Chris Rabb

I’ve always known that our economy isn’t broken — it’s purpose-built to help the wealthy few and leave the rest of us to fight over the scraps. I’ve been fighting against that for decades. The policies I’ve been advocating, like Medicare for All and raising the minimum wage to $25, are grounded in a vision of an economy that benefits the working class.

It’s not just on the economic front. I’ve been calling for abolishing ICE since before it was popular for an elected official to do so, and I’ve been pushing to move us to 100 percent renewable energy. I feel deeply aligned with DSA and its big-tent socialist vision of working together to plant the seeds for a socialist future, while changing the conditions for working people right now.

So, the truth is, I’ve been a democratic socialist for a very long time. Now I’m proud to be officially a DSA member.

Chris Rabb

As a public servant for decades here in Philly, I’ve seen firsthand how the Democratic establishment has failed working-class communities. We need to give people more hope — not only by being honest about the limitations of our current economic system and the two-party establishment but also by giving them a real alternative vision they can sink their teeth into. DSA does and can continue to do that by fighting for policies that have a tangible impact on people’s lives, and by electing champions of the vision and the policies.

Zohran Mamdani won over a lot of black New Yorkers by being his authentic self instead of catering to the black political establishment or doing the corny things a lot of other Democrats might. And he spoke to policies directly tied to people’s everyday lives, from free buses to public grocery stores that can drive down the cost of food.

Aside from the occasional kente cloth photo op, the Democratic establishment has given up on black people. It has been unable to hold violent police accountable, deal with the root causes of crime, or deliver on the promises of the movements they continue to ride on the backs of. Socialism is not alien to black people or our movements. It was at the heart of the politics of Martin Luther King Jr, Ella Baker, and the Black Panthers.

We need to send a clear message to the black working class, and the working class more broadly, that they have a home in DSA and that our organization is the one standing up for the bold changes we need. We need to invest in developing black leaders and ensure that our rhetoric is always grounded in real diagnoses of what’s wrong and real solutions for moving forward.

Chris Rabb

We have to understand undocumented people as a key pillar of the working class and continue to work to protect and expand their rights. Philly DSA has done good work on that front by backing the ICE OUT legislation, which passed the city council last month. We need to continue to support our undocumented brothers and sisters and make sure they are part of the coalitions we’re building. They’re impacted by everything from climate change to policing too, and we need to tie these issues back to how we’re all being exploited by the same group of bloodsuckers.

We also need to work with labor unions to strengthen workers’ power in the city and across the country. Union membership has been lingering near all-time lows while wages stagnate. We need to organize people in their workplaces. I know it can be hard work. I know — I helped organize the adjunct union at Temple University and experienced retaliation. But it is essential for us to build power outside of elections.

Tenant rights and tenant organizing are also important. With the Safe Healthy Homes Act, Philly DSA helped pass a policy that will directly benefit Philly’s working class by empowering renters to speak out about dangerous living conditions and making it easier to hold negligent landlords accountable. We need to organize these constituencies into real fighting forces, whether it’s block associations, tenant unions, or good old-fashioned labor unions.

Chris Rabb

DSA has been on the front lines of the biggest fights we face in Philly, and I’m honored to have earned the chapter’s endorsement. Philly DSA’s endorsement is special because I know it isn’t a paper endorsement — it means people on the ground and at the doors, and that’s the only way I want to win. Philly DSA helped us gather over 7,000 petition signatures to get on the ballot, more than triple the number required. Once this campaign is won, I hope those same people will be out there working to hold me accountable and helping me push legislation that will change the lives of the people they’re meeting with at the doors.

In Congress, I look forward to being a strong partner with Philly DSA as part of the Socialists in Office (SIO) group, working with the chapter to ensure real accountability and a genuine working relationship. The only way we can solve the biggest crises facing our country is by working together, and as part of the SIO, I will work closely with the chapter to develop policy, organize and mobilize support, and deliver the legislative action we need to win.

Chris Rabb

As a Pennsylvania lawmaker for nearly ten years, I am proud to have never taken a dime of corporate PAC money. I don’t answer to the ultrawealthy or political insiders — I answer to the people of Philadelphia. Some of my opponents have given themselves personal loans and have gotten millions in support from billionaire-backed super PACs. Our campaign is people-powered and that’s the biggest thing that separates our campaign from my opponents. I’m proud that we have seven times more small-dollar donors than my opponents combined and nearly five times more Philadelphia donors than my opponents.

I think this all shows up in my policies. I don’t take stances because they’re popular among the donor class. I take them because I genuinely believe they will empower working-class people and move us closer to a society where the majority holds the power.

Chris Rabb

Socialist elected leaders must speak out on US foreign policy because we must be fully committed to collective liberation. No one is free unless we are all free, and we have a responsibility to say so plainly as public servants and as some of DSA’s most high-profile messengers. As DSA members who hold elected office, we must also speak out on US foreign policy because it directly impacts what we can accomplish here at home.

Donald Trump’s illegal war in Iran is costing US taxpayers over $1 billion a day. Instead of dragging us into another deadly conflict that’s killing innocent civilians and driving gas prices above $4 a gallon, we should be investing those funds in our communities. All the money being spent on this war could instead go toward Medicare for All, expanding Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program (SNAP) benefits for hungry families, building affordable housing, funding public works programs that provide good-paying jobs, and much more.

US foreign policy affects the entire working class in this country, and socialist elected leaders need to help voters understand that. We need to help people see the true cost of these wars and the need to change who holds power, so that we can end the bloodshed and focus on lifting up our communities here at home.

Chris Rabb

Using the n-word as a political talking point to erase the deaths and suffering of other oppressed people is shocking. That statement is an affront to the legacy of black leaders who’ve stood in solidarity with the Palestinian cause.

So many of us were taught to “welcome the stranger,” but this feels like someone turning their back. As we seek to represent our black community here in Philly, we must also recognize that our people have suffered genocide through slavery and Jim Crow on indigenous lands themselves depopulated by genocide at the hands of our own government. We must be able to call out genocide and injustice wherever we find it and work together to stop the violence and secure the peace and safety these people deserve.

Whether or not these comments were driven by donations from AIPAC-affiliated donors, they speak to a political environment of dehumanization toward Palestinians — one in which oppressed people are being pitted against each other to distract from the capitalist imperialists who don’t care about black lives, Jewish lives, or Palestinian lives.

Chris Rabb

Taxing the rich is at the center of our agenda for economic justice because it’s about fixing a system that’s been rigged to benefit billionaires and instead making the real investments needed in workers, who are the real engine of our economy. Taxing the rich won’t fix everything, but it’s a start in tipping the balance toward working people and stripping away the ultrawealthy’s ability to control our economy and our lives.

For too long, the wealthy and powerful have failed to pay their fair share in taxes. In Congress, I would cosponsor the Ultra-Millionaire Tax Act. The bill would apply a wealth tax to fortunes above $50 million and generate $6.2 trillion in revenue over the next decade. That would provide enough money for Medicare expansion, universal childcare, free community college, and much more. This, combined with pushing money out of politics, would be a major step toward a country actually run by working people instead of the Elon Musks and Jay-Zs of the world.

Chris Rabb

I like the music, not the politics. I don’t think anyone should have that much power or wealth while children are wondering where their next meal is coming from. And he plays his own role in taking the wind out of black-led movements.

Chris Rabb

It’s a powerful legacy centered on service, speaking truth to power, and organizing in communities of struggle toward collective liberation. I’m inspired by my ancestors’ shared courage, perseverance, and boldness in fighting for a transformative vision of a nation built on their stolen labor.

In Baltimore, my family was part of a community of black folks who understood that if we didn’t tell our own story, nobody would. I come from a tradition of black activism fighting for civil rights, dignity, and opportunity. My great-great-grandfather built one of the most important black newspapers in the country, the Afro-American, empowering black voices to speak truth in a world trying to silence them. In Chicago, my mother helped build the movement that elected Harold Washington, Chicago’s first black mayor. I learned that justice means if something’s wrong, you change it.

Today’s socialist movement, and the part I can play in it, is about building on the legacy of the black freedom fighters I come from and continuing to fight for the justice all of us in the working class deserve. The bounty of this planet belongs to all of us, and we need a politics that speaks to that and aims to birth a new world based on justice and love instead of greed and domination.

Chris Rabb

There’s a reason I don’t take corporate PAC money. I’ve seen how it has rotted the Democratic establishment and tied it to the same forces behind Trump and the greatest injustices on this planet. The Democratic establishment has caved in when it has mattered the most. I will not do that, and that’s because I’m guided by democratic socialist principles and my own value system — not a bunch of rich people who are building bunkers and trying to escape to Mars.

I’m not afraid to reach across the aisle, but unlike most electeds, I only do it when I know it will absolutely benefit working people. Socialists need to expose the role of both parties in our crisis and point toward a future where the working class holds power.

Chris Rabb

Big Tech wants to build AI data centers across the country. These facilities would use our water, our power grid, and our tax dollars — and they want to do this with zero accountability.

Artificial intelligence is too powerful a technology to be left unchecked and unregulated. We’ve already seen ICE work with these AI companies to spy on our families and communities. These same companies are using the profits from that work to buy politicians and facilitate their own expansion. They’re getting tax breaks and using that money to build more data centers that are increasing electric bills for our families. They’re using our money and our data to buy our political system while we shoulder the burden.

In Congress, I would fully support the moratorium proposed by Senator Sanders and Congresswoman Ocasio-Cortez. We need technology to work for us. Right now, it’s set up to extract from us and from the earth.

Chris Rabb

The truth is that I have worked with Republicans and centrist Democrats on a wide range of bills as a state lawmaker. In my first six years in the state house with a GOP majority, I still got five bills passed into law — including one establishing Pennsylvania’s first statewide police misconduct database, to stop corrupt cops from moving to a new town and hurting new communities. I also authored a first-of-its-kind First Chance Trust Fund, investing in over-incarcerated neighborhoods to open up opportunities for young people.

I get things done, but without being beholden to the Democratic Party establishment or the corporations they serve. People see that as being a lone wolf. I see it as prioritizing the entire wolf pack over the super PACs.