Good afternoon. I’m Ryan Rose, this is U.S. Democratic Socialists.

Democratic socialist Melat Kiros unseated 15-term Rep. Diana DeGette in Colorado, extending the winning streak that began last week in New York City. Workers behind the most anticipated video game of all time are demanding union recognition before it releases. Broadway’s theater cleaners voted to authorize their first strike in nearly two decades. And from Texas to Florida, even red-state communities are rejecting Big Tech’s data centers.

Facebook demonetized our page last week without warning. Nothing has changed. A page that reached millions of people is still dark, and Mark Zuckerberg’s company has not said a single word about why. We are far from the only independent outlet this has happened to. But this newsletter was built to survive exactly this moment, because it doesn’t run on an algorithm — it runs on readers who pay for it. Working-class media cannot exist on a platform a billionaire can shut off like a light switch. Help us keep the lights on and become a paid subscriber today.

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Now, let’s dive in.

Democratic Socialist Winning Streak Hits Colorado

Hakeem Jeffries calls this a handful of primaries. The voters who just ended four congressional careers in two weeks call it a pattern.

Melat Kiros, a 29-year-old democratic socialist, defeated Rep. Diana DeGette in Colorado’s 1st District Democratic primary. DeGette had held the Denver-based seat for 30 years. She was first sworn in four months before Kiros was born.

Kiros was endorsed by Bernie Sanders, the Democratic Socialists of America, and Justice Democrats. Her campaign refused corporate PAC money. DeGette outspent her more than two to one and rolled out endorsements from the Congressional Progressive Caucus. Outside groups poured in late spending to save the incumbent. None of it mattered.

At her victory party, Kiros took the stage under a sign that read “Power to the People.” She told the crowd: “This is a movement, and we are just getting started.”

DeGette is the seventh House member to lose renomination this cycle and the third in seven days. Kiros joins the three Mamdani-endorsed winners from New York — Brad Lander, Darializa Avila Chevalier, and Claire Valdez — in what is now an undeniable wave of democratic socialist victories in deep-blue America.

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GTA VI Workers Want a Union Before Game Releases

The most anticipated video game in history has a release date: November 19. But the workers who made it have a deadline of their own.

The Rockstar Game Workers Union, organized under the Independent Workers’ Union of Great Britain, formally requested voluntary recognition from Rockstar Games this week. Workers across the company’s studios in Edinburgh, Dundee, Lincoln, Leeds, and London have joined.

They want formal collective bargaining over pay transparency, flexible working, and crunch — the industry’s euphemism for mandatory overtime during the final push to ship a game.

GTA VI has already generated more than $3 billion in pre-orders. Rockstar’s parent company, Take-Two Interactive, spent an estimated $3 billion on salaries alone during the game’s development.

The push for recognition comes after Rockstar fired 31 workers across its UK and Canadian studios in late 2025. The company called it misconduct. The IWGB says every one of those workers was in talks to join the union. The fired developers have launched legal action, and a tribunal recently granted the union the right to argue blacklisting allegations.

If Rockstar refuses voluntary recognition, the union has signaled it is prepared to escalate. This includes a possible strike before launch day.

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The company behind the most anticipated game of all time can union bust. Facebook can demonetize an entire publication with the push of a button. When billionaires control the platform, they control who gets heard. If you believe working people deserve their own media, upgrade to a paid subscription today.

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Even Red States Are Rejecting Big Tech’s Data Centers

The opposition to AI data centers was never a blue-state concern. The communities fighting hardest right now are deep red, and they are winning.

San Marcos, Texas recently became the first city in the state to ban data centers outright. The city council voted 4-3 to prohibit data centers in every zoning district, citing the threat to local water and electricity. When the issue came up at San Marcos City Hall, the chambers overflowed. Nearly every resident who spoke was against the projects.

In Florida, the resistance is just as fierce. Citrus County commissioners voted unanimously to freeze all data center development after residents packed the chambers. DeSoto County followed with its own moratorium vote after a CEO told residents his project would use somewhere between zero and 3 million gallons of water per day.

Even Ron DeSantis signed legislation protecting Floridians from subsidizing data centers. SB 484 prohibits utilities from passing data center electricity costs onto residential and small business customers and preserves local authority over zoning and permitting.

Nationwide, the numbers tell the story: more than 300 bills filed across 30 states. Eighty-five billion dollars in data center projects canceled over three years. Seventy-nine rejections in the first four months of 2026 alone, already surpassing all of 2025.

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Strike Looms at 30 Broadway Theaters

Every night, Broadway actors take their bows. And every night, someone else sweeps the confetti off the floor. Those workers just voted to authorize a strike for the first time in nearly two decades.

More than 250 members of 32BJ SEIU, the union representing cleaners at 30 Broadway theaters, voted to authorize a potential work stoppage. The theaters affected include the homes of Wicked, The Lion King, Cats: The Jellicle Ball, and Schmigadoon!

The union has been negotiating with the Broadway League, which represents the producers and theater owners, since early June over wage increases, stronger retirement security, paid leave, anti-discrimination protections, and safeguards for employer-paid healthcare. No strike has been called yet, but union leadership now has the green light if talks fail.

Martha Aristizabal, a porter at the Ambassador Theatre, said in a statement: “During COVID, we put our lives on the line to ensure Broadway could open again. For each show, we stand ready to meet the needs of the performance — whether it’s cleaning up hundreds of pieces of gravel from the stage or collecting millions of pieces of confetti from the carpet.”

The cleaners are asking for wages and pensions that let them live in the city where they work. Broadway grossed over $1.8 billion last season. The Broadway League is trying to save money on the backs of the workers who keep the lights on and the floors clean.

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Bought Parties Are Bought by the Same Billionaires

There is a version of the Democratic Party that would look at the last two weeks and understand what is happening. That would see progressive victories in Colorado and New York and recognize the future staring them in the face. That is not the party the establishment is running.

The party they are running calls a cultural shift “a handful of primaries.” It outspends insurgents ten to one and still can’t hold the line. It refuses to debate challengers and calls that leadership.

USDS exists because the moment doesn’t wait for permission. Facebook’s algorithm can slow us down, but it can’t stop us. We are not rebuilding on Mark Zuckerberg’s platform. We are rebuilding here, with readers who pay for the journalism they believe in. If you made it this far, you already agree with that. Become a paid subscriber and make the next edition possible.

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Thanks for reading. We’ll see you next week.

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Good afternoon. I’m Ryan Rose, this is U.S. Democratic Socialists.

Mayor Zohran Mamdani’s endorsed candidates swept all three congressional primaries in New York City. Apple permanently closed its first unionized store while keeping workers at its non-union stores employed. Congress is moving forward legislation to stop Big Tech from making your family pay for AI data centers’ electric bills. And a Seattle oyster bar shut its doors after workers walked off the job after a year of stalled contract negotiations.

Facebook demonetized our page this week without warning, without explanation, and without recourse. A page that reached millions of people, effectively silenced. Just like that. We are not the first independent outlet this has happened to, and we will not be the last. But this newsletter does not exist at the mercy of Mark Zuckerberg’s algorithm. It exists because readers pay for it. If you want reporting from working people that no platform can silence, become a paid subscriber today. We need you now more than ever.

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Now, let’s dive in.

Zohran Mamdani: King of New York (Elections)

Tuesday night was supposed to be a test for Mayor Zohran Mamdani’s political movement. It turned into a coronation.

All three congressional candidates endorsed by the democratic socialist mayor of New York City won their primaries, unseating two sitting Democratic congressmen. Barring something extraordinary, all three are headed to Congress in November.

Brad Lander, former city comptroller, crushed five-term Rep. Dan Goldman in the 10th District, 62 to 38 percent. Goldman, an heir to the Levi Strauss fortune, had Jeffries’ endorsement, millions in outside spending, and AIPAC’s backing.

In the 13th, DSA member Darializa Avila Chevalier, who helped organize the pro-Palestinian protests at Columbia, defeated five-term incumbent Adriano Espaillat, chair of the Congressional Hispanic Caucus and another Jeffries pick. AIPAC’s United Democracy Project and allied groups spent $2.9 million defending him.

In the open 7th, state Assemblywoman Claire Valdez, a former union organizer and DSA member, beat Brooklyn Borough President Antonio Reynoso, who had the backing of retiring Rep. Nydia Velázquez.

Mamdani ping-ponged across the city celebrating. At Valdez’s party in Brooklyn, the crowd chanted “DSA! DSA!” At Avila Chevalier’s celebration in Manhattan, he told them: “We are showing there is a new path for politics in our city and in our country.”

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Apple Closed Its First Unionized Store

Apple permanently closed its retail store at Towson Town Center in Maryland on June 20. It was the first Apple Store in the United States to unionize in 2022, and the first to ratify a collective bargaining agreement in 2024. Seventy-eight workers lost their jobs.

Apple also closed two non-union stores the same day, in Trumbull, Connecticut and Escondido, California. Workers at those stores were offered transfers to nearby Apple locations to continue their roles.

Workers at Towson were not. They were told to apply for open positions or accept severance.

The International Association of Machinists and Aerospace Workers, which represents the Towson employees, filed an unfair labor practice charge with the National Labor Relations Board. The union called the closure “a cynical attempt to bust the union.”

It’s true the Towson Town Center mall has been losing tenants for years. But the mall was declining when those workers voted to unionize in 2022 and when they bargained a contract in 2024. It only became a reason to close when the workers started exercising their rights under it.

Nine members of Congress sent a letter to Tim Cook demanding answers. Apple, a company worth over $3 trillion, responded by pointing to the fine print of the contract the union negotiated. This is what leverage looks like when only one side has it.

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Apple can spend millions to union-proof one store. Facebook can demonetize an entire publication with the push of a button. When billionaires control the platform, they control who gets heard. We learned that the hard way. If you believe working people deserve their own media, upgrade to a paid subscription today.

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Congress Could Make Big Tech Pay for AI’s Electric Bills

The House of Representatives began consideration Wednesday of a bill that would force tech companies to pay AI’s power bills. Right now, families and small businesses are picking up the tab.

The Ratepayer Protection Act, sponsored by Republican Rep. Gabe Evans of Colorado and Democrat Rep. Kathy Castor of Florida, would require state utilities to adopt a “large load standard” making data center developers pay for the grid upgrades their facilities demand.

Residential electricity prices have risen more than 36 percent since 2020, and are forecast to keep climbing. In Virginia, data centers already account for more than 25 percent of overall electricity demand and could hit 40 percent by 2030. Nationwide, power costs on the largest U.S. grid have exploded by $23 billion.

Trump promised to cut electricity prices in half during his first year. Instead, prices rose an average of 6 percent. Now, his alliance with the AI industry is becoming a political liability. Governors who campaigned against rising electricity costs won landslide victories in New Jersey and Virginia last November.

The tech companies did sign a White House pledge to cover their own energy costs. Only the pledge carries no binding commitments, and the industry is not yet profitable enough to absorb the costs it is generating. Communities in Virginia, Texas, and Ohio can’t wait for a handshake to turn into policy.

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Seattle’s Most Famous Oyster Bar Shuts Down as Workers Strike

The Walrus and the Carpenter, a James Beard–nominated oyster bar and the flagship restaurant of chef Renee Erickson’s Sea Creatures group, closed its doors on June 22 after workers represented by the union United Creatures of the Sea went on strike.

Workers voted unanimously to authorize the strike after more than 15 months of negotiations over a first union contract. The union says Sea Creatures engaged in unfair labor practices designed to stall bargaining and avoid reaching an agreement, and has filed charges with the National Labor Relations Board.

Workers say they experienced reduced hours, lost income, worsened benefits, and instability throughout the bargaining process. The dispute centers on how a 22 percent service charge is divided. The restaurant pays a $25 hourly base and discourages tipping, which essentially functions as a tip replacement that the company controls.

Sea Creatures initially brought in replacement staff and stayed open. Then the picket line intensified, management cited safety concerns, and the restaurant shut down. Management’s Instagram statement apologized to guests for not receiving “genuine hospitality.”

It did not apologize to the cooks, oyster shuckers, servers, dishwashers, bartenders, bakers, and baristas who built the restaurant’s reputation over 16 years and are now fundraising on GoFundMe to cover rent.

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Both Parties Cash the Same Checks

There is a version of the Democratic Party that would look at Tuesday night and understand what it means. That would see three democratic socialists beating the establishment and recognize the future staring them in the face. That is not the party Hakeem Jeffries is running.

The party he is running calls a clean sweep “a handful of primaries.” It pours millions into defending incumbents who lose anyway, then asks you to donate so it can do it again next cycle.

USDS exists because the labor movement and the socialist movement don’t wait for permission, and neither does this newsletter. Facebook’s algorithm can slow us down, but it can’t stop us. We are not rebuilding on Mark Zuckerberg’s platform. We are rebuilding here, with readers who pay for the journalism they believe in. If you made it this far, you already agree with that. Become a paid subscriber and make the next edition possible.

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Thanks for reading. We’ll see you next week.

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Good afternoon. I’m Ryan Rose, and welcome to the first newsletter from U.S. Democratic Socialists.

Our stories today: Elon Musk has become the world’s first trillionaire off the backs of (former) USAID recipients. Sen. Bernie Sanders has proposed giving 50% of artificial intelligence ownership back to the public. Nurses in Massachusetts have authorized a strike after contract negotiations fell through. And a ballot measure in Arizona could ban all public sector labor unions.

This is a weekly newsletter for people who already know the economy is rigged, both parties answer to the donor class, and the only force that has ever pushed back successfully is organized labor. We don’t take money from PACs, corporations, or party committees. We take it from readers. If you want reporting from the side of working people, become a paid subscriber today.

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Now, the news.

Elon Musk Is the World’s First Trillionaire

Elon Musk is now worth $1.3 trillion. That is more than the annual economic output of New Zealand, Portugal, and the Czech Republic combined.

SpaceX completed its IPO last week and began trading on the Nasdaq on June 12. Its first-day valuation came in at over $2 trillion. Musk holds a 38% stake. The offering raised $85.7 billion in gross proceeds, the largest tech IPO in history.

A significant portion will go toward paying off nearly $20 billion in debt from Musk’s acquisition of Twitter and his AI venture xAI, debts quietly merged into SpaceX before the offering went public. The rest will fund orbital AI data centers SpaceX wants operational by 2028 and the expansion of Starlink’s satellite broadband network.

Musk is now the co-founder of seven companies, including Tesla and xAI. He accumulated this fortune while running DOGE, the advisory board that gutted the federal workforce and slashed public services.

DOGE’s cuts to USAID, the agency that delivered HIV treatment, childhood immunizations, and famine relief, have been linked to more than 750,000 deaths worldwide. The majority of them were children. A trillion dollars built on that is not a fortune. It is blood money.

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Bernie Sanders Wants the Public to Own Half of Big AI

Every AI model on the market was trained on your words, your work, and your data. One senator thinks you should own a piece of what they built with it.

Bernie Sanders has announced the American AI Sovereign Wealth Fund Act, which would impose a one-time 50% stock tax on the largest AI companies and place those shares into a public fund. Americans would get a direct ownership stake in OpenAI, Anthropic, xAI, and others, along with board seats and voting power.

Sanders pointed to Norway’s $2.3 trillion sovereign wealth fund, built on oil revenue, and Alaska’s Permanent Fund, which has paid residents $1,000 to $2,000 a year since 1982. His proposal combines both models.

“The time has come to reclaim what was stolen from us,” he said. “Since AI is built on the collective knowledge of humanity, the wealth it generates must benefit humanity. Not just Elon Musk, Jeff Bezos, Mark Zuckerberg, Larry Ellison, and other billionaires.”

This will not pass the current Congress, as Sanders and Warren are in the minority. But the billionaires who trained their AI on your data didn’t ask permission either.

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Nobody in Washington is going to hand working people a share of the wealth they created. Not the Republicans, who are writing the billionaires’ tax code. Not the Democrats, who are writing the fundraising emails about it. If you want media that treats public ownership like common sense instead of a fringe position, upgrade your subscription to paid today.

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Massachusetts Nurses Vote to Strike

Thousands of registered nurses at Brigham and Women’s Hospital in Boston held the largest nurse strike authorization vote in Massachusetts history on Tuesday. The result: 2,798 in favor, 12 against. That’s 99.6%.

The vote came after seven months and 19 bargaining sessions, during which Mass General Brigham executives offered 0% wage increases for most nurses, proposed raising their health insurance costs, and refused proposals to recruit and retain permanent staff.

The union says MGB has relied heavily on expensive temporary travel nurses instead of investing in the permanent workforce, driving up costs while experienced nurses leave for better offers. Kelly Morgan, a labor and delivery nurse and chair of the bargaining committee, said “MGB executives have left nurses with little choice.”

Meanwhile, MGB’s highest-paid executives collected $35.9 million in combined compensation in 2024. The system posted $2 billion in net gains.

The authorization does not automatically trigger a strike, but it gives the bargaining committee the power to schedule a one-day walkout with the legally required 10 days’ notice. The next bargaining session is June 18. If MGB doesn’t move, this would be the first strike in the Brigham’s history.

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Arizona Bill Could Kill Every Public Union in the State

Arizona Republicans wrote a bill to punish teachers for organizing. Then they quietly rewrote it to go after every public-sector union in the state.

HCR 2040 started as a constitutional amendment targeting the Arizona Education Association, the state’s largest teachers union, after it launched a ballot initiative to reform the universal school voucher program. The House version banned union activity on school grounds and outlawed payroll deduction of dues, even when employees request it.

Then it hit the Senate, and the scope exploded. GOP senators added language barring “this state or any political subdivision of this state” from negotiating any collective bargaining agreement with any labor organization. Labor attorneys say courts would likely read it as applying to every public employee in the state, including cops and firefighters.

The bill was co-written by the Freedom Foundation, a think tank whose CEO has called government unions “a root cause of every growing national dysfunction in America.” When asked what loophole the sweeping language was meant to close, they couldn’t name one.

A 2022 anti-union law in Arizona specifically exempted police and firefighter unions. This one doesn’t. This is what union-busting looks like when it’s done by people who went to law school.

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Neither Party Is Coming to Save You

There is a version of the Democratic Party that would make Musk’s trillion-dollar fortune a centerpiece of the midterm message and send lawyers to Arizona before a union-busting amendment ever reaches a ballot. That is not the party we have.

The party we have runs every good idea through a focus group until it comes out dead, then asks you to vote for it anyway.

USDS exists because the labor movement can’t wait for permission. If you’ve been reading this far, you already agree. This newsletter isn’t running on ads, billionaires, or consultants. Become a paid subscriber and make the next edition possible.

Thanks for reading. We’ll see you next week.

🚨 The corporate media that covers them is owned by the same boardrooms writing the checks.

There is no cavalry coming from either party. There is only us.

For decades, Americans have been handed a choice between two flavors of the same corporate agenda. One party gives tax cuts to the donor class with a sneer. The other does it with a smile and a diversity statement.

Both cash the same checks. Both answer to the same boardrooms. Both emerge from the same fundraisers, the same donor calls, the same quiet agreements made behind closed doors. Meanwhile, rents skyrocket, wages stagnate, healthcare bankrupts families, and working people are told to be grateful for whatever scraps survive the negotiation.

They built this system to work for them. We’re here to build one that works for us.

Today, we’re excited to announce the launch of this new Substack for the U.S. Democratic Socialists. We don’t answer to donors. No corporate PAC. No billionaire owners. Our accountability runs in exactly one direction: to working people. That’s why we’re here. And that’s why they’re afraid of us.

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We’re starting with a bang. USDS has secured an exclusive interview with New York City Mayor Zohran Mamdani, the most galvanizing political victory for the American left in a generation. Mamdani didn’t win by moving to the center. He won by telling the truth about who owns this city and who it should belong to.

His message to the landlords, the speculators, and the displacement machine was unambiguous: “If your business model is harassment, violation and displacement, that’s a model that’s going to come to an end.”

That’s not a talking point. That’s a promise with teeth. This is what democratic socialism looks like: real power, built by real people, accountable to no one but the communities that put it there.

That’s our promise, too — and we’re in a position to deliver. We’re not another leftist group that’s all bark and no bite. USDS is already the largest democratic socialist organization on social media, with over 2.5 million members across platforms making real change.

USDS exists because the two-party system has failed working Americans, and enough people finally know it. The proof is already in the streets and in the halls of power. The new generation isn’t waiting for permission. They’re running for office, winning elections, and governing without apology.

They’re proving that a politics built on housing, healthcare, and worker power isn’t a fantasy — it’s a majority position that the donor class has spent decades trying to make unspeakable.

The fight was never left versus right. It’s always been the many versus the few. For the first time in a long time, the many are winning. This is how we fight back. Not with their money. Not with their platforms. With our voices, our values, and our refusal to let democracy die in darkness while oligarchs turn off the lights.

Join us.

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You already know the drill. Turn on the TV. Open a news app. Scroll your feed. You’re not getting news. You’re getting a product, carefully curated and packaged by the same billionaire class that owns the politicians, the think tanks, and now, the press.

Jeff Bezos owns the Washington Post. Patrick Soon-Shiong owns the LA Times. Rupert Murdoch’s shadow still stretches across half the country. And it’s getting worse, not better. Every year, more local newsrooms close. Every year, more “independent” outlets get swallowed by private equity or absorbed into some hedge fund’s media portfolio. Every year, the people who benefit most from keeping you uninformed spend more money making sure you stay that way.

That’s not paranoia. That’s the business model.

Which is exactly why what we’re building here matters.

U.S. Democratic Socialists is already the largest democratic socialist digital media platform in the country: over 2.2 million on Facebook, more than 200,000 on Instagram, 110,000 and growing on YouTube. We didn’t get there with corporate backing or venture capital. We got there because people are hungry for something real. For media that isn’t trying to sell them a car or protect a donor or soften a story because the subject advertises with them.

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This Substack is the next step.

No ads. No corporate money. No billionaire with a stake in what we say or don’t say. Just direct, honest, reader-funded journalism and commentary from a democratic socialist perspective, covering the stories that matter, saying the things that other outlets are incentivized not to say.

And we mean journalism. Original, independent reporting. The kind this country desperately needs and is rapidly losing. We’re not here to aggregate and repackage what corporate outlets already covered. We’re here to do the work they won’t.

But we can’t do it without you. This is 100% reader-funded. No outside money, no corporate lifeline to fall back on. If you believe independent media is worth fighting for, consider becoming a paid subscriber. Every subscription goes directly into building the kind of journalism that actually holds power accountable.

The need for this has never been greater. And the fact that you’re here tells us you already know that.

Subscribe. Share this with someone who’s fed up. And let’s get to work.

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-Justin, John and The U.S. Democratic Socialists Team