DSA is Anti-Black and Gentrifying Harlem

FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE

James Felton Keith Condemns Anti-Black Democratic Socialists: Corrupt Endorsement Process of NYC-DSA for Congressional NY-13

NEW YORK, NY — James Felton Keith, candidate for Congress in New York’s 13th District, is calling out what he describes as a pattern of structural anti-Blackness and insider favoritism within the NYC-DSA’s electoral process. “This is how gentrification actually happens” — "Outside political forces endorse national cultural issues that mute our local efforts for Equity in Housing and Incomes”.

The condemnation follows a December 20th candidate forum in which Harlem — the cultural and political center of NY-13 — was treated as an afterthought, and Black DSA members were silenced after raising concerns about erasing Black Harlem's fight via the Interfaith Commission on Housing Equality’s fight for Affordable Housing Subsidies, Childcare, and Income.

DSA did not invite organizers & candidates who are doing the work on the ground to speak. The DSA leadership converted what should have been a democratic vetting process into an orchestrated coronation for an insider candidate who does not live or organize here.

“The masks are off,” said Keith. “Leadership like Cihan Liu admitted to my staff in writing that their top criterion is a ‘relationship with members.’ That’s not democratic — that’s clique politics. They are cosplaying as Uptown activists while behaving like a colonial force trying to occupy the Black Mecca. Harlem is still the largest landmass and largest voting block in NY-13”

A Documented Pattern

Keith points to repeated instances where NYC-DSA marginalized independent Black leaders who built power outside the organization’s social network:

• Chi Ossé: The organization questioned his “viability,” dismissing his demonstrated community support and transformational work.

• Kristin Richardson Jordan: DSA overlooked KRJ in 2021; she went on to win without them, proving their disconnect from Harlem voters. She also endorsed James Felton Keith.

• NY-13: Keith secured nearly 20,000 votes — 25 percent — challenging Adriano Espaillat in 2020 during the height of the COVID-19 crisis. Yet DSA leadership again erased a viable Black candidate rooted in the district.

“They fear Black power they didn’t create, and their questionnaire specifically asks to run your campaign” Keith continued. “They want relationships they can control, not leaders accountable to the block. NY-13 is Harlem — and a multiracial powerhouse of Black, Jewish, White, Dominican and non-Dominican Latino neighbors. DSA treated all of us like background characters in their internal drama.” — “I was receiving live updates the entire time.”

Campaign Demands

The Keith campaign — representing decades of organizing in Harlem and the Bronx — issues the following demands to NYC-DSA leadership:

1. Public apology to the Black DSA member silenced for speaking about Harlem’s erasure.

2. Removal of “relationship with members” as an electoral criterion, due to its exclusionary and structurally anti-Black impact.

3. A public, open candidate forum in Harlem, inviting all NY-13 challengers and accessible to the full diversity of district residents.

“We are not naïve,” Keith concluded. “We know an occupation when we see one. You cannot win NY-13 without Black voters — and you won’t earn their trust while operating like the machine you claim to oppose. We owe us better.”

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