Democratic socialists in the United States face a crucial test, one more significant than any since the mass 1930s incorporation of the industrial working class into the Democratic Party coalition. The Bernie Sanders campaign has politicized thousands of new democratic socialists; the COVID-19 crisis may create political space for social-democratic policies unlike anything we have seen since the Great Depression; and a tidal wave of mass protests for racial justice has upended conventional politics throughout the spring, with far-ranging political consequences we are only beginning to understand.

The situation is fraught with extraordinary uncertainty — simultaneously creating the conditions for a resurgent left, as well as an even stronger and more emboldened right-wing nationalism. Quite simply, we are living through an epoch-defining moment for the Left. Depending on how we respond, the coming years may offer unprecedented opportunities for the growth of democratic-socialist politics, or else lead to the socialist left’s increasing isolation and irrelevance.

In this piece, I lay out two basic paths socialists might take on the electoral front, each of which can operate on different scales (local, state, regional, and national). The first broad approach has been advocated in some form by left-liberals as well as pragmatic-minded socialists, ranging from Data for Progress to the Working Families Party and Justice Democrats. This orientation exhorts progressives and leftists to build common cause with as broad a coalition of Democrats as possible, within legislatures as well as among the electorate. That means seeing most elected Democrats as potential allies — while also working to primary conservative Democrats in liberal districts — and widening our support among both working- and middle-class voters.