Rep. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez (D-N.Y.), right, attends a rally with Democratic congressional candidate Jessica Cisneros on Feb. 12, 2022, in San Antonio. (Eric Gay/AP)
In what will turn out to be the last “progressive” DP slate in history, the RGV DP’s “progressive” wing tries one last time to reel-in working people with laughable candidates and politics.
By Jonathan L. Salinas
As U.S. capitalism collapses, and class-consciousness among workers rises, RGV “progressive” Democrats are attempting to keep us inside the conundrum that is capitalist politics, by running “progressives” who, in one case, is campaigning against “dark money,” while taking plenty of it, and, in another case, is an AOC-style attorney betting on bad publicity from an FBI frame-up operation against her opponent and the politicized Supreme Court “leak” to win. What a farce.
The Texas Tribune reported April 26 that “LUPE Votes,” a vote-harvesting outfit for the “nonprofit,” LUPE, failed to report their midterm expenses until a month after—and missed disclosure deadlines before—voting. The expenses included $51,000 for mailers, flyers and other campaign literature. These expenditures must be disclosed within 48 hours. The Tribune reports that LUPE’s attorneys warned and educated them about the deadlines.
In addition, the campaign literature intentionally deceived voters by saying the materials were unapproved by the candidate or any candidate committee. In fact, Danny Diaz, who works for LUPE Votes, is also the treasurer of the ‘Lupe Votes PAC,’ which allegedly split the cost of a poll with the Vallejo campaign in late March. While Vallejo is supposedly running a campaign against dark money — i.e. funds to PACS from organizations — she received over $100,000 from a New York based “nonprofit,” according to the Tribune.
Diaz was also Jessica Cisneros’ campaign manager when she first lost the Democratic nomination for District 28 against longtime incumbent, Henry Cuellar, by 3,000 votes. Cuellar’s home and office were raided on the eve of the primary, Feb 1, by FBI agents in what was obviously a politicized investigation and frame up. No charges have been filed against him, and none will. Despite these internecine DP political crimes, Cuellar was only forced into a run-off.
And again, coming to the aid of Cisneros — who has lots of backing from upper middle-class D.C. liberals with a vendetta against Cuellar — the Supreme Court “leak” was seized on by Cisneros to attack Cuellar. As a social conservative, Cuellar is stringent on abortion access, as the only “pro-life” Democrat in Congress. The media seized on this, too, just as they did with the last story. But as every class-conscious worker should know, the Democratic Party (including “progressives”) have done nothing except hurt the struggle for universal abortion rights.
It’ll take a mass working class effort to win abortion as a constitutional right, under the equal protection of the 14th Amendment. The DP’s strategy of reifying Roe v Wade, which abruptly ended the debate and struggle for abortion as a fundamental working class right, is, not just doomed but, reactionary.
A vote for Vallejo and Cisneros, or participating in these primaries at all, is a concession to the nihilistic belief that there‘s hope for working people inside the twin capitalist parties. What’s needed, as inflation wreaks havoc on our lives, is a labor party, one that’ll fight for control of production and a workers and farmers' government. Time wasted on any of the twin parties is time not spent on building the class leadership necessary to overthrow capitalism and save humanity from nuclear catastrophe.
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