There was a time in this country when even the Democrat Party’s most liberal members drew a hard line against communism. Whatever you thought of their policies – and believe me, there was plenty to critique – you could at least count on a shared understanding that Marx and Lenin had no seat at the American table. That consensus held for decades. Through the Cold War, through the fall of the Berlin Wall, through the War on Terror. It was one of the few things still binding us together.
That consensus is dead. And what’s replacing it isn’t some quirky progressive experiment cooked up on a college campus. It’s something far more deliberate, far more dangerous, and it’s unfolding right now in one of the most consequential Senate races in the country. A race that could hand Democrats control of Congress.
From Fox News:
A former member of the Democratic Socialists of America (DSA) who lives in Michigan issued a dire warning against extremism in American politics, and ripped far-left, progressive Democratic Senate candidate Abdul El-Sayed as dishonest and “sanctimonious.”
“So, I think that it’s up to everyone to not sit on their hands, Democrats, Republicans, Independents, we all need to be out there,” Jake Altman told Fox News Digital. “We all need to be supporting candidates who love this country, who want to deliver for Michiganders. We should not be leaning into this sectarian politics. My fear is we’ve seen the left wing of the Democrat Party import the politics of Hezbollah into the United States, and now we’re living with the sectarian aftermath of that.”
Notice who’s sounding the alarm here. Not a Republican operative. Not a conservative think tank. A former DSA member and labor union worker – a man who watched from the inside as the organization he once believed in was devoured by ideologues pledging allegiance to some of history’s bloodiest regimes.
A party that once rejected communism
According to Altman, the rot set in around 2014 and 2015. Marxist and Leninist factions began infiltrating the DSA and the labor unions orbiting it, using well-meaning workers as pawns in a broader campaign to drag the Democrat Party leftward. By August 2025, the transformation was formalized: the DSA voted to strip its longstanding prohibition on Leninists operating within the organization.
Gone. Just like that.
The group’s current co-chair, Megan Romer – whom Altman flatly describes as a “Marxist-Leninist” and “fan of the Cuban regime” – traveled to Cuba last year with forty fellow radicals. She gushed about the communist nation being “care-focused vs. production-focused,” pinned Cuba’s food shortages and mass emigration on America’s blockade, and proclaimed Cuba home to “the most LGBTQ-friendly constitution in the world.” Apparently the political prisoners and crumbling infrastructure didn’t make her travel journal.
What Altman once knew as an organization rooted in “a broader liberal tradition” is now, in his own words, “very susceptible to extremist takeover.” Susceptible? The takeover already happened.
Michigan’s alarming test case
Enter Abdul El-Sayed – the progressive Democrat vying for Michigan’s U.S. Senate seat against Republican former congressman Mike Rogers. During the primary, El-Sayed welcomed socialist streamer Hasan Piker onto the campaign trail. For those unfamiliar with Piker’s greatest hits: he declared in 2019 that “America deserved 9/11.” He’s praised Mao Zedong. He’s called for capitalists to be murdered in the streets. He’s unleashed a steady stream of antisemitic bile.
That’s the guy El-Sayed chose to campaign with. Voluntarily.
When pressed, El-Sayed shrugged Piker off as a “streamer from California” with little relevance to Michigan. He has refused – pointedly, repeatedly – to condemn him. Meanwhile, he’s busy trying to charm the party’s moderates ahead of November. The audacity is almost impressive.
Altman, who has met El-Sayed personally, isn’t fooled. “We see that the guy is not a straight shooter, he’s not an honest broker,” he told Fox News Digital. “He’s the most sanctimonious man in Democrat Party politics, and that’s going a long way because there’s a lot of sanctimony in that party.” Hard to argue with that assessment.
What’s really at stake
This isn’t confined to one candidate in one state. The DSA’s influence is metastasizing across the Democratic coalition – from Zohran Mamdani’s controversies in New York City to the organization’s internal strategy debates about embedding deeper within the party apparatus. The playbook is consistent: infiltrate, radicalize, then feign moderation when the spotlight hits.
The 2026 midterms will test whether voters in battleground Michigan – and beyond – grasp what’s happening before it’s too late. When a former socialist is the one warning Americans about communists capturing his old movement, the rest of us would be wise to pay attention. The guardrails didn’t erode naturally. They were torn down deliberately, by people who knew exactly what they were doing.
Key Takeaways
- A former DSA insider warns the organization has been fully captured by Marxists and Leninists.
- Michigan Senate candidate Abdul El-Sayed refuses to condemn an ally who said “America deserved 9/11.”
- The DSA formally lifted its ban on Leninists in 2025, openly embracing communist ideology.
- The 2026 midterms will reveal whether voters recognize the radical left’s tightening grip on the Democrat Party.
Sources: Fox News
