Trump’s electoral defeat, as in Brazil, is the result of the democratic mobilization of broad sectors of youth and the working class against the far right. It is a defeat that emerges from the bottom up. This is his final political defeat, diminishing the GOP’s power in both chambers and ending a political legacy of imperialism in its most decadent phase.

Among these movements from below, we have seen highly radicalized developments, such as the Minneapolis uprising, and the growth of DSA and the idea of socialism as a national political movement with significant influence among young people and sectors of the working class.

As a countertrend, a new political phenomenon appears to be emerging from the Democratic victory in Texas: a young political figure, James Talarico, who presents himself as a powerful centrist force, potentially capable of pulling the Democratic Party and the political establishment into his orbit in the lead-up to the next elections.

Although the election results strengthen for now the Democratic Party as a whole, the emergence of this young Texas senator introduces a “moderate” alternative. This shifts the balance of forces in the palace struggle, creating a tendency to move politics back toward the “center” and away from the poles represented by Trump and AOC. 

While the Congressional Progressive Caucus added 25 new members, the “centrist” New Democrat Coalition added 39, and the conservative Blue Dog Coalition doubled its membership from ten to 20.

In this context, AOC’s role has changed. She is no longer the uncontested “left-wing presidential alternative” within the Democratic Party “movement.” With a renewed centrist tendency, she has considerably less political space than she did six months ago, when the field appeared to be wide open.

A few weeks before the elections, DSA caucuses aligned with Mamdani managed to push through a nationwide consultation within DSA on whether AOC should be promoted as a candidate in the Democratic presidential primaries. The vote was divided, although AOC won overall, with results in major chapters such as Boston showing a narrow 52% to 48% margin.

In Providence, Rhode Island, 75% of voters approved an ordinance to divest city funds from Israel on November 3. Rhode Island Island DSA’s independent candidate, Brittany Kubicek, won 23% of the vote in the general election, demonstrating that there is enormous political space to the left of the Democratic Party — space that must be won without hesitation or timidity.

In light of this, the premature and unnecessary attempt to tie DSA to the Democratic Party is far more a political maneuver aimed at demobilizing and demoralizing DSA and its left wing than an exercise in “realpolitik.”

This is precisely where the importance of the Rhode Island DSA chapter’s resistance to capitulating to the Democratic Party lies. Across the country, there is resistance within the DSA to the liquidationist orientation, which ultimately seeks to block the socialists’ path toward the working class.

The key to the political development of the advanced sectors of the youth and workers is the emergence of a new political force in the national arena, a party of the workers. This is the most important task of the moment for the whole workers’ movement. Any step further we can take in this struggle will become the post from which to fight the ruling class in the near future. 

There’s a new generation of youth and workers who have nothing to lose, as their present is already shattered by capitalism. So they take to the streets. They did so in Minneapolis, but also in France, Italy, Germany, Spain, Portugal, Albania, Brazil, Argentina, India – and counting. Like in Minneapolis, the workers are fighting with their own methods. There’s a general strike called in France on November 5 and in Italy on November 11, in a growing strike movement across Europe.

The next two years will see a lame-duck President, but we shouldn’t expect the situation to be peaceful or calm. 

The ruling classes will use chaos and disorder to push their reforms and austerity, and continue polluting the peoples of the US and in the world. And the resistance will grow.

We have to learn to dissipate the maneuvers of the regime and keep our course steady. History is on our side. 

¡Venceremos!