Democratic Socialists of America split on Bernie Sanders endorsement after he punts on reparations

By Molly Prince

Members of the Democratic Socialists of America (DSA) are urging the organization’s national political committee to withhold its endorsement of Bernie Sanders for president after he stated that he was not in favor of slavery reparations.

The DSA’s AfroSocialist and Socialists of Color Caucus wrote an open letter to the political committee criticizing Sanders’ failure to address “the unique experiences of Blacks in America” and not taking time “to inform himself on generations of work around reparations.”

“Should the organization move forward with an endorsement of the Sanders campaign, despite his failure to adopt specific policy stances to address matters of persisting racial injustice and despite his unwillingness to champion reparations to specifically address the experience of the descendants of African slaves, it will risk alienating not just members of color within the organization, but people of color in the communities in which the DSA works,” the letter reads.

Several of the candidates seeking the Democratic nomination in 2020 have come out in favor of reparations for the descendants of slaves including Massachusetts sen. Elizabeth Warren, who stated that “it’s time to start the national, full-blown conversation about reparations.”

Sanders was pressed during a CNN town hall in February to clarify where he stood on the issue. Sanders responded that “there are massive disparities that must be addressed” but questioned what exactly reparations mean. None of the presidential hopefuls who have advocated for reparations have detailed who would receive payment and who would be responsible for paying.

DSA’s March 12 poll on whether or not to endorse Sanders fell largely in his favor. He won 76 percent of the vote, according to Vox. The national political committee is scheduled to vote on his endorsement on Thursday.

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Image courtesy of Wikimedia Commons/Ardfern

4 thoughts on “Democratic Socialists of America split on Bernie Sanders endorsement after he punts on reparations

  1. I will go out on a limb here and state that I will NEVER pay a single red cent for reparations to any special interest group. The Federal government and/or the State can bill me, send me late notices with compounding interest and threaten to steal my property and I will not pay. They’re going to need all their young Social Justice Warrior Thugs with badges to even attempt to enforce this abomination.

  2. The flip side of the coin is: Slavery was legal so all the slave owners descendants should be the ones reparated.

  3. Jezzum burnee has a sliver of sense who’d a thunk..First off the US taxpayer is on the hook for the 20 something trillion that’s been pizzed away by demonrats in the name of the Great Society to level the playing field of the Blacks. As anyone with half a brain can see it’s done
    virtually nothing to level the field. Any black living now has never been a slave, unless they just came from 3rd world $hithole. Blacks were sold into slavery by other blacks like still is being done. Whites fought the bloodist war to free the slaves and the ingrates now want some spending cash to make it all
    better, I think not. Just like the money payed to Katrina victims who had to move, it all went to drugs, alcohol, and smokes and women… I say any black that doesn’t like it here in America be given a free boat ride to Liberia their homeland created after the Civil War..

  4. I have yet to hear what identifying criteria will establish a person as a descendant of U.S. slaves – to what degree – and what is the cutoff point? That’s about six to nine generations and there’s been a lot of marriages to people who never were slaves or whose ancestors were slaves in Jamaica, Haiti, Cuba, Tobago etc. – or even Europe or Africa – and have since come to the U.S., for which our responsibility could not even be imagined. Is there any estimate of the number of people who will be able to trace a lineage that long? I can’t see compensating someone who just thinks their ancestors were slaves – that’s like Lizzie Warren and the Indians.

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