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Philly left loses big at the polls. Or did it even try?
Last night's election seems to signal a defeat for the Philadelphia left. But Diop and Honkala were not the right vehicle for for a social justice candidate.
Philly left loses big at the polls. Or did it even try?
Last night’s election seems to signal a defeat for the Philadelphia left: Green Party candidate for Sheriff and anti-poverty activist Cheri Honkala received just 7 percent of the vote, crushed by Democrat Jewell Williams; and Uhuru’s black nationalist-socialist candidate Wali “Diop” Rahman got destroyed, receiving less than 4 percent.
Honkala’s candidacy never took off into anything resembling the grassroots movement that would have been necessary to overcome the huge number of Philadelphians who likely vote a straight Democratic ticket, and Diop’s message of “revolutionary resistance” made his self-imposed political isolation a forgone conclusion. But while this might be a defeat for the self-proclaimed leftist candidates in Philly, the city’s left, some of whom are camped out at City Hall, largely sat this election out.
Keystone Progress, a statewide progressive organization, is responsible to so many constituencies that their voting guide was effectively useless: nearly every candidate in the state was endorsed by at least one union or liberal group, making it impossible to discern any clear progressive standard bearers.
Council currently lacks such a voice on the left: Councilwoman Jannie Blackwell (not exactly a progressive, though certainly not a conservative: this is Philly) cast the lone vote against the new youth curfew. There is a constituency in this city that would support a forceful, thorn-in-the-side advocate for social justice.
And indeed, there was nearly a progressive victory this spring, and most everyone missed it: progressive candidate Sherrie Cohen — the daughter of longtime Northwest lefty councilman David Cohen, and sister of state Rep. Mark Cohen — came extraordinarily close to winning the Democratic primary for City Council at-large. The media never reported on her close finish, and throughout the campaign reporters dedicated most of their attention to Andy Toy, describing him as the challenger most likely to knock off an incumbent.
But it was Cohen who came within 1,675 votes (0.4 percentage points) of beating Jim Kenney. Cohen beat Toy by a decisive 4,938 votes. (I would prefer to link to the city’s official results instead of the Inquirer but incredibly the City Commissioners office does not make results of past elections available online, and said that I would have to pay for a copy at the office. Perhaps this is something that the newly elected reform commissioners plan to change?)
And yesterday’s primary was perhaps a missed opportunity for a high-profile lefty candidate like Cohen. The only real race on City Council ended up being the five-way contest to fill two “Republican” at-large seats (that race is still too close to call). But these aren’t Republican seats. They are just seats for non-Democrats, (or any other hypothetical majority party), according to the Philadelphia Home Rule Charter.
A left-leaning independent could run for those seats.
So if Sherri Cohen had run for City Council at-large as an independent rather than during the Democratic primary, could she have won? Or is Cohen right in believing that the only way for a progressive to win in Philly is with a big “D” after his or her name? As we reported in June, Cohen and others founded a Democratic Progressive Caucus “in hopes of electing candidates who aren’t beholden to the machine.” However, we haven’t heard from them yet — and we certainly didn’t hear anything from them yesterday.
Dan:
You completely missed the point of our Progressive Voters Guide.
Keystone Progress does not endorse, but we have provided a widely-used guide (150,000 readers) that helps progressive voters understand who is being endorsed and why they were endorsed.
Contrary to what you wrote about “ nearly every candidate in the state [being] endorsed by at least one union or liberal group,” we were only able to find just over 200 progressive candidates out of over 10,000 running statewide.
We listed the endorsements of 36 progressive organizations, adding a unique icon system to let people know at a glance whether a candidate earned their endorsements in one or more of five areas: Education, Environment, Labor, Reproductive Freedom and Social Justice.
Interestingly, not one candidate in Philadelphia earned all five badges. No one got an Environment badge and only 4 earned the Reproductive Choice icon.
We believe our guide is invaluable information for a progressive voter who wants to know if a candidate is pro-choice, pro-environment, cares about LGBT rights, supports public education, etc. Endorsement, or the lack thereof, speaks to those concerns for voters in places as diverse as Pittsburgh to Tioga County.
Our guide is the only source for this information. The City Paper doesn’t provide it, nor does any other media outlet anywhere in the state.
Your criticism of our being inclusive sounds like the media’s criticism of the Occupy movement. We are not trying to make decisions for people. Our purpose is to give people information so they can make informed choices. That’s the essence of democracy.
Michael Morrill
— Keystone Progress- BTW, our guide listed Sherri Cohen in the primary and Cheri Honkala in the general election. — Keystone Progress
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