"You can fight harder, win more, and build a broader coalition when you approach politics as a team sport. When I joined the City Council, we teamed up with the Working Families Party and other allies to create the Progressive Caucus-to bring in the workers, tenants, and community leaders that did not previously have a home in the Council to partner in campaigns for dignity for all New Yorkers. And we did well. We banned stop-and-frisk and strengthened protections for tenants against eviction."
"We became the first city in the country to guarantee a living wage for Uber drivers and deliveristas, stable schedules for fast food and retail workers, and strong protections for freelancers from wage theft. We desegregated the middle schools of Brooklyn's District 15 and brought participatory budgeting to New York City. All of those campaigns were won by "inside/outside" coalitions. They won meaningful material gains, so they built trust and strength for the next fight, and for more genuinely participatory democracy."
Brad Lander is leaving his post as New York City comptroller to run for Congress in New York's 10th District, covering parts of Brooklyn and Lower Manhattan. He is a longtime progressive who mounted a mayoral bid and finished third in the Democratic primary; his cross-endorsement and campaigning alongside Zohran Mamdani consolidated progressive support and helped Mamdani prevail under ranked-choice voting. Lander emphasizes team-based politics and inside/outside coalitions that combine movement pressure with governing power. Those coalitions produced policy wins including banning stop-and-frisk, stronger tenant protections, living wages and labor safeguards for gig and service workers, school desegregation, and participatory budgeting.
Read at The Nation
Unable to calculate read time
Collection
[
|
...
]