City-County Councilor Jesse Brown was expelled from the Democratic caucus of the Council just before its meeting on Monday, February 3. This would prevent Brown from joining any meetings of the Democrats on the Council. In an email to constituents sent Monday night, Brown said that 13 Council Democrats voted to remove him, barring him from closed-door party meetings. Brown, who will remain on the council through at least 2027, was joined by five other councilors who voted to keep him in the caucus.
More: In shocking upset, open socialist Jesse Brown defeats Council VP Zach Adamson
The Democratic Party is anything but democratic
Council Democrats first threatened to expel him in February 2024 (one month after he assumed office) for, as Jake Allen of the Indy Star accurately put it: “veering away from the party’s moderate strategy and publicly criticizing Indiana Statehouse Republicans who introduced bills targeting Indianapolis last year.” In other words, the local Democratic Party establishment immediately targeted Brown for openly criticizing a widely unpopular piece of state legislation. In a word, they first sought to kick Brown out of the Democratic Caucus for representing the people who elected him into office!
Allen’s reference was to Brown’s correct attack on Republican State Senator Aaron Freeman for introducing legislation to ban IndyGo from building new rapid transit bus lines, effectively killing the Blue Line. Brown survived that vote but was again attacked for straying from the Democrats’ political strategy of presenting Republicans with feeble opposition at best, outright collaboration at worst.
Brown has been vocal in demanding Mayor Joe Hogsett resign in the face of sexual abuse cover-ups and political failures such as the decision not to hire contractors to plow neighborhood streets, leading to chaos after this winter’s heavy snowfall. Recently, he has objected to the effort by fellow Councilors Maggie Lewis, Leroy Robinson, and Carlos Perkins to pressure the Indianapolis Public Schools board to accept a compromise in which devastating bills introduced in the Statehouse would be killed in return for IPS giving funding to charter schools.
Democrats opportunistically move away from the people
When Republicans in the Statehouse introduced bills this session that would destroy IPS along with four other school corporations across Indiana, Hoosiers responded with a spontaneous surge of struggle and renewed commitment to fighting back. Hundreds of school workers attended Indiana State Teachers Association meetings orienting them to the fight. Families established an IPS Parent Council to organize efforts to defend their children’s schools. The IPS Board released statements against the bills.
When Councilors Lewis, Robinson, and Perkins signed their letter calling on IPS to accept “structural change” in the face of this legislative onslaught, the people of Indianapolis saw this collaboration with Republicans in attacking IPS for what it was. Brown then moved with the people and demanded answers from his colleagues on the Council, but this was a step too far for the Democratic Party, who expelled him instead of the councilors attacking public education.
The fundamental issue: Brown represents his constituents
Brown has built a track record of responding to his constituents and advancing their demands, not the demands of the biggest corporations and wealthiest party donors. For months, he worked alongside public pressure from Jewish Voice for Peace, ANSWER Indiana, and other groups to introduce a ceasefire proposal, only to have it removed from the agenda at the very last second and replaced with a say-nothing mockery in collusion with Republicans.
Zach Adamson, whose seat Jesse won handily in the 2023 primary election, built his track record on attacking the left while supporting the right: he wrote that Indy Pride “chose to add to the divisiveness” when they removed cops from Pride in 2020, then plagiarized a Republican proposal to criminalize giving mutual aid or food to people in need. The people’s election of Brown was a clear rejection of Adamson’s anti-worker agenda—an agenda which Democrats have clearly continued.
A final nail in the Democratic Party’s coffin?
Brown’s expulsion should be the final nail in the Democratic Party’s coffin; it is, at the very least, uncovering the Democratic Party’s self-positioning as the “alternative” to the Republic Party.
The Democratic Party asserts that they are the best chance for voters to fight back against the rising political forces on the right. This insults the intelligence and resolve of Hoosiers, who see Democrats’ constant collusion with Republicans not as a “broken system” but just as how politics works. The capitalists control the two establishment parties through campaign donations, lobbyists, personal influence, and the promise of lucrative jobs. While Republicans lead the attack in the Statehouse, Democrats move to land the killing blow locally.
What should we do instead?
Instead of putting our hopes in the Democratic Party, we need a movement and a party to fight for the interests of the working class, and to fight for a whole new system that stands with the Palestinian people and all oppressed people. Jesse Brown won his seat on the Democratic Party ballot line, but not on their political line—we need to build the capacity for socialists to win on our political merits without connecting our politics to the backwards actions of the Democrats.
The Party for Socialism and Liberation has been organizing to build that capacity. In 2022, we took on a challenge the Democrats abandoned and opposed Republican Mike Speedy for State Representative in District 90 on Indianapolis’s southeast side. In 2024, PSL candidates Claudia De la Cruz and Karina Garcia restored a Socialist option for President and Vice President. You can help us continue to fight by supporting our work with a monthly or one-time donation.
Featured image: Jesse Brown calls on Indianapolis Mayor Joe Hogsett to resign at a rally in September 2024. Credit: Indianapolis Liberation Center.