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UPFRONT

• SUNDAY 3PM — Defund MPD working group in-person meeting

• WEDNESDAY 5PM — Stand with striking theater workers in Bethesda
  

• THURSDAY 7PM — Socialist Night School: Palestine + BDS 101

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Defund MPD Working Group — monthly meeting (in-person), Sunday, June 20 at 3pm

Last week, the DC Council heard oral testimony on MPD during the Committee on the Judiciary and Public Safety’s Budget Oversight Hearing. A wide network of allies provided oral testimony urging the Council to meet the demands as outlined by the Defund MPD Coalition.

We need to keep the pressure on the Council to defund MPD and refund our communities. This Sunday at 3pm, join us at Malcolm X Park for an IN-PERSON gathering to meet folks we’ve primarily seen through screens for the past year, sign up for sub-groups if you’re not plugged in already and learn about the Coalition’s vision for defunding the police and refunding our communities here in DC.

DSA membership NOT required to attend — members of the Defund MPD Coalition and individuals interested in getting involved with organizing for police abolition are welcome to join. Whether you’ve been deep in the work or you’re relatively new to organizing, you are welcome and encouraged to attend this event to build community.

(But hey, non-members, while you’re here, why not consider joining today?)

Stand with Strathmore Theater Workers! — Wednesday, June 23 at 5pm

With Montgomery County lifting COVID-19 restrictions, Strathmore Theater in North Bethesda is preparing to start holding in-person performances regularly for the first time since March 2020. However, a proposal to add ticket kiosks to Strathmore in North Bethesda as in-person performances return has drawn the ire of a local theater union, which worries that machines would replace employees.

Join unionists and allies around the region in standing with the workers of Bethesda’s Strathmore Theater and their union, IATSE Local 868. Strathmore, just as things are reopening, are proposing eliminating all the front-of-house workers who handle tickets. Management is trying to kick these workers while they’re down. We’ll be meeting on the 4th floor of the parking garage at the Grosvenor Metro Station.

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BRIEFS

Afrosoc Monthly Meeting — Sunday, June 20 at 4pm

Join the Afrosocialists and Socialists of Color Caucus for our monthly meeting! This is an affinity space for Black, Indigenous and other People of Color to organize. We encourage new and curious members to join us, but as a caucus, we emphasize that this space is intended to be an affinity space only for those who identify as Black, Indigenous, People of Color. This is separate from our monthly caucus happy hour, where we set an informal time to connect.

This event is open to both DSA members and supporters but this space is intended to be an affinity space only for those who identify as Black, Indigenous and other People of Color.

Senate to hold hearings on DC Statehood bill — Tuesday, June 22

A Senate committee will hold a hearing for legislation to make DC the country’s 51st state next week. The hearing will begin at 10am on Tuesday, with opening remarks delivered by DC’s Congressional Rep Eleanor Holmes Norton. The House has passed the bill twice in the last year, and will be introduced this time with a record 45 cosponsors, including Majority Leader Chuck Schumer.

Residents (including socialists) of the the DMV have long been demanding statehood for the residents of the District. You can read more about DC Statehood from our archive on the Washington Socialist, which includes some historical articles from the ’80s and ’90s republished for record.

Maryland’s Eviction Crisis continues to devastate families

Evictions in MD continue to rocket through the recently reopened court system and low-income renters and homeowners continue to get shafted. The state’s emergency declaration will expire at the end of June and eviction moratoriums are already unenforceable — especially if your one-year lease expired during the pandemic, meaning you are totally unprotected. Eviction-threatened tenants have to appear in court (losing a day of work and maybe a job) and are frequently SOL without a lawyer (the landlords always have one). We’ll publish a wider account of this crisis by our MoCo comrade Stephen M in the July newsletter but meanwhile renters or advocates can seek help at Renters Alliance (MoCo) or CASA. Here is the very latest from Maryland Matters.

Smoke ‘em if you got ‘em: DC Council votes to ban flavored tobacco products

The District Council voted Wednesday to ban flavored tobacco products from sale in the District.

Only Trayon White (Ward 8), Phil Mendelson (Chair) and DSA member Janeese Lewis George (Ward 4) voted against the ban, and Kenyon McDuffie of Ward 5 also chose to vote present). All five voted to approve an amendment to the bill which carved out an exception for bars and restaurants that offer hookah.

In a statement on the vote, Councilmember Lewis George noted that “enforcement of minor violations has often been the pretext with catastrophic encounters with law enforcement for residents like Eric Garner and George Floyd.” Just last week, a viral video from Ocean City documented another example of egregious use of force by police against a teenager over a vaping infraction. Here is the Progressive Maryland Justice Task Force response to the OC outrage.

In DC, the bill will be enforced by the DC Department of Consumer and Regulatory Affairs; however, MPD could decide to enforce the law on its own.

Metro DC DSA now has a YDSA Liaison!

MDC DSA Steering Committee Actions

The following are resolutions that have been approved by the Steering Committee via Loomio since the beginning of our term:

• Resolution 2021-06-R03: Standardize Record Keeping;
• Resolution 2021-06-R04: 13th Steering Committee’s Portfolios;
• Resolution 2021-06-R06: Security Steward Appointment Resolution;
• Resolution 2021-06-R07: Create Chapter YDSA Liaison Position;
  
• Resolution 2021-06-R08: Appoint an Interim Chair and Establish the Role of National Convention Delegation Chair

Additionally, per Section 6.1.1 of our bylaws, the Steering Committee and the Campaign Council will be meeting on Tuesday, June 29th from 5 to 7pm to discuss submitted quarterly reports from our Sections, Priority Campaigns and Working Groups. Click here to RSVP!

You can read the full report on the Steering Committee's decisions on the web version of this week's update.

- Brendan G, MDC DSA Secretary

Washington Socialist for June

The Washington Socialist is our chapter’s monthly publication — produced by volunteer writers and editors on our Publications Team. Here’s what we’ve got for June ICYMI …

• An article posted last week: Our MDC DSA comrade Andy Feeney, who has explicated Marxist approaches to environmental activism in past issues, puts that lens on the Biden admin’s infrastructure plan in the current issue.
• A comrade recounts two decades of watching — and participating in — a Palestinian rights movement that has made great gains with the public and attracted sophisticated new opposing strategies in that time.
• A photo and text account of the Nakba anniversary protest of several Saturdays ago.
• What would make a military veteran join DSA? Does their experience in uniform provide a unique perspective? A group of personal accounts from socialist veterans.
• Covering DSA’s activity, an entry recounting how DSA’s local Medicare for All working group came together to organize alongside allies and mutual aid formations to address the Bowser administration’s bumbled (and inequitable) COVID vaccine rollout.
• Explaining the emotions and language surrounding the sometimes-embattled term “Defund” is one of the toughest tasks in our issue-strategy array. Two articles explore this work in progress: From Defund to Abolish and Reimagining the Police.
• And something a little different, maybe even sobering: a DIY guide to infusing antiracism into every aspect of our organizing.

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INFO ACCESS

It wasn’t that long ago — maybe 2016 — that the summertime for activists was sleepy enough that the monthly Washington Socialist published a combined July-August edition, published on, yep, July 14 — Bastille Day. Things are a little busier now, what with Trump, a weekly email Update and so forth. But we still (see below) publish articles monthly, dropping urgent ones into the Update between monthly newsletter issues, and that seems to work out well. What has not changed: MDC DSA members need to write those articles. So don’t stop thinking your socialism out loud, write it down before you forget and keep the conversation rolling and productive.

Oh, and send it in ([email protected] is fine) of course. On time helps, definitely. Frank Bruni published his last column in the NYT yesterday (Thursday) and the opinion editors were full of praise for his many years of work. But what stuck in this ageing editorial worker-bee’s mind was this: “he never missed a deadline.” Bruni was no socialist, but that’s a record to admire.

Submissions don’t need to be manicured or perfect (how would you know, anyway?) Our Pubs WG folks are on station to help shape your work, collaboratively.
—Woody Woodruff

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GOOD READS

Bob Dylan turned 80 a few weeks ago, but the tributes keep turning up, including this one from The Guardian. Your Dylan is always nobody else’s Dylan, but “Where once he was the most interesting Hamlet of his generation, he is now the most interesting Prospero” might keep your own Dylan evolving … to hear that “All Along the Watchtower” has been “the song he has performed most in his career — at more than 2,200 concerts — ahead even of ‘Like a Rolling Stone’” indicates that our Dylan (that is, this writer’s, which may or may not be your, the reader’s, Dylan) might overlap more with Dylan’s Dylan than he or we know.

Touted by our comrade Dave R, a left view of the revival of empire-think: “Biden is promising to restore a violent, rapacious system that had increasingly lost its legitimacy.”

Sobering insights on VA’s primary results last week from Chair of the VA Young Democrats.

Ezra Klein in NYT: “What the Rich Don’t Want to Admit About the Poor” — that is, that wealth requires poverty, because capitalism …

A recent ProPublica investigation sheds some much needed light on how the wealthiest Americans avoid paying taxes — legally. The IRS tax returns they received and reviewed cover more than 15 years of financial data belonging to the nation’s richest, including Jeff Bezos, Elon Musk, Bill Gates, Warren Buffet and more.

What Donald Trump both represents and is part of — a planet-wide ferment within societies of real inequality mixed with resentment of imagined lost supremacy and the political exploiters who gain ascendancy by amplifying those trends. NYT’s Tom Edsall checks the temperature of researchers on this matter: “The peculiarly American characteristics of the Trump years have blinded us to the spread of this radical disorder worldwide …”

DSA comrades and allies are asking in Maryland Matters why Maryland State Senator Jeff Waldstreicher (D-18, Silver Spring, Kensington) — a media hound, fake progressive and sadly their state senator — quietly worked with Montgomery County police leadership to push bills and amendments that undercut even the modest reforms undertaken by the Maryland General Assembly.

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MDC DSA CALENDAR OF EVENTS

Saturday, June 19

6:15 – 8pm | MoCo DSA June Happy Hour
Enjoy some in-person socializing with comrades at Denizens Brewing Co. in downtown Silver Spring this Saturday. Non-MoCo comrades are also invited to join!

7 – 8:30pm | NoVA Book Club — People’s Republic of Walmart

Sunday, June 20

3 – 5pm | Defund MPD Working Group — IRL Social and Monthly Meeting

4 – 5:30pm | AfroSOC Monthly Meeting

5 – 6:30pm | Medicare for All Work Group Weekly Meeting

Monday, June 21

7 – 8:30pm | June Labor Working Group Organizing Meeting

7 – 8:00pm | Queer Section Monthly Meeting (Zoom link forthcoming)

Tuesday, June 22

5:30 – 7:30pm | Defund MPD Phonebank

7 – 9pm | Biweekly Steering Committee Meeting

Wednesday, June 23

8 – 9pm | Why You Should Join DSA / New Member Orientation

Thursday, June 24

5:30 – 7:30pm | Defund MPD Phonebank

7 – 8:30pm | NoVA Branch Monthly Organizing Meeting

7 – 9pm | MoCo Advisory Committee Meeting

7 – 9pm | Socialist Night School: Palestine & BDS 101

Sunday, June 27

4 – 5pm | MoCo DSA Member Orientation

8 – 9pm | Birth Strike Reading Group — Session 4/4 [New River Valley DSA + MDC DSA SocFem]

Tuesday, June 29

5 – 7pm | Quarterly Joint Steering Committee and Campaign Council Meeting

Wednesday, June 30

7 – 9pm | MDC DSA Workplace Organizing Workshop

8 – 9pm | Why You Should Join DSA / New Member Orientation

Friday, July 9

6 – 9pm | Social Hour for Us: Afrosoc, Queer Section, SocFem
White cis straight males are asked not to attend, thanks.

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NATIONAL DSA HIGHLIGHTS

Sunday, June 27

6pm | DSA’s Labor Strategy: Organizing Worker Power for a Socialist Future
Please join your comrades for a deep dive into our labor strategy, focused on strategic, multiracial workplace organizing and rebuilding the labor movement in every red, blue and purple corner of the country. We’ll be talking with labor militants and union organizers on the importance of building rank-and-file power among Black and Latino workers and in the South … more at link

Tuesday, July 6

8pm | DSA Convention Info Call
If you’ve been elected as a delegate to the 2021 DSA Convention, join us for an info call that will cover all of the basics on the 2021 Convention, including what to expect as a delegate, the proposed schedule, the role of chapters leading up to Convention, the platform and resolutions process, important dates and next steps, and … more at link

Wednesday, July 7

8pm | So You Want to Start a Chapter?
Interested in building working class power through DSA, but don’t have a chapter in your area? Want more info on what it would take to start one? This call is for you! We will lay out the organizing and administrative steps to take so that you can grow from a small group to a full fledged DSA chapter, featuring DSA staff/leaders and first hand lessons from … more at link

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COMMUNITY BULLETIN + ALLIED EVENTS

Monday, June 21

7 – 9pm | Reel & Meal Film Screening: Third Harmony
This month’s Reel & Meal film program features Third Harmony, a 2020 documentary that draws on interviews with veteran political and civil rights activists, scientists, Congresswoman Pramila Jayapal and others to help portray what nonviolent protest is and how it works. Sponsors this month: Prince George’s County Peace and Justice Coalition. Registration at link

Tuesday, June 22

4pm | Virtual Town Hall with Senator Chris Van Hollen
Sponsored by Maryland League of Conservation Voters to discuss American Jobs Plan bill. RSVP here or at Facebook event page.

Monday, June 28

6pm | Ward 2 Mutual Aid Onboarding Meeting

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