Landis Spencer is running for a seat on Detroit’s Board of Police Commissioners (BOPC), a civilian oversight body that has moved away from its original purpose of reining in the Detroit Police Department (DPD) and now has ex-police officers serving on it. Spencer’s platform includes creating a mental health worker emergency response team to replace armed police; banning facial recognition technology; demilitarizing the police (currently the proud possessors of an enormous tank); ending police brutality; and protecting civil liberties. He wants to move public dollars out of the police department, which absorbs a third of the city’s budget, and into services that would improve poor and working-class Detroiters’ daily lives.

Spencer is a member of Metro Detroit Democratic Socialists of America (DSA) and the former cochair of the chapter’s Black and Brown Alliance. His two-person slate — the other candidate is Denzel McCampbell, running for city clerk — has been endorsed by Congresswoman Rashida Tlaib and is heavily backed by DSA. Detroit DSA member Courtney Smith recently spoke with Spencer about how he came to democratic socialism and how his campaign is looking to translate the energy from last year’s George Floyd protests into lasting political power.