Candi CdeBaca won a runoff race in early June 2019 against former Denver city council president Albus Brooks, and she did it by promising to implement communist policies “by any means necessary.”
CdeBaca was among three candidates that unseated incumbents in the Tuesday runoff, preliminary results show, and she’s already drawing comparisons to Socialist Congresswoman Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez, the 29-year-old who unseated 10-term incumbent Joe Crowley in New York’s 14th congressional district in 2018.
“It’s historic,” said Carlos Valverde, state director for Colorado Working Families, a political activist group that supported CdeBaca. “It is in the vein of Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez. … A victory that really demonstrates people power over money power.”
CdeBaca defeated Brooks 52.4 percent to 47.6 percent, though military and overseas ballots are still being counted.
The upset victory, and two other incumbent defeats, marks the most significant shift in city leadership in over 30 years, and Valverde contends it “began a movement” toward more progressive policies once the new members are sworn in this week, The Denver Channel reports.
CdeBaca thanked her supporters on Facebook, where she claimed her secret to success was simply keeping it “real.”
“The Eastside taught me really early what ‘real’ really means. Don’t talk about it, BE about it. I knew in my heart if community who knew this principle still existed in the Eastside, they would see me and recognize real,” she wrote. “If they didn’t I was cool with it too because I wanted to serve those who understand this principle. They are here, they showed up, they recognized real.”
In April, Jonathan Woodley posted a video of CdeBaca during a “Denver Decides” candidate forum as she explained to voters exactly what she’s all about, and why she plans to implement communism at every opportunity.
“I don’t believe our current economic system actually works. Um, capitalism by design is extractive and in order to generate profit in a capitalist system, something has to be exploited, that’s land, labor or resources,” CdeBaca alleged.
“And I think that we’re in late phase capitalism and we know it doesn’t work and we have to move into something new, and I believe in community ownership of land, labor, resources and distribution of those resources,” she continued. “And whatever that morphs into is I think what will serve community the best and I’m excited to usher it in by any means necessary.”
By Any Means Necessary also happens to be a radical “anti-fascist” group known for instigating violent confrontations with Trump supporters and patriots across the country, including the deadly melee at a Unite the Right rally in Charlottesville, Virginia in 2017.
The Cambridge Dictionary defines communism as “an economic system based on public ownership of property and control of the methods of production, and in which no person profits from the work of others.”
It’s a natural progression of socialism, which is becoming increasingly fashionable in American politics.
A Harris poll conducted for Axios on HBO published Sunday found 55 percent of American women between the ages of 18 and 54 would prefer to live in a socialist country like Venezuela than the U.S. More broadly, the four in 10 Americans said the same.
