New York Mayor Zohran Mamdani celebrates with Sen. Bernie Sanders and Rep. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez during an election rally on Oct. 26, 2025, at Forest Hills Stadium in the Queens borough of New York City. (Andres Kudacki / Getty Images)
By Ben Zeisloft September 20, 2026 at 4:00am
A former leader of the Democratic Socialists of America who left the organization issued a warning for those still part of the movement to likewise “leave.”
Jake Altman, who was an executive board member for the Boston chapter of the DSA, said in a Saturday interview with Fox News that the group is working to “force their agenda down other people’s throats.”
“I had been involved in my local union and met some people who were far, far to the left, in like, a frightening way,” he described.
“I was looking for a more pragmatic and thoughtful option on the left that was focused on economic policy.”
As he became more involved with the DSA, he developed the realization that the group was “beginning to sound more and more like those extreme groups on the left that I, you know, certainly didn’t want anything to do with.”
In 2019, Altman had expressed concern that the DSA defended the regime of Nicolas Maduro in Venezuela, since “the democratic socialists and social Democrats in Venezuela are in the opposition.”
DEPROGRAMMED: A former executive board member of the Democratic Socialists of America is sounding the alarm after leaving the organization, saying DSA members now embrace Marxism and defend foreign regimes that oppose the United States.
Jake Altman, who served on DSA’s Boston… pic.twitter.com/mbBgdKQBet
— Fox News (@FoxNews) September 19, 2026
“The person disagreed with me and defended, you know, essentially defended the Maduro regime,” Altman described.
“Flash forward to today… you have DSA members saying, ‘Bernie Sanders, AOC, they’re not socialists,’” Altman added.
“They’re willing to fall over themselves apologizing for any regime that opposes the United States, simply because it opposes the United States.”
The DSA has generated headlines throughout the 2026 election cycle, with several DSA and socialist-aligned candidates unseating establishment Democrat incumbents in the primaries.
Altman warned that there is a “marriage” between “Marxist utopianism” and “third worldism” characterizing the DSA.
He described it as “this view that America is a unique evil in the world and that its enemies have a point.”
That’s when he advised Democrats who are still members to “leave.”
“I personally think that just, given the organization and the structure inside, that a lot of dissident voices have been silenced,” he continued.
“A lot of dissident voices have left the organization.”
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Ben Zeisloft is the communications director for the Foundation to Abolish Abortion. He also serves as a writer and editor for The Sentinel. He is a former reporter for The Daily Wire and has been published in other conservative media outlets such as The Spectator and Campus Reform. Ben graduated from the University of Pennsylvania’s Wharton School with concentrations in business economics and marketing.
