Democratic Socialists of America
The Democratic Socialists of America (DSA) is a multi-tendency, democratic-socialist, and labor-oriented political organization in the United States. Its roots are in the Socialist Party of America (SPA), whose leaders included Eugene V. Debs, Norman Thomas and Michael Harrington. In 1973, Harrington, the leader of a minority faction that had opposed the SPA's transformation into the Social Democrats, USA (SDUSA) during the party's 1972 national convention, formed the Democratic Socialist Organizing Committee (DSOC). In 1982, the DSOC, which Harrington described as "the remnant of a remnant", merged with the New American Movement (NAM), a coalition of intellectuals with roots in the New Left movements of the 1960s and former members of socialist and communist parties of the Old Left. Upon the DSA's founding, Harrington and the socialist feminist author Barbara Ehrenreich were elected co-chairs of the organization. Following the merger, the DSA became the largest socialist organization in the United States, with a membership of approximately 5,000 ex-DSOC members and 1,000 ex-NAM members. From 2015 to 2021, DSA membership increased 15-fold from 6,200 after Bernie Sanders' 2016 presidential campaign, the presidential victory of Donald Trump, the 2018 election of DSA member Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez, and the COVID-19 pandemic. Membership peaked at 95,000 in 2021, when the organization had 239 local chapters, before declining to 77,575 members by August 2023. Between 2013 and 2017, the median age of its membership declined from 68 to 33, leading some, such as Holly Ottesrbein of Philadelphia Magazine, to credit the organization for the rise of millennial socialism. The DSA's stated goal is to participate in "fights for reforms today that will weaken the power of corporations and increase the power of working people", with a long-term aim of social ownership of production as public enterprises, worker cooperatives, or decentralized planning. To this end, it has endorsed candidates for political office and led various organizing campaigns for public electricity, social housing, tenants unions, and abortion rights, among others. The DSA is a decentralized organization with local chapters and dues-paying memberships. Some of its members have run in elections and been elected. Some of its members in Congress have initiated various pieces of legislation central to the modern progressive movement in the United States, including the Medicare for All Act in 2003 by John Conyers and the Green New Deal in 2019 by Ocasio-Cortez. Former longtime members of the United States House of Representatives, including Conyers, Ron Dellums, House Whip David Bonior and Major Owens, have been affiliated with the DSA. The three endorsed members of the DSA now serving in Congress are Ocasio-Cortez, Rashida Tlaib, and Cori Bush. , 51 state lawmakers and 132 local officials were affiliated with the DSA. Early history and leadership 

Formed in 1982 by the merger of the Democratic Socialist Organizing Committee (DSOC) and the New American Movement (NAM), the DSA is a 501(c)(4) nonprofit organization. At its founding, it was said to consist of approximately 5,000 members from the DSOC, plus 1,000 from the NAM. Dorothy Ray Healey, a communist and former leading figure of the Communist Party USA, served as Vice Chair in 1982. The DSA inherited both Old Left and New Left heritage. The NAM was a successor to the disintegrated Students for a Democratic Society. The DSOC was founded in 1973 from a minority anti-Vietnam War caucus in the Socialist Party of America (SPA)—which had been renamed Social Democrats, USA (SDUSA). DSOC started with 840 members, of whom 2% had served on its national board, and approximately 200 of whom came from SDUSA or its predecessors (the Socialist Party–Social Democratic Federation, formerly part of the SPA) in 1973, when the SDUSA stated its membership at 1,800 according to a 1973 profile of Harrington. The red rose is part of the official DSA logo, having traditionally been a symbol of socialism since the 1886 Haymarket Affair and the resulting May Day marches. It was drawn from the logo of the DSOC, its precursor organization, and previously of the Socialist International, which shows a stylized fist clenching a red rose, the fist replaced by a biracial handshake pertaining to the DSA's staunch anti-racism. The fist and rose logo was originally designed for the French Socialist Party in 1969 and later shared by socialist and labor political organizations worldwide. Membership 

In the early 1980s, the estimated membership of the DSOC was 5,000, but after its merger with the NAM and subsequent founding of the DSA, the membership of the new organization grew to an estimated 7,000 in 1987. In 2002, Fox News said there were 8,000 members in the DSA. In 2017, the organization passed a resolution calling for the national office to provide the group's paid members with a copy of a financial report in non-convention years. A first such report covering 2017 and the first half of 2018 was published in August 2018. The DSA's membership greatly increased following Bernie Sanders' 2016 presidential campaign, the presidential victory of Donald Trump, the 2018 election of DSA member Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez, and the COVID-19 pandemic. In May 2020, organizers said the DSA had attracted about 10,000 new members since March of that year. According to DSA leaders, after Bernie Sanders dropped out of the 2020 presidential race in April, many supporters previously aligned with his campaign moved over to the DSA. In August 2023, the organization claimed 77,575 members. According to the finance data for the 2021 DSA convention, the organization collected $4.6 million in membership dues in 2020. The DSA offers dues waivers for members who "may be experiencing financial problems right now". DSA membership in 2023 declined from 2021, when membership peaked at around 95,000 members. Some DSA members, such as Seattle Councilwoman Kshama Sawant, have argued that this decline was primarily due to dissatisfaction with decisions of DSA congresspeople on military aid to Israel and the 2022 United States railroad labor dispute. Others have attributed the losses to a general decline in interest in socialism since the presidential election of Joe Biden, or insufficient chapter engagement in membership recommitment drives. Structure

National conventions 
Biennial national conventions represent the DSA's highest authority and help guide it and its policies. Conventions are held every odd-numbered year. Convention delegates are primarily chosen by local chapters from their membership, but some are selected at-large by members not associated with a specific chapter. National Political Committee 

Between conventions, DSA is governed by its National Political Committee (NPC), which simultaneously serves as its board of directors. Since 2001, the NPC has had 16 members elected at the national conventions. The DSA's constitution requires at least 8 of the NPC's members to be women and at least 4 from "racial or national" minority groups. A 17th vote is split between two delegates from the Young Democratic Socialists of America, at least one of whom must be a woman or gender non-binary. The NPC meets four times a year. The NPC elects a leadership committee of six, the Steering Committee, including seven of its own members, two of whom are the representatives of the youth section. At least two of these are constitutionally required to be women and at least one a person of color, with the National Director and the Youth Section Organizer also participating as ex officio non-voting members. The Steering Committee meets bimonthly, either in person or by conference call. Chapters 
The DSA is organized at the local level as self-governing chapters with guidance from the NPC and national conventions, and works with labor unions, community organizations, and campus activists on issues of common interest. , the DSA lists 206 official chapters and organizing committees in all 50 states, as well as 126 student chapters. Staff 
The DSA hires staff to "fulfill the goals set by DSA's elected volunteer leadership." The DSA states that staff do not set its political goals and do not provide political advice. Staff include the National Director and positions in finances, organizing, communications, development, operations, and grievances. Nationwide campaigns are coordinated by the organization's national office in New York City, directed by the national conventions and the NPC. DSA Fund 
The Institute for Democratic Socialism (IDS) was founded in 1978 as a 501(c)(3) organization under the Democratic Socialist Organizing Committee to distribute funding to promote democratic socialist ideals via political education and activist trainings. The IDS continued under the DSA upon its founding and, in the mid-1990s, IDS renamed itself the Democratic Socialists of America Fund (DSA Fund). In December 1980, the IDS organized a three-day conference, "Eurosocialism and America", attended by over 2,000 U.S.-based activists and featured democratic socialist and social democratic activists and leaders, including Jean-Jacques Honorat, Ron Dellums, Olof Palme, Willy Brandt, Michael Manley, François Mitterrand, Joop den Uyl, and Rudolf Meidner. The event included speeches about economic democracy and the Meidner Plan, advances in social democracy in Sweden, the Netherlands, and France, democratic education, and revitalization of democracy in movements and parties. In the 1990s, the DSA Fund directed resources to the Prison Moratorium Project led by the youth section of DSA, which aimed at divesting from private prisons and contributed to Sodexo partially divesting from private prisons. In the 21st century, the DSA Fund provides support for students to attend YDSA winter and summer conferences, and for democratic socialist political education. 