The Real Reason Socialism Is Surging Across America

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Welcome to the Daily Signal Podcast, where we provide intelligence for the intelligent. Now, without further ado, here's today's take.

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Brooke Medina (0:27)

The DSA has been laying this groundwork and organizing at the local and state level for a long time, for many, many years. So the DSA proper emerged in 1982 and it's steadily been been building. And so they have decided, though, that the best way to be more effective electorally is to not just stand alone as their own party, but really to build from within the Democratic Party. So they have not built their own infrastructure. They have co-opted the Democratic Party's infrastructure.

Rob Bluey (1:11)

It seems that everybody is talking about socialism and the rise of the Democrat Socialists of America. And we have with us today a guest who has always organization has studied this issue quite closely and has a new special report, which documents the rise of DSA in the United States of America. Brooke Medina is the Vice President of Communications for State Policy Network, a great organization that has a presence in all of our states and works closely with a lot of the state policy organizations that are on the ground in state capitals doing tremendous work advocating for freedom and free market principles. Brooke, thanks so much for joining The Daily Signal.

Brooke Medina (1:51)

Thank you for having me, Rob.

Rob Bluey (1:53)

Well, this report is one of the most comprehensive that I've seen about the DSA, and I'd like you to walk us through what you found, because I think when a lot of us think about DSA or the candidates who certainly made a lot of news and headlines, people like Zoram Mamdani or Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez, we think of places like New York City. But that's really not the only place where the DSA has grown. You've mapped quite the growth of this organization from 2013 to today.

What did you find?

Brooke Medina (2:28)

Yeah. I think that you're right, though, to frame it up as when we think of the DSA, we think of those largely liberal, left-leaning bastions in urban areas or Democratic-run states. But what we found was this has really spread significantly since 2013

In 2013, there were about 21 DSA chapters across the country. Today, there are 204

This growth has been exponential, just even in states that you might not expect it, like Kansas and Texas and Florida. Just right after New York, Florida has the second most number of DSA chapters in the country. I think that's something that's incredibly noteworthy about this report's findings, the growth of the DSA and this increasing acceptance of DSA sort of priorities and preferences within the Democratic Party. I think that's significant, but also, I'd like to note that there are these blue states, excuse me, red states that have just more success with DSA candidates at the local level. So even if you're sending, you know, Republicans to Congress, you have to watch out, like you might have someone running for Flood Commission that is a DSA candidate. So I think that that's also interesting, is it's really permeating at the local and state level.

Rob Bluey (3:56)

Brooke, when you have a situation like that, where a candidate at the very local level is running, are they openly identifying themselves with DSA, or is it more under the radar, they believe in socialist ideas, but they maybe askew the label? What is the situation that you found in your analysis?

Brooke Medina (4:16)

It's a bit of a mixed bag. It really does depend on the electorate in that area. But largely, it seems like increasingly these candidates are very comfortable wearing the DSA label or openly acknowledging that they are a socialist. And that's actually not that surprising when you look at the numbers of Democrats that identify or are sympathetic to socialism, which is about one third of those who identify as Democrat voters.

Rob Bluey (4:44)

Now, we, as your report acknowledges, a recent Gallup poll showed there was an increase in the number of Americans who were showing favorability toward socialism, which I think for those of us who recognize certainly the pitfalls and look back at the history and the failures of socialism, it just caused some alarm bells to go off. So do you think that that's a combination of maybe the education system in the United States? But how much of a role are these local chapters of DSA and people who are embracing the politics behind it having an influence over those poll numbers?