Video Still, Jeff McDevitt
Progressive candidates and ballot referenda won in many states and cities in the November election. Here is just a sampling:
Candidates for county sheriff who opposed having the sheriff’s office help ICE round up undocumented immigrants won elections in Georgia, South Carolina, Ohio and Massachusetts. And in Florida’s Miami-Dade County, Democrat Daniella Levine Cava won the mayor’s seat after running on curtailing cooperation with ICE, and on opposing a new state law mandating that local law enforcement assist ICE.
Every US House candidate that ran on Medicare for All won. The “Squad” all won re-election, and added two more members, Jamal Bowman of New York and Cori Bush of Missouri. Oakland, California housing activist Carrol Fife won a City Council seat. The first two openly gay Black men were elected to Congress in New York, (one of the men also identifies as Latino), and in Flint, MI, some Water Warriors won election to local offices.
Indiana, Wisconsin and Arizona voted to increase public school funding. Oregon voted to tax the rich to fund universal pre-K. Florida, along with Portland, Maine, approved a hike in the minimum wage, and Portland also voted for rent control, a local Green New Deal, and against facial surveillance.
Oregon voters decriminalized a number of drugs. South Dakota, Montana, Arizona, and New Jersey legalized marijuana for adults for any reason. Mississippi approved medical marijuana, and Washington, DC, legalized psychedelics.
Austin, the San Francisco Bay Area, Washington, D.C., and Los Angeles saw progressives elected to local government. And LA County passed Measure J, which sets aside 10 percent of county-generated funds for social services in communities harmed by racism and bars local government from spending any of that money on jails or police. New York, Pennsylvania, Minnesota and Montana elected democratic socialists to state government.
Some cities elected or re-elected district attorneys who campaigned on reforming the justice system, including in Chicago, St. Louis, Corpus Christi, Orlando, Ann Arbor, Austin and Los Angeles.
And in a powerful rejection of confederate culture, 73% of voters voted to adopt a new state flag without the Confederate symbol.
These victories show that when we fight we win. The unity and political infrastructure that was built in winning these victories will no doubt be strengthened for the struggle that still lies ahead.
