t pass progressive legislation when they have power.
Progressive members of Congress, when they had leverage, did not extract any meaningful concessions. Progressive organizations, unions, and organizers did not bother asking their allies in Congress to use their leverage when it counted. Instead, they focused their energy wagging their fingers at (the much larger group of) people who supported #ForceTheVote. The so-called grassroots organizers jumped through mental gymnastics in their attempts to explain why progressives should vote for Pelosi — even without significant policy concessions.
Enacting progressive, legislative change will require the so-called Squad and their allies to utilize their leverage, publicly, against Democratic Party leadership at key moments. Squad members got elected through our votes, donations, door-knocking, phone-banking and more. And we pay taxes. It is our moral obligation to push our elected officials to challenge Democratic leadership when party leadership is enacting policies of militarism and corporatism. In order for that to happen effectively, progressive organizations and organizers must stop their self-righteous gatekeeping.
