The Civil War Inside the DSA

At around 8:40 p.m. on a late August evening, a meeting of the South Brooklyn branch of the Democratic Socialists of America (DSA) was drawing to a close. Grace Mausser had just made the case for why she and Gustavo Gordillo, her fellow New York City DSA co-chair, deserve $95,000 salaries, and it was now time for the few dozen of her comrades gathered inside a dimly lit Park Slope bar to weigh in.

Not everyone was convinced. One woman kicked off the venting session by saying she wasn’t sure she could continue as a member after watching local party leaders “defend things that I don’t agree with,” including on police-related issues. A 10-year member of the DSA objected to the proposal on procedural grounds, noting that neither co-chair is working class to begin with. Another member, Alex Rivera, said he didn’t oppose paying leadership in principle but questioned how salaried co-chairs would be held accountable, considering the chapter has no real budget process and no member vote on meeting agendas, and relies on borrowed bar space for monthly meetings, according to a recording of the meeting reviewed by The Free Press.

“This feels very much top-down leadership instead of like, bottom-up,” Rivera said.

Two days later, the resolution to approve the co-chair salaries passed overwhelmingly anyway. The scene inside this Brooklyn bar late last month revealed the fault line running through DSA nationally as the coalition looks to expand its growing foothold in American politics. Riding its best-ever electoral stretch, the organization now has real hope that the soon-to-be-elected bloc of socialist Congress members might finally start extracting major concessions from establishment Democrats and reshape the party in the DSA’s image.