By Shmuel Bershenker

Picture this. It’s the year 2030 in Crown Heights. The community has continued to grow, despite the fact that many families can no longer afford to live there. The mosdos are bustling, shuls are packed for minyanim and shiurim, the ever growing network of Shluchim continues to bring guests for incredible weekends in the heart of a thriving Chassidic community. But all isn’t right.

Last week, a group of angry protestors stormed down Eastern Parkway, protesting the fact that Crown Heights was hosting injured Israeli soldiers for a meaningful weekend in the community. Marching at the head of the protestors is the newly elected state assemblywoman. A member of the DSA, the Democratic Socialists of America, she’s an open Marxist-Leninist, a member of the DSA’s Marxist Unity Group, who thinks Stalin was a good guy. She makes no secret of the fact that she openly supports Hamas. When a yungerman was beaten up a few weeks beforehand, she comments that she’s against violence, but understands why the attacker was upset about the forces of gentrification that ‘bad landlords’ cause. The irony that she was born in the Midwest and has been living off her parents’ dime totally escapes her.

Don’t worry, though, her comms director assures everyone, she’s working with Jews For Racial & Economic Justice to develop a curriculum to address antisemitism, Islamophobia, and all forms of racism and hate due to rising white nationalism. It will teach neighborhood children about Jewish leaders like Rosa Luxemburg, Leon Trotsky, and the bold pioneers who helped establish Birobidzhan.

In the meantime, she’s lost no time in office. Working together with her DSA allies in the city and state, many of them representing the so-called Commie Corridor that runs from Williamsburg through Bedstuy and now past Crown Heights, she’s pushed through a suite of legislation, decriminalizing drugs and immorality. And she’s only just getting started.

How a verified Communist came to represent Crown Heights is no secret. It started in 2026.

A group of Crown Heights residents decided to embark on a foolhardy experiment. While many of their frustrations were real, many more were entirely misplaced. Obsessed with the desire to vote for someone from ‘our community,’ they rallied behind a candidate who, while well-meaning, had little political understanding and unpolished communication skills.

The gambit was risky, hedging on the fact that it needed both low turnout from the general population in the primary and an incredibly strong showing of Anash. Not enough Lubavitchers were registered to vote, too many were in the country. Despite his op-eds and admirable attempt to get out the vote, he lost.

The incumbent continued to represent Crown Heights Anash, though perhaps with less excitement than he had before. But others were watching. DSA saw a weakness, the chance to split the vote in a future election and run through a true socialist with a background in political organizing and masters in creative dance. The rest is history.

Or it could not be.

Politics has never been about getting exactly what you want. Despite the allure of the toxic combination of hubris and naivete, the reality remains the same: There are no perfect politicians. It requires conversation and compromise and the willingness to navigate the different needs of a diverse community. It requires hakaras hatov for the help we receive from politicians, and an understanding that sometimes we need to pick our battles wisely.

Getting what we need as a community requires us to show up in numbers, vote vigilantly, and cultivate relevant political relationships. Relying on fear and misinformation, portraying centrist or center-left politicians as fringe left is a disastrous play that weakens our political muscle and leaves us vulnerable to the scourge of radical politics sweeping Brooklyn.