Campaign Report: An Interview on Veterans Organizing in the Pacific Northwest

Soren Whited August 1th, 2026

An interview with John, a veteran and organizer involved in veterans advocacy work and the Campaign for a Socialist Party.

Soren: Well, I think we talked about, over the emails, that I thought it’d be nice to start with a little bit of your background and how you’ve come to your involvement in CSP and your involvement in veteran support. If you’re up for it, would you mind saying a little bit about how you ended up in the military?

John: Let’s see. I got out of high school. And I guess right out of high school, I didn’t have any prospects of going to university or anything. But I was playing in bands. I was doing music a lot. And still do, but not to the same extent. But yeah, I was playing in bands, local punk rock scene and hardcore scene.

Anyway, I met a girlfriend. She was an artist. I basically moved to New York with a girlfriend for four or five years. Spent a year in Germany, bumming around with her.

Soren: This is all post-high school?

John: This is right after high school. Yeah. She told me something—I remember this because it’s a very pivotal moment in my life—and I remember her telling me this because we were working shitty restaurant jobs. Really scraping by. To me, this was no problem. So I was like, yeah, this is what it’s going to be like, you know? I was totally okay with it. But one day, she just came to me and said, “Look, I just want to be middle class. I want to have a dishwasher and a house.” And yeah, next thing you know I joined. I had military service in my family.

And I mean, as far as politics at that time, I was in a punk rock scene. So it was leftist, but I didn’t take any of it seriously. It was very naive. You know how it is: kids, anarchism, against authority and the police. And I wasn’t even really involved in that kind of way, even. But I was aware of it and, you know, kind of had anti-authority leanings.

But yeah, the military didn’t freak me out. And I figured it was the quickest way to jump into the middle class. And it’s true.

Soren: Yeah. So it was informed by your girlfriend’s request to obtain middle-class status?

John: Yeah, yeah. I mean, I remember—and you know memory is a funny thing—yeah, I distinctly remember having conversations that she’s, you know, tired, and I mean we were both worn out by it. But to me, that’s just what it was. I was okay living that kind of way. But she had graduated at the time. And she wanted to—I remember her distinctly saying, “I want to be middle class,” using those words, you know.

And then, for one thing, I thought about what I could do. College wasn’t going to cut it. She had been to college. I mean, she got an arts degree, but still. And so, yeah, I went and signed up for the military.

Soren: And what branch was it?

John: Army. And I stayed in the Army for 10 years. I got really into it. I stayed there for 10 years, and then I got out. And this kind of leads into how I was politicized or got into Marxism, because this all occurred when I got out.

The military, it’s really a bubble. And a lot of guys—myself included—take it as a job. You know? It’s not a political ideology. Ideology is frowned upon. You can actually get in trouble for that kind of thing, believe it or not, in the military. But, you know, you take it as a job. That’s kind of what I did. And after deployments and things, you start thinking. But yeah, at about the 10-year mark, my body started kind of giving out on me. I mean, I probably would have stayed if my body had stayed with me. I probably would still be in because it was furnishing everything we needed.

Soren: Because it’s a steady foundation to have?

John: Yeah, and it’s good money. You make more the longer you’re in. And I enjoyed soldiering.

Soren: And what about it did you enjoy?

John: Oh God. I mean, it’s horrible and it sucks, but that’s part of what’s enjoyable about it, in a sense. It’s just a physical job where you’re also using your brain. It can be very exciting.

The thing about the regiment of it, that wasn’t my favorite part. Like, that’s kind of my least favorite part. But, as you kind of move along, that gets less and less. But yeah, the camaraderie, and guys get addicted to deployments—that’s a real thing. I think that happened to me because when I got out, I went back to contracting, which is essentially doing it to a lesser degree. It’s basically the same thing.

Soren: So you were on deployments through the private sector then?

John: Not in security or anything, but deployments doing contracting work. No combat in any of my contracting deployments. They were all the same kind of thing I am doing now, just overseas.

Soren: My next question was about your politicization. And it sounded like, to a certain degree, there was at least a sort of cultural affinity pre-Army, but then you got into Marxism post-Army. So I guess what happened in between there, in terms of your own ideological development?

John: Yeah, I’d say that when I joined the Army, I just went completely gung ho—this is what I’m doing, I don’t care about politics. And you know, even before that, I didn’t really take seriously the politics that were around me, the radical politics I was seeing. I didn’t really take it seriously.

But yeah, even in the military, I was aware that there’s class divisions and this kind of thing. But when I joined the Army, I just kind of said, “Yeah, I’m not in that world anymore.” I don’t have to worry about that—I’m in the military now. So yeah, I just put politics on the back burner, like almost completely while in the military.

And what happened is that when I got out, that’s when I started thinking and questioning kind of everything. You know? Because when I got out, I was introduced into the workforce. I didn’t go right back into contracting. I flirted with college and getting another job. And that’s when I found Marxism.

Funnily enough, I never finished college or anything because I ended up getting contract work, but I took a sociology class, and that was my initial—I guess first—interaction with Marxism, through a Sociology 101 class at a community college. And that kind of started it all off.

Soren: So you were back in the non-military world and observing things, and then also had this sort of introduction to sociology, and the two kind of came together?

John: Yeah. I mean, when I got out, I started questioning just everything. Like, “What is this world we live in?” And kind of like a crisis almost. It happens to a lot of military guys. You’re confronted with the real world, as they call it.

Soren: How old were you at this point when you got out?

John: I was old. I was a little older, so I had a bit of an advantage over a lot of guys. I was a bit older when I got in. I went in when I was 27—26, 27. And that’s old for a private in the military. You’re an old guy. These are kids, you know? Their frontal lobes aren’t even developed. You know, mine barely was [laughs].

So yeah, I just started questioning everything, kind of had a crisis, an existential crisis, and started—I mean, I was reading all kinds of things. I was reading Terrence McKenna. I don’t know if you’re aware of him; he’s like a psychedelic, spiritual LSD guru. I was reading Oswald Spengler, “The Decline of the West,” and his theory about the cycle of history.

I was just trying, you know. And I got introduced to Marxism and then, through my own autodidacticism, I became convinced by it. And then where to go from there? Throughout all that, I was reading Marx, which is extremely hard if you’re coming at it just full on with no guidance.

So I started looking for people to help explain this, you know? And that was YouTube [laughs]. And yeah, bouncing around YouTube because a lot of the leftism and stuff I was then confronted with after getting a cursory kind of self-education in Marxism, it wasn’t lining up with what I had read.

Soren: You mean on YouTube? So like contemporary stuff?

John: Yeah. Basically secondary sources. YouTube channels, speaking. And then essays that certain people were reading, you know. And then I started exploring different post-Marx writers to help explain Marxism. And then, of course, you learn that, “Oh, there’s this whole history that goes along with this that’s very important to understand.” You know, the history of leftism.

Soren: And the mismatch was between what you had absorbed from your direct reading of Marx and sort of this contemporary leftist milieu—at least on social media?

John: Social media and some of the parties. Looking into some of the parties, such as Socialist Alternative, the DSA, the IMT and various Trotskyist groups.

And you know, why is that? Why aren’t these things lining up—what happened? So somewhere in there I learned about Platypus, most assuredly from Douglas Lain’s channel, “Sublation,” or whatever it was called then, “Diet Soap” or something.

But yeah, some Platypus got brought in, and I don’t know when it happened or how it happened. But I started watching the Platypus panels, and those were great. I got into that. And then I started doing a bit of the online reading groups here and there, when I had time.

Soren: So was this during COVID?

John: Yeah, that was during COVID, when I was trying to start doing the group. But I had been following them for several years prior to that too. But yeah, it was during COVID when I said I should do a reading group because they opened it up.

And I even emailed them and said [location redacted] doesn’t have a chapter and I’d like a chapter. And they even put me in contact with a member that lives here, and that didn’t really go anywhere. But yeah, that’s right—they started during COVID, and that gave me an opportunity to actually attend the reading group.

And yeah, I just didn’t have time. It was like Sundays, which is like, yeah, I can’t. Sundays have to be for my family. It’s geared toward students, you know. But, you know, it’s a great education and I try to get what I—and still do try to get what I can—out of it.

Soren: I want to ask you about how you became interested in the Campaign through Platypus, but maybe first we can back up a little bit and talk about how you came into veterans advocacy work, and specifically around disabled veterans, right?

John: Yeah. Well, disabled—and it’s really veterans, in any state, that we try to advocate for. And I can explain that further, but how I got involved with that is just being a 10-year veteran and still working in the military for all intents and purposes. I got involved with the veterans through the VFW hall. Someone invited me casually and I started hanging out there, and then I started getting involved with doing kind of charity work with various organizations, Veterans of Foreign Wars, The Warrior Project, which, you know—and I just kind of lucked into this.

Soren: I know somebody who has been involved with that, but continue, please.

John: Oh really? I just went to a couple meetups with them. I didn’t get really involved. I had buddies who had been helped by that program. Well yeah, no, okay, yeah, I got a little bit involved—but it didn’t stick.

Soren: And at this point, this was not politically or ideologically motivated?

John: No, not at all. Those two came together later, just in the last year or two, really. But this happened. I started doing this about five years ago. So I had been out, I was still contracting and, yeah, I got pulled in just by buddies, work buddies of mine back at the VFW hall. And yeah, it felt good to be trying to help.

Oh, and that’s the other thing. I got service-connected disability myself through the VA. That was a big impetus to try to help others. Because when I got out, I didn’t know what to do. I didn’t immediately run to the VA. I didn’t know that was possible. I didn’t know how it worked. You’re kind of taught in the military, you know, to hide any injuries you may have. This kind of thing is frowned upon in the military. But anyway, unless you get really banged up and you get out really banged up, they’re not going to—the military doesn’t prepare you or put you in that VA pipeline. Even if you’re really banged up, they don’t always put you immediately into that pipeline.

Anyway, so yeah, a couple of years of that, and then, by talking to buddies, veteran buddies of mine, and guys I worked with, and buddies that I got now—I’m talking about the VA and stuff—I got clued into it. So then, when the opportunity came to help other guys get connected to the VA and help other veterans, it seemed natural to start getting involved in that.

And I guess it was a little—not political—but [I wanted] to do something, you know? I said, there’s no politics on the horizon that I can see. And so, you know, do something. It was something to do that would at least be helping my little group a little bit.

Soren: So this is interesting. Correct me if I’m wrong, but my impression is that your interest in leftism and Marxism was developing at the same time as you became more involved in veterans work, but in parallel, not directly informing each other.

John: Yeah, correct. Absolutely.

Soren: But it’s interesting how those things could develop from all these different points of motivation.

John: I know, I know. And the funny thing is it never really occurred to me that they could have overlapping needs. At the time, I just saw that the politics—that any leftist politics—was so removed from what I was doing, and that they don’t do that. You know, this isn’t the kind of thing that they do.

And yeah, totally. And that is what’s interesting. I’ve given a lot of thought to that, and when the Campaign rolled around, and I found out what they were doing, I said, “Holy shit, this is the two colliding now—in real life.” Which has been amazing to me, because I see it with totally different eyes now. And I can look back at even the history of our little group and see how things have developed in certain ways.

And through the hurdles, you know, and seeing it through using Marxism to kind of see that. It’s been really interesting.

Soren: So you’ve come to view your own activity with veterans issues—that at the time you didn’t connect to leftist politics—but retrospectively you sort of now view it through that lens?

John: Yes, absolutely. And it really re-energized me.

Soren: That’s really interesting. And I mean, you talked about this disconnect. Do you have any sense of what it was about the leftists or the leftist organizations and activities and discussions that made them feel like they didn’t have any relevance to your veterans work?

John: In what they were doing, what they were actually doing, which was—to my eyes—doing a lot of fundraising for a newspaper, their newspaper, campaigning for various politicians in the area. It’s very vigorous here because we have [individual redacted].

And, I mean, God, I have so many experiences just from my veterans work of when leftists show up, they’re usually not helpful [laughs]. They don’t seem to be interested in actually helping people. They’re more interested in fighting their own fight with whatever authority is present. That seems to be the big thing to them.

And, yeah, I don’t know. They’re not involved with any kind of segment of the working class as far as I can see. It’s all very young, and that makes me very suspicious. And yeah, I just didn’t see what they were actually physically doing. They would talk—they would invoke Lenin and the party and an independent working class—they would say these things, but what I was actually seeing physically happening, it had zero effect.

And it’s very small here. I think even Socialist Alternative is very small here. But yeah, I was aware and thinking for years now that the party seemed to be the issue to me. Or the one that was being neglected was the party question. And no one was being honest about it. Really, really honest about it, including the leftists that I would witness here locally and online and stuff.

So, yeah, I just got a feeling they weren’t interested in doing these kinds of things. And they would even say as much. They would say, “Oh, that’s just charity work.” And God forbid it’s veterans or something. You know, and I’d seen and witnessed how some veterans were treated by the leftists.

And there’s this kind of attitude by leftists that, if you are a veteran, you have to kind of, you know, prostrate yourself to the leftists and say, “I feel horrible.”

Soren: Yeah, I was going to ask, did you encounter a certain level of suspicion on the part of leftists toward you or other veterans?

John: Yes, yes. Not directly to me, but I’ve witnessed it. And still witness it.

Outside of myself, I never got so involved with any of these groups that I would even share my service or, you know, what I’m doing now. You know, I imagine, like, you go into a—I just watched something the other day where a guy talked about his former service, and they’re, you know, calling him a baby killer and all these horrible things.

So yeah, but it never happened to me directly because I was—honestly—I didn’t want to get involved. I was totally put off by that. I didn’t want to subject myself to that.

Soren: So we talked a little bit about how you got involved in veterans work—veterans advocacy—but could you maybe just remind me how that came about? It sounded like it was a relatively organic development.

John: So by that time, I was back and I was doing contracting, and just through buddies I worked with and friends I had, I ended up hanging out—initially it started at the VFW hall in [location redacted]—and, you know, hanging out there, seeing the kind of activity that was going on and seeing what a couple of other guys were doing.

I thought, “Oh wow, I should maybe give back and try to do something like this,” like these guys are doing. Which was, you know, volunteering for various NGOs and the like. And some directly with the VA.

So I started doing that, and the volunteer opportunities are very—they’re not very good. Most of the NGOs, and the VA included, kind of put you into busy work. It’s just nonsense. You know, helping people find directions in the VA building. You don’t feel like you’re really doing much.

And so I tried a couple of things at the VFW hall and through them. And then I met a guy who, after talking to him a couple of times, said, “Oh, you should come”—and I guess I was voicing frustrations and whatnot—he said, “Oh, you should come to the [location redacted] and volunteer with the DAV.” And I said, “OK.”

So I started volunteering there, and slowly, through meeting with guys at the VA who were in the DAV group, I kind of got brought in. And they said, “Hey, this is what we’re doing. Like, are you interested in doing it?” And that was the present group that I’m with now.

Soren: Can you say a little about what it is that you do, what this group does and what you do with it?

John: Yeah, yeah, of course. So it’s an informal group of veterans. At the present time, there’s 11 of us. There’s typically seven to a dozen really active participants. Basically we do—we don’t have a name. People in the community call us the “sock guys” [laughs] because we hand out white tube socks. So that’s our—that’s kind of our name.

Soren: That’s a good moniker.

John: Yeah, yeah. And you find out everybody wants socks—you can imagine.

So we basically do veterans outreach. But what is that, right? What does that actually entail? It entails kind of several strategies to help veterans. So basically, to get in contact with veterans who may need help. That’s kind of our goal.

Our initial goal is to find these veterans who we might be able to help. And there are two strategies. One of them is to go out on the street—to go to the encampments and meet them right there directly. The other strategy that’s developed over time—this particular group is almost 10 years old; it’s seven or eight years old—is developing relationships and contacts with other groups: the gospel missions, the NGOs and the Veterans Administration.

So we’ve developed these relationships, and we’re referred veterans. For example, a veteran walks into the gospel mission downtown and presents as a veteran. The mission there knows us and will call us and say, “Hey, we got a veteran in here. Can you guys help this guy out?” And that’s when we’ll initiate what we do.

Soren: So I guess you’re really integrated into a broader network?

John: Yes. And that happened—that doesn’t happen instantly, of course. That took years and years. That’s kind of the most—I see it as one of the most valuable things about what we do.

And that’s kind of the need we fill. It’s the crack in the pavement that we identify. We’re proactive about finding the people. They don’t have to wander into places. So yeah, that’s basically it. Do you want to know—should I talk about what we do?

Soren: Yeah, I would like to hear some about that. I also was going to ask, and maybe you could address this in your response or as another response, but political thoughts or aspirations aside, I was going to ask, just on its own terms, what kind of constraints you’ve come up against in that work. That is to say, you know, what goals have you been structurally frustrated in reaching? But maybe it would make sense to start more specifically with what you guys do.

John: Yeah. Then I could give maybe some examples and stuff. So we’ll meet with a veteran. We’ll find a veteran, and they’ll want help or assistance. Usually, if they end up at the Gospel or at a mission or something like that, they’re ready for help then.

And what we’re able to do is bypass a lot of red tape and, you know, in a matter of minutes, take them to the VA or get them into other services. And we’re able, through our relationships and knowledge about how the system works, to get them in much faster than the NGOs, social workers or the VA can give these veterans assistance and get them into programs.

We can generally do it much faster because we know how it works. We know the little tricks of the trade, what to say. And it really depends on what the veteran needs. Sometimes we have longstanding relationships with a lot of these veterans, and we’ll give them rides to their appointments. There’s one guy whom one of us takes grocery shopping every month. Oh, and helping veterans get driver’s licenses—it’s like anything.

And there are, of course, certain things—and that’s the limitation—certain things we can’t help with. We’re financially constrained, and there’s a way we deal with that too. We kind of have a petty cash system, but there are financial constraints. But it’s really any kind of problem the veteran presents us with. We try to use our resources to tackle those.

Now, with the veterans we encounter being, the majority of the time, homeless or having substance abuse problems, most of the time at the beginning, until they get into treatment, it’s getting these guys into treatment and off the street.

Soren: What would you say these other organizations lack that your group is able to provide in turn, and that allows you to expedite these processes so much?

John: Just that we are concerned citizens [laughs]. We have no attachments or professional ethics that we must abide by within their organization. We can improvise. If it’s Sunday night at 2 a.m. and we get a phone call, we can take care of that right then, whereas there’s no way that would even be possible within these organizations.

You know, they don’t have—it’s not set up that way. These are just guys. And at the NGOs, the main majority—the people who are really doing the work in NGOs—are paid employees. They’re, you know, it’s a 9-to-5 job and they have their own frustrations. People don’t like to work, you know? And so, just by not being constrained by these systems they have in place, their bureaucracies and rules, we can bypass that.

And that’s not to say that the NGOs aren’t helpful because they are. And, you know, over time, we’ve collected more sympathetic employees and members of these organizations as well who will help us. But yeah, the fact that we’re able to improvise, the fact that we’re not constrained by their—we don’t have to worry about getting fired. We don’t have to worry about getting in trouble. We can really advocate.

And we can—to give an example—a city social worker will be presented with a veteran and they’ll have, like, a checklist and they have a questionnaire and they, you know, have a way of trying to get people into places, right? Like, we’ll just ask the veterans, “What do you want to do? What does your recovery look like? What do you want to happen?”

And so we take that into account. And, you know, sometimes it’ll be a veteran and he’ll say, “Well, you know, I have a family in Montana. If I could get close to them, that’s where my social support network is. You know, if I could just get a ride to Montana”—this happens more than you think. We could just buy them a bus ticket. We don’t just buy them the bus ticket. We call the families and we get involved in what’s going to happen and what happens after.

But yeah, we can call the family, make sure that they’re wanted there and that there’s going to be support there. And then start the VA process of getting them into the VA or wherever they want it—it’s mainly the VA because we don’t have contacts in other organizations in other cities—but yeah, to get them started there.

Yeah. Tell me if I get off topic or ramble.

Soren: No, no, no. That’s all really helpful. And I had a follow-up question, which was to ask if you have encountered, or regularly encounter, anything that might challenge that flexibility and adaptability that you currently have. Do you have to sort of actively protect it from encroaching imperatives or anything like that?

John: I think so, yes, and we kind of do it instinctively. Another thing we do is vet people who are going to work with us. Everyone must be vetted over time to see if it’s going to work out.

The other things we do are that we don’t have a name, and we don’t solicit fundraising—and that’s been an issue. People have brought that up and people have fought for that—for fundraising. We’re not beholden to donors, and I’d say that is a limitation.

And we keep the group small. We actively say that, but it kind of just stays the same size. We’re never like, “Oh, we’ve got too many people,” you know what I mean? But then the other limitations and constraints are coming from the NGOs and other organizations and stuff, and that’s just things—you run into walls. Like, guys don’t want to help you, they don’t have room, but there are ways to get around all of this.

So we can generally find a way. And this is why it is so important that you’re able to have this flexibility, because when you’re presented with someone who’s ready for help—and they have substance or housing issues or whatever’s going on—and they’re ready to receive help, it’s a matter of minutes, maybe. You know, it’s not days, it’s not weeks.

And that’s what will generally happen. If a veteran—we’ll just use the VA—if a veteran shows up at the VA or a shelter or whatever and says, “Hey, I’m ready to get off the street. I’m ready to get into treatment,” or whatever, you get put onto a list. And it could be a month, it could be two weeks—that would be good, if it was two weeks. But by that time, the ship has sailed. That moment of crisis has passed, right? So you want to get that veteran or that person in that moment of crisis, where they’re ready to stop, and get them in there. And it’s minutes, and we’re able to do that.

“Tent cities” have become commonplace across the Pacific Northwest (such as this one in Tacoma, WA) and often include veterans struggling with homelessness and addiction.

Soren: So you’d already described the sort of parallel paths that you were following. On the one hand, your interest in Marxism, leftism, the history of the left and how that’s been of interest and of use to you. And then, on the other side, this veterans outreach and advocacy work, which you’ve described as not inherently political, perhaps not political at all. And then you encountered the Campaign for a Socialist Party as an opportunity to perhaps bridge the gap in some way. Is that accurate?

John: Yes, and to start thinking of it in more political terms, or starting to experiment with the two meeting—and thinking of it more in that way. And of having possible political implications, you know, for maybe later.

Soren: Have there been any developments on either side, or starting from one side or another, that have started to concretely bridge that gap?

John: I think so, and I’ll give you an example. And I was even talking about this specific thing with one of our other members over the weekend, and he interestingly kind of mirrored—he didn’t use the same language I may use—but he mirrored kind of my same experience.

But the development of our group and our kind of mission, and the horizons we set out for ourselves, have changed—have broadened. And how that’s happened is, you know, for years, we were just doing veterans. We were only taking in and helping veterans. There was a real allergy to working with nonveterans. We just wouldn’t, and they would present themselves.

We even had an incident where a guy presented as a veteran and turned out not to be a veteran. And we ceased trying to help the guy, right? I wasn’t personally there, but this happened. And so, yeah, for years, it was like that. But over time, slowly—and now, when we have the bandwidth and we’re able to do it—we’ll help anyone who presents themselves to us and wants or needs help.

And I think that’s literally developed just by the other members seeing a need in society. And I don’t want to say it’s worker consciousness or something, because they wouldn’t call it that, but maybe—or maybe just a broader societal consciousness, in the sense that this is affecting everyone and not just our group.

Soren: So it sounds like you’re expanding, or you’re no longer, strictly speaking, an issue-based organization.

John: Right. Yeah. And we’re taking the issues as a whole. And I think it’s just the consciousness of the group has changed in that way.

Soren: Are other members of the group involved at all with the Campaign?

John: No. A few of them know that I’m a leftist, I guess. But most of them just think I dislike the government [laughs].

Soren: Which may be true as well.

John: Yeah, that’s probably true as well. They’re mainly conservative, as are a lot of veterans, right? And, you know, it’s more complicated than just the stereotype that they’re sitting home and watching the news and they love Trump. A lot of them don’t like Trump, and, you know, but they’re still conservative—it’s very conservative.

People don’t have, like, this set of rigid beliefs. It’s kind of all over the place. It depends on the issue, but they tend to be conservative—I’d say they’re conservative. And that initial, “Oh, we’re just helping veterans,” was a conservative impulse of theirs, and that has broadened.

Soren: So you’ve seen their own political framework or horizons broaden some?

John: Yes, I think so. That’s the big one that’s really opened my eyes and kind of connected the two, like, “Oh wow,” because I’m witnessing all this leftism. And I’m like, “Hey, would any of this really work?” But I’m seeing progress on that end, and just a group of guys getting together and trying to do these things. It’s like self-organization in a way.

And, you know, of course, there are limitations to that. There are tons of limitations, but yeah, I see it.

Soren: Do you have any sense of, or hopes for, what it might be heading toward?

John: Well, you know, in my imagination, I can imagine that a socialist party or the Campaign could start a group like our group now. If we had enough members in [location redacted], I would do it now, because we have the contacts with my group. And yeah, I have hopes that I could help other people if they’re interested in this kind of work—and, if not get started, have ideas of how and what to do.

I was thinking about this, like, could you write a paper or teach a class on doing this particular work? And I don’t think so. It’s really relational.

Soren: I think your years of experience doing this particular kind of work are pretty invaluable to the kinds of efforts that CSP is hoping to make.

John: And it’s something you have to do—it’s really relational. It’s building relationships, and it takes a long time. But yeah, so I mean, like, in my head, the big limitation to me is that no matter what you do—and I’ve read this several times from people talking about the CSP or getting involved—and they’ve said things like, “Oh well, I know that you guys don’t really want to work with NGOs.”

And I know that’s not the CSP line either, you know, because they’re aware that anything you do, just about anything that you’re going to do, you’re going to run immediately into the NGOs and the state. It’s going to happen—that’s unavoidable.

And so anyway, yeah, I’m probably jumping all over the place. But anyway, yeah, no, I can imagine a future with a socialist party where it’s kind of a community center model, where we could provide health care. Like, when we go out and meet these people on the streets who need help, we could take them to our socialist doctor, our socialist rehab, the socialist party rehab or whatever, you know?

Soren: So you’re not looking to sort of incorporate your veterans work into your own or the CSP’s political project, but you’re interested in harnessing your experience and the contacts and networks that you’ve developed to pursue socialist efforts at social organization.

John: Yeah, I think that’s right.

Soren: Are there any historical examples of that kind of work that you’ve looked at when thinking about what you would like to do?

John: You know, I’m aware of things like the Black Panthers and the Breakfast Program and things like this, but no, I haven’t read much Marxist stuff. I generally read Marx and the more theoretical stuff.

Soren: Even if you don’t have a lot of historical knowledge about this kind of work within radical leftist organizations before, you already have a strong foundation in terms of understanding the on-the-ground necessities and exigencies of this kind of work.

John: Yeah, and I even wonder about that. And the reason I haven’t told my fellow veteran dudes about my involvement—well, first of all, they don’t ask, and, A, they probably wouldn’t be interested. And, B, it’s just not necessary now. I think later on, perhaps.

Soren: Yeah. It doesn’t seem relevant to—

John: Yeah. It does not seem relevant. Right, exactly. Like, I have this friend, and this is what she does. She does the social, civil stuff. She’s on the board of the tool library. It’s like four or five organizations and efforts at once.

And I brought it up and told her, but then she’s like, “Well, what do you guys do?” And I’m like, “Well, we’re doing what you’re doing now,” you know [laughs]? Like, because she would be great. And she would have a lot to teach people. Because she just does this kind of stuff of her own free interest.

But yeah, I was trying to get her involved in the CSP, but then was presented with, “Well, what do you guys do?” And it’s like, well, we do what you do, but with an eye on socialism. And she’s like, “OK, but, like, then what?”

Soren: And has she shown any interest?

John: Not really. Not when I told her, like, “Hey, there’s, like, a monthly meeting.” She was kind of just like, “OK, yeah. Let me know how it goes, maybe later.” But yeah, I think—I thought that was interesting because she would kind of be perfect. But yeah, I think there’d have to be more to the national organization.

Soren: Well, can I maybe ask one more question and then maybe go—so I can just blow off some steam for a little bit before this other thing—but you had expressed frustration with, and skepticism toward, the electorally oriented work of leftist organizations that you’ve encountered and that they’re involved in, or that they orient their activity or activism around. So the kind of organizing that you’re talking about, and that the Campaign is talking about, is a very different form.

What would you say are the crucial differences, and why do you think that this form of organizing has greater political promise, even if it’s in the longer term, than the other predominant forms of leftist organization in the U.S. these days? Sorry, that was a mouthful.

John: Yeah, I’ll try. I’ll try. I think that the Campaign is—and I think this is important—instead of reacting to news items, which, you know, immigration is a news item, but the goal of that work is to continue doing it even after. And a lot of the other activities, mine included—basically, not rallying to news items is one thing, and kind of continuing this work even after perhaps the news spotlight fades is a good thing.

Another aspect to it is, I think, meeting society where it is. And instead of thinking of it as policy solutions and, “Oh, what can we do to fix this,” instead literally working with other citizens to help ourselves. And that, I think, is a total breeding ground—or could possibly be a breeding ground—for socialism. Because just as I said earlier, just us doing the work we are doing is broadening the other members’ conceptions of society and what needs to be done and what’s necessary.

Yeah, I guess the hope is that that could turn into a socialist party. I mean, I hate to use the word “consciousness,” but the way that’s building consciousness is by directly dealing with society. And not thinking of it—not conceptualizing it—in terms of fixes, and not dealing with it in an intellectual or technocratic domain, but actually getting your hands dirty and, cheesy as it is, building relationships with people and getting results.

If we can get results for people, if people can come to us and get things in return, then they’ll have no choice but to like us [laughs].

Soren: And is the sense that through developing this kind of community presence and delivering goals that it sets itself and—or the communities ask it to pursue—in doing these things as a socialist organization, at what point does this kind of organizing take on or point toward a more explicit political form?

John: That I don’t know. But I imagine at some time, when we’re active enough and we stay true to staying, for the moment, out of electoral politics and kind of showing people an alternative—that we, as people, can organize ourselves to find solutions to problems and issues and help ourselves independent of the state and the parties, independent of those things.

As we grow—I guess in my mind and my imagination—at some point, yeah, there’ll be a qualitative change, a kind of boiling over that would turn into a party, where we could exert all kinds of pressure on the state. You know? If there was just 3% of us, then you can really start having—and if we’re that strong and that big, we’ll be making an impact politically in ways I don’t think we can even imagine now. But we just will, because of our presence and what we’re doing and the questions we’ll be raising. Just as an organization, doing these things will exert pressure by just doing it.

Soren: Right. Your sense of this being a sort of a more organic development as opposed to something more programmatic is key. Because, you know, you’re not going to really know what that transition or that transformation looks like until you approach it. And not being terribly programmatic about it also gives you a level of flexibility, which you were talking about with regard to your veterans work.

John: Yeah. And that’s by us not being attached to certain organizations and other systems, we can improvise, change tact. You can—I mean, it’s horrible—but we’ll say certain things to certain people that we wouldn’t say to another person or another organization. And knowing what to say to a certain person.

You know? And these are all things that practically have to be worked out in real time—and to be flexible. And that’s a good point. And that kind of illustrates earlier when I was saying, I think, for my little group here—I don’t know about the CSP in general—but it’s kind of important that we don’t have these ties and that we’re totally independent and don’t advertise. And yet I know that’s also a contradiction and an issue if you want to grow, right?

It’s more slow-going, but I don’t know if there’s any other way, because I just imagine it’ll be corrupted. Like, just imagine if someone came into our group and convinced everyone that we need to be working with the DAV officially or something. It would just vaporize immediately.

So this stuff’s fragile too, but maybe fragile like a baby’s fragile. Like, you know, you can drop the baby—it’s not going to die—but, you know, you still shouldn’t drop the baby [laughs].

Soren: Flexible with soft bones [laughs].

John: Yeah! Yes. Flexible, limber, but, you know, tougher than you think.

This report was contributed by Campaign Reporter Soren Whited (submitted July 18, 2026 reprinted in Sublation with permission).

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