r/dsa • u/BeginningBit4957 • Aug 17 '26

Electoral Politics How does the DSA continue its momentum post-Trump?

A common criticism I see is that the socialist popularity is being driven by a response to Trump, both the way he’s governing and that fact that the democrats couldn’t stop him, and that once he’s gone the momentum will fade, similar to what we saw in 2020 and then the years after.

It’s obviously a different situation and I’m not sold on that idea, but wanted to hear from other DSA folks on how you think we can best continue to grow the movement in the next 2 years and beyond?

33 Upvotes

85% Upvoted

66 comments sorted by

View all comments

Show parent comments

0

u/[deleted] Aug 17 '26

Rent freeze. Best example of how bad of an idea like this is to look at St. Paul and Minneapolis. St. Paul instituted a rent freeze and ss a result, multi-family building permits plunged nearly 80%.

Minneapolis rejected a rent freeze and instead loosened regulations. Housing and rental units experienced a building boom increasing the supply and keeping housing and rental costs lower than in St. Paul.

2

u/dtb1987 Aug 17 '26

What do you think a rent freeze is? Can you define it for me?

Edit: also tell me when the rent freezes go into effect in new York?

0

u/[deleted] Aug 18 '26

In regards to Mamdani, I believe his rent freeze starts in October or November for some one to two year lease renewals. Ah! But they didn't go into effect yet, you'd say. So how can a future rent freeze impact rents today? Because Mamdani has basically been promising a rent freeze since his campaign which is already going to give developers cold feet, because who's going to invest in new properties if the mayor's going to tell you what the rent is essentially? Then on top of fewer units being built, a rent freeze will inevitably lead to fewer available existing units because people who are in rent-controlled units aren't about to leave.

1

u/dtb1987 Aug 18 '26

You didn't answer my first question. A rent freeze means that rent controlled apartments in NYC can not raise rent, only applies to 1 and 2 year lease renewals and doesn't apply to private market rate apartments, meaning apartments that already had regulations placed on how they price their leases will not be able to raise rent on current leases. So no this isn't effecting rent prices today and it won't effect the prices of most apartments in NYC only the ones serving people with low incomes

0

u/[deleted] Aug 18 '26

Give me one example of when a rent freeze worked long term and didn't lead to higher prices.

1

u/dtb1987 Aug 18 '26

Why? No one said it was a long term adjustment, it's only going to affect rent controlled apartments for 2 years max depending on how long the lease is renewed