Along with our original recommendations, Emerge also recommends that NYC-DSA CLC representatives vote yes on both Jaslin Kaur and Adolfo Abreu.

In our original batch of recommendations, we abstained from making a recommendation for Jaslin Kaur’s candidacy in District 23 as her responses to the candidate questionnaire implied that she did not intend to run as an open socialist. Since Emerge first conceived of the 2021 City Council Slate project, we have always envisioned city council members as tribunes of the people and spokespeople for the socialist project we see NYC-DSA building together with the people of New York.

We now know that Kaur plans to run as a socialist, and we find her candidacy very exciting. We believe Jaslin Kaur shares many of our priorities, specifically building working-class power through transit, union, and housing organizing as well as putting an end to the repressive power of the NYPD. We are happy to recommend that NYC-DSA CLC representatives endorse her.

We are also happy to recommend Adolfo Abreu in District 14. We originally did not comment on the Bronx/Upper Manhattan candidates as the B/UM Electoral Working Group had not yet made endorsement recommendations. We are excited about the prospect of running Adolfo Abreu, an experienced organizer with Northwest Bronx Community Clergy Coalition, and someone with a record of working with NYC-DSA. He participates in the Housing Justice For All Coalition (of which NYC-DSA is a member), and offered principled support for Samelys López’s DSA-endorsed campaign when it was not politically expedient for him to do so. We share his vision of co-governance and believe it’s of the utmost importance that NYC-DSA makes inroads in communities like his.