Trotsky’s New York
Leon Trotsky's brief 1917 stay in New York City left a mark on the American socialist movement.
Leon Trotsky's brief 1917 stay in New York City left a mark on the American socialist movement.

Democratic socialist David Orkin is running for New York State Assembly in Queens, aiming to further bolster the left-wing stronghold and unseat a key ally of former mayor Eric Adams. Jacobin spoke to Orkin about his campaign.
Ill fares the land in 2016 . . . the shame of Cleveland . . . America First . . . 9/11=Inside Job . . . Islamic Plots . . . Alex Jones . . . Build the Wall . . . Police State Vibes . . . Un-American Activity . . . Loneliness, Despair, Frustration . . . Meet the people ushering in the age of Trump.

The left case for an independent Canada.

Cornel West has a compelling message. Instead of running a third-party campaign most voters won’t notice, he should grab the spotlight by challenging Joe Biden for the Democratic nomination.

Julia Salazar won her New York State Senate race last night. Her campaign, and those that lost, show what the Democratic Party will throw at left candidates — and how we can beat them.

Though Tuesday’s gratifying Democratic victories in Georgia are unlikely to move the needle of politics very far, they came as a satisfying vindication of arguments the Left has been making for years.

Look past the theatrics of a feisty, bellowing president and reactionary hecklers. Joe Biden’s State of the Union address didn’t offer working-class people a clear economic alternative or signal real opposition to Israel’s brutal war in Gaza.

Within the Democratic Party, institutions created during the New Deal and civil rights era have acted as barriers to insurgents on both the right and left.

You can’t do mass politics without mass demonstrations.

If the Supreme Court strikes down Joe Biden’s proposed student debt cancellation plan tomorrow, the president has other, smarter options to relieve student debtors.

Within hours of going on strike, West Virginia educators defeated a dangerous education privatization bill. They've again reminded us of a simple truth: strikes work.

For Democrats, taking a stand for democracy requires prosecuting coup plotters wherever and whenever they show their seditious faces. This rule holds fast except for in Bolivia, where prosecuting coup plotters apparently amounts to authoritarianism.
Donald Trump wants to divide and conquer the labor movement. We shouldn’t let him.

Rhode Island has long been one of the most corrupt and machine-driven states in America. A new left movement is trying to change that — but they can’t agree on how.

Democrats refused to seize a rare opportunity to outmaneuver Republican Senate leader Mitch McConnell. They settled for a COVID relief bill that skimps on benefits, provides tax breaks to the rich, and pulls us toward austerity extremism.

The Civilian Conservation Corps, FDR’s original Green New Deal, cared for the environment and gave jobs to the unemployed. And though its record on racial equality was imperfect, it helped undermine key parts of Jim Crow.

The uptick in high-profile strikes in recent years has been heartening. But sustaining and expanding the gains won by that militancy will require careful strategizing and deep political engagement that starts with but goes beyond the shop floor.

The American left has been transformed over the past four years under President Donald Trump. But the Left will have to organize and fight just as hard under President Joe Biden.

Democrats have a choice: continue as the loyal opposition in a political order defined primarily by the populist right, or mobilize a transformative ideological vision and distinctive set of policies capable of defining the political order itself.