We are not all on the same side.
We win when we fight for justice together, not when we tell people to fall in line with injustice.
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Before I crossed the line from activist to candidate, I naively believed Democrats represented a unified front.
We were supposed to be the party that stood for the vulnerable, the disenfranchised, the oppressed.
But any illusions of unity evaporated when Florida Democrats collaborated with Ron DeSantis to undermine elections in Florida.
Any misgivings I had about Democrats siding with the oppressed disappeared when party leaders stood shoulder-to-shoulder with a genocidal regime as it bombed civilians in Gaza1.
And any assurances that we were still “the good guys” were obliterated when the White House and DNC gaslit the public, smeared college students for protesting war crimes2, abandoned LGBTQ+ people as book bans spread3, and turned their backs on the moral, progressive wing of the party — all while normalizing fascist rhetoric.
After chastising young people for not rallying behind Harris, the Democratic establishment pushed out one of its most visible young leaders, David Hogg, in a humiliation that echoed the purging of Nina Turner and Jamaal Bowman45. Rather than cultivating and elevating new voices, the party has treated its brightest lights as threats, not allies.
And now we know some of the biggest online voices who brand themselves as “independent” progressives are paid to parrot DNC talking points.
As Taylor Lorenz revealed in Wired, dark money networks have been quietly funneling cash to top Democratic influencers, buying loyalty and silencing dissent. Rather than cultivating an authentic grassroots media ecosystem, the party has turned to covert funding streams that reward conformity and punish honesty. It’s a strategy ripped from the playbook of corporate lobbyists and fossil fuel giants: capture the narrative, starve the truth-tellers, and call it democracy.
Rather than strengthening an authentic, accountable media ecosystem, the party has chosen to bankroll conformity, buying loyalty online while silencing dissent. In doing so, Democrats haven’t just ignored the grassroots — they’ve actively undermined it, hollowing out the progressive movement’s ability to build independent power.
Instead of investing in truly progressive creators, writers, and independent media — the very infrastructure that could counter the right’s disinformation machine — Democratic “stars” like Gavin Newsom poured resources into vanity podcasts, even inviting architects of MAGA propaganda like Steve Bannon6. In doing so, they didn’t just ignore the grassroots, they legitimized the voices working to dismantle democracy itself.
Meanwhile, in Washington, DC Mayor Muriel Bowser openly praised Trump for sending troops into the capital, calling it a “welcome surge7” — and just this year, she signed onto Republican-backed surveillance expansions8. At the federal level, Democrats wag their fingers at fascism but quietly adopt its tools.
All of this was brought front and center when Zohran Mamdani defeated disgraced sex pest Andrew Cuomo for the Democratic nomination in the race for New York City mayor9. Rather than rallying around of the country’s most popular new faces10, they attacked him in blatantly racist11 and Islamophobic12 tirades with false smears.
Moral clarity once bound us together. The conviction that we stood against injustice, that we stood for humanity. That façade collapsed when Democrats told us not to trust our own eyes, demanding silence as a European settler colony slaughtered thousands in the name of “self-defense”.
The danger isn’t only that Democrats have failed to defend democracy. It’s that their refusal to change course is accelerating its collapse. By silencing progressives, smearing students, and starving independent creators of support, Democrats are paving the way for a second Trump presidency — or something even worse. If the party continues to place loyalty to power above loyalty to principle, then democracy itself will not survive.
The Democratic Party will not save us. At best, it has become a feeble and feckless bureaucracy. At worst, it has become complicit — an accomplice to fascism.
But this doesn’t have to be the end of the story.
History reminds us that when Democrats embraced moral clarity and progressive values, unity followed — and with it, power.
The New Deal coalition reshaped the country by centering workers.
The civil rights movement expanded democracy when leaders stood shoulder to shoulder with activists in the streets.
Even in recent years, progressive energy helped flip Congress in 2018 and propelled Biden to the White House in 2020.
Unity has never been achieved by silencing dissent or chasing dark money donors — it has been won by listening to the grassroots, by trusting the people, and by standing firmly for justice. That is the only path forward if Democrats hope to defeat fascism and reclaim the promise of democracy.
If Democrats are willing to realign — to invest in the grassroots, to elevate progressive candidates, to support online creators who tell the truth without corporate sponsorships — then they can still reclaim the moral clarity that once defined us.
If they don’t, history will remember not just the cruelty of the right, but the cowardice of the center-left that allowed fascism to rise unchecked.
If we do not root out those who betrayed both the party and the morality that bound us together, Democrats will not overcome what they’ve lost — and we may never get another chance.
ADDITIONAL READING:
Holmes O. Biden defends Israel as civilian toll rises in Gaza. The Guardian. Oct 2023. Available from: https://www.theguardian.com/world/2023/oct/21/biden-defends-israel-gaza-civilian-toll
Baker P, Rogers K. Biden calls campus protesters ‘extremists’. The New York Times. May 2024. Available from: https://www.nytimes.com/2024/05/15/us/politics/biden-campus-protests.html
Andrews M. LGBTQ rights eroded in statehouses as Democrats stay quiet. NPR. June 2024. Available from: https://www.npr.org/2024/06/20/1266659999/lgbtq-rights-eroded-statehouses-democrats
Relman E. David Hogg says he’s leaving Democratic politics after clashes with party leadership. Insider. Aug 2024. Available from: https://www.businessinsider.com/david-hogg-leaving-democratic-politics-after-clashes-2024-8
Otterbein H. How Democrats helped take down Jamaal Bowman. Politico. July 2024. Available from: https://www.politico.com/news/2024/07/01/democrats-bowman-primary-loss-00165678
Wong J. Newsom launches podcast featuring Steve Bannon and others. Rolling Stone. Sept 2024. Available from: https://www.rollingstone.com/politics/politics-news/gavin-newsom-podcast-bannon-2024-1234827369
Bowser M. Statement on federal law enforcement surge in Washington, DC. Press conference remarks. June 2020. Available from: https://www.c-span.org/video/?c4883100/bowser-welcomes-federal-law-enforcement
Caldwell L. DC mayor supports expanded surveillance law backed by GOP. The Washington Post. March 2025. Available from: https://www.washingtonpost.com/dc-md-va/2025/03/11/dc-surveillance-law-bowser
Hirschfeld, Andy. “Sanders, Mamdani Rally Progressive Voters as NYC Mayor’s Race Intensifies.” Al Jazeera, 7 Sept. 2025, Al Jazeera, published via Al Jazeera English. https://www.aljazeera.com/news/2025/9/7/sanders-mamdani-rally-progressive-voters-as-nyc-mayors-race-intensifies
Thompson, A. Wary Democratic establishment keeping New York’s Mamdani at arm’s length. Axios. July 2025. Available at: https://www.axios.com/2025/07/21/zohran-mamdani-new-york-democrats-wary
Jayapal, Pramila. “Jayapal Statement on Racist Attacks on Zohran Mamdani.” Congresswoman Pramila Jayapal, 27 June 2025, jayapal.house.gov/2025/06/27/jayapal-statement-on-racist-attacks-on-zohran-mamdani/
Wells, D. Mamdani faces Islamophobic attacks from lawmakers, commentators. The Washington Post. June 2025. Available here: https://www.washingtonpost.com/politics/2025/06/27/mamdani-republican-attacks-muslim/
Our corporate duopoly has taught our leaders: Good Cop, Bad Cop, Just a Means to Stay on Top.
I went Green Party after Obama's hope-and-change bait-and-switch - his deliberately ineffectual homowners assistance programs that resulted in 9 million foreclosures, most of which were the result of dodgy banking-industry enticements, and a $786-billion bailout of the banks that created those enticements. I relented and voted for Biden in 2020, thinking he would at least be a marginal improvement over Trump, never dreaming that my vote would end up helping enable a genocide. Now we have the feckless Dems ousting David Hogg and doing their racist best to defeat the decisive, charismatic and likeable winner of the New York City mayoral primary. So much for the lesser evil. Never again.