On December 18th 2018, the DSA-LA Electoral Politics Committee voted to recommend for endorsement DSA-LA member Jackie Goldberg for the March 5 special election for the fifth district of the LA Unified School District board.
We request that the Steering Committee add time to the January chapter meetings agenda to allow the candidate to come speak to the members, and help facilitate a chapter-wide vote on whether to formally endorse Jackie Goldberg following those meetings. Additionally, we also propose that DSA-LA membership vote on the following campaign plan and mobilize the chapter resources described below.
Why We Support Jackie Goldberg for LAUSD
Los Angeles is at the forefront of a nationwide battle over the future of education. On one side, charter school advocates — with their billionaire backers — want to privatize our education system. On the other, parents, unions, and community members want to defend and expand every student’s right to a quality public school. The last Los Angeles Unified School Board election was the most expensive in U.S. history because the billionaires understand the importance of this race: the winner will either tip the majority in favor of privatizing education or improving our public schools. For over thirty years, Jackie Goldberg has stood firmly on the side of working Angelenos as a community organizer, LA city councilwoman, and state assembly member. Not only does she have a proven track record of standing up for kids, parents, and teachers, but her unapologetic support of community schools stands in stark opposition to the privatization agenda. As socialists, we should be proud to endorse a candidate whose long history in the community and values align so closely with a vision of Los Angeles that works for the many, not the few.
Campaign Working Group
We propose that a Campaign Working Group be established to carry out this proposal and further develop DSA-LA’s strategy to ensure Jackie Goldberg’s victory. This Working Group shall be open to the membership of DSA-LA, but primarily composed of members of from the Electoral Politics, Membership, Agit-Prop, and Communications committees to coordinate both DSA-LA’s internal campaign work and to interface with the greater Jackie Goldberg campaign infrastructure.
The Working Group would also coordinate and promote GOTV canvasses and phone banks independent of DSA-LA and/or in coordination with the greater Jackie Goldberg campaign and their coalition partners.
The working group will formally convene after a majority “yes” in a chapter-wide vote by the membership of DSA-LA and will formally disband after either the March 5 special election results in an outright win for Jackie Goldberg or the results of the May 14 runoff election are confirmed.
Member Outreach
Hundreds of dues-paying members live in the district—many of them have friends, family, and (by definition) neighbors who do, too. We request access to their member data.
Turnout for the (non-special) 2015 election for this LAUSD seat came in at 26,000 total, and the margin of victory in the primary was just 845 votes. LA turnout in the 2018 versus 2014 election almost doubled, indicating that more Angelenos might be voting these days—but when combined with the fact that this is a special election in March, it’s unlikely we’ll see a significant increase in turnout over the 2015 numbers.
Our members, and their contacts, could be an important part of swinging this thing.
We would like to start by contacting every member in the district to ensure that they’re aware of the election and will vote for our endorsed candidate. Steps to carry this out could include, but are not limited to:
- Providing information to our members outlining the issues and arguments, and asking them to similarly call/contact people they know in the district and secure their vote.
- Asking members to host house parties using the same materials and with a guest speaker/organizer to back them up, to engage their networks in a more fun way.
- Engaging new contacts in our ongoing campaign work, extending DSA-LA’s base of support.
Communications/Agit-prop
We want Jackie Goldberg to win. To that end, we ask that the chapter social media and agitprop resources be put into full effect as soon as soon the endorsement goes through, with daily tweets, Instagram posts, and Facebook posts pertaining to the candidate, race, and LAUSD issues. We will work within our own committee and with the agit-prop and communications committees to create the assets (graphics, photos, video, copy, etc) to supply that stream.
We also want to create engaging content that conveys the stakes of this race to all Angelenos, highlight the significance of the charter/public divide (ideally in a way that makes accepting charter lobby money a litmus test for voters in any race), and underline how it fits into DSA’s larger vision of change.