Gabriela Santiango-Romero, a current Detroit city council person representing a largely Latinx and immigrant district, has been disqualified from running in the upcoming elections in November. According to the Wayne County Clerk’s office, Gabriela Santiango-Romero was disqualified from the upcoming race because she signed an affidavit saying that she did not owe any outstanding campaign fees. It was later discovered that she did have a late fee of $250.
Apparently, this issue isn’t an uncommon one. Even a senior official with Detroit’s election department, speaking to Bridge Detroit said that “unfortunately, some candidates only discover they have outstanding obligations when their names are denied placement on the ballot.”
In fact, the Detroit Free Press reported that a Wayne County Commissioner dealt with something similar a few years ago, and had to file a lawsuit to get placed back on the ballot. Santiago-Romero filed a lawsuit and is legally represented by the former chair of the Michigan Democratic Party. She has records of her filing on time. She also has records of how she made an error in the original filing, and how she promptly filed the amended paperwork needed. She even has paperwork showing that the late fee has since been waived. Still, she remained off the ballot.
The situation was so ridiculous that even the city of Detroit’s lawyers agreed Santiago-Romero’s late fee waiver meant that she should be placed on the ballot. As it stands, Santiago-Romero will appear on the August primary ballot.
If an established politician is having a hard time navigating the bureaucracy of local government, imagine how difficult it is for independent candidates. The truth of the matter is that these types of bureaucratic practices are meant to weed out those who don’t have resources from those who do. It can’t be seen any other way.
The fact that candidates don’t get notified of outstanding fines by the elections department — who obviously have these records — when candidates first pull petitions is ridiculous and is just another testament to the undemocratic nature of the electoral process. This isn’t just an issue that is restricted to Wayne County, but applies to the U.S. electoral system as a whole. It is one of the reasons why we have a two party system, and both the Democrats and Republicans consistently work to keep it that way.
We Need An Anti-Capitalist Alternative
As revolutionary socialists, we reject the undemocratic practice that led to Gabriela Santiago-Romero’s disqualification from the election, but we do not support her candidacy. For us, politicians who are seeking to be forceful representatives of the working class and oppressed cannot be members of a political party that actively supports genocide in Gaza, backs legislation that has led to the incarceration of millions of Black and Brown people, or promotes and supports legislation and policies attacking immigrant rights. We also need elected representatives who oppose voting for any budget that gives tax breaks to the rich.
Unfortunately, workers, oppressed people, and the Left don’t have any real options in the upcoming elections. However, we do have the power to use the elections to raise issues that matter to Detroiters, and to create and strengthen a space to organize people around these issues. In the context of mounting anger and dissatisfaction at Trump, which is being mobilized by people taking to the streets, the Left needs to fight for a program that unites the different struggles, bringing out the full power of the working class and oppressed. At the same time, we have to fight for the creation of democratically controlled independent organizations and assemblies of the movement, driven from the bottom up by the working class.