In 2018, frequent Jacobin contributor Max Zirngast was arrested and imprisoned in Turkey after his left-wing journalism came to the attention of the repressive Erdoğan administration. He was confined to a high-security prison for three months, and only released following an international solidarity campaign.

In an article for Jacobin after his acquittal one year after his arrest, Zirngast wrote that despite right-wing governments’ attempts to isolate and intimidate socialists like him, “​​We will carry on. We will continue to fight for democracy and socialism, for a free world that ends the exploitation of humans and nature, patriarchy, and racism. Their weapon is brute force. Ours is solidarity.”

Upon his return in 2019 to his home city of Graz, Austria, Zirngast’s socialist politics found new expression in the Communist Party of Austria (KPÖ). In September 2021, running on the KPÖ ticket, Zirngast won a seat on the Graz city council. The entire KPÖ performed well in the election — securing the mayorship, edging out the ruling conservative party to finish first with Graz voters, and turning Austria’s second-biggest city into a potential “red fortress.”