Revolutionary Workers

Revolutionary Workers is closely intertwined with Workers Strike Back (WSB), an organization Sawant launched after announcing that she would leave the Seattle City Council. Revolutionary Workers describes itself as explicitly Marxist within the WSB sphere; members do not have to be socialists to join WSB, while Revolutionary Workers is intended for activists who agree that capitalism must be replaced. WSB has promoted a $25 federal minimum wage, unionization, affordable housing, government-provided health care, opposition to U.S. military aid to Israel, and a new political party independent of Democrats and Republicans. ^{2  4  5}

Background

Before co-founding Revolutionary Workers, Kshama Sawant served on the Seattle City Council from 2014 through 2023 as an openly socialist politician affiliated with the radical-left Trotskyist political organization Socialist Alternative. In January 2023, Sawant announced that she would not seek reelection and would instead help launch Workers Strike Back (WSB), an organization that claimed to be a national labor and working-class organizing effort. ^{5  6}

WSB formally launched in March 2023, while Revolutionary Workers emerged from WSB the following year from a split within Socialist Alternative over the direction of WSB. In an August 13, 2024 statement, Sawant and 30 other signatories announced that they were leaving Socialist Alternative and forming Revolutionary Workers, accusing the organization’s leadership of deprioritizing WSB, limiting its independence, and retreating from class-struggle organizing. They described Revolutionary Workers as a new Marxist organization intended to participate both in revolutionary socialist organizing and in broader labor and political campaigns. ^{3  4}

Socialist Alternative disputed the breakaway group’s account, arguing that Sawant and her allies had instead deemphasized explicitly revolutionary organization in favor of a broader campaigning model. Revolutionary Workers later maintained that Socialist Alternative had become too inward-looking following WSB. ^{7  2}

Advocacy

Economic and Labor Policy

Revolutionary Workers advocates a socialist economic program and calls for a $25 federal minimum wage, “good” union jobs, national rent control, large-scale public housing, and government-provided universal health care. It argues that health care, pharmaceutical, energy, banking, real estate, and other major businesses should be seized from private ownership and placed under what it calls democratic public ownership as part of a centrally planned socialist economy. ^{2  8}

The organization promotes a confrontational model of labor organizing that emphasizes rank-and-file control, strike action, direct election of union leaders, and reduced reliance on established labor leadership. WSB and Revolutionary Workers activists have supported union campaigns and strikes, including Amazon organizing and Seattle labor fights, and have argued that unions should stop directing political money to the Democratic Party and instead help build an independent working-class party. ^{9  10}

Electoral Politics

Revolutionary Workers has rejected the Democratic and Republican parties as representatives of capitalist interests and has called for a new party of working people. In July 2024, WSB held an inaugural national videoconference in which more than 300 people participated and voted to endorse Green Party presidential nominee Jill Stein. Kshama Sawant subsequently spoke at a WSB protest at the Democratic National Convention in Chicago under the slogan “No Harris! No Trump!” urging voters to oppose both major-party nominees. ^{4  11}

After the 2024 election, Sawant wrote that the Democratic Party deserved defeat and argued that both major parties ultimately had to be destroyed as political instruments of capitalism. Revolutionary Workers later backed Sawant’s 2026 unsuccessful independent socialist campaign against U.S. Representative Adam Smith (D-WA) in Washington’s 9th Congressional District. Sawant’s campaign called for ending U.S. military aid to Israel, shutting down U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement detention centers, attempting to institute government-provided universal health care financed through higher taxes on wealthy people, a $25 federal minimum wage, and national rent control. ^{12  13  14}

In July 2026, Sawant also used Revolutionary Workers to endorse New York Party for Socialism and Liberation candidate Andre Easton and Pacific Green Party of Oregon candidate Justin Filip, presenting both campaigns as part of an effort to build electoral politics outside the Democratic and Republican parties. The group has repeatedly argued that socialist candidates should use campaigns not only to win office but to organize mass movements and build toward a new working-class party. ^{15  6}

Israel and Foreign Policy

Revolutionary Workers “Gaza pamphlet” called for ending the war, the Israeli occupation of Palestinian territories, and all U.S. military aid to Israel while also encouraging workplace and student walkouts, protests at the 2024 Democratic National Convention, and support for Green Party Candidate Jill Stein rather than then-former President Donald Trump or then-Vice President Kamala Harris. The organization framed the conflict through an “anti-imperialist and socialist” lens and argued that lasting peace requires international working-class organization. ¹⁶

In December 2025, Sawant described potential U.S. military action against Venezuela as an imperialist war for oil and regime change and called on working people to oppose it. ^{17  2}

Social Issues

Revolutionary Workers has supported abortion rights, transgender interests, gender-transition treatments, and expanded federal civil-rights protections for LGBT people. In a May 2026 statement, the organization opposed restrictions on gender-transition treatments for minors and transgender participation in public life, supported passage of the national Equality Act, and connected those positions to its calls for government-provided health care, national rent control, and expanded public housing. ¹⁸

The organization has opposed immigration enforcement policies associated with the second Trump administration. Sawant’s congressional platform, which Revolutionary Workers promoted, called for ending deportations, and closing ICE and immigration detention centers. Revolutionary Workers treats immigration, racial discrimination, gender issues, and economic inequality as connected struggles that it argues require mass organizing and ultimately socialist transformation. ^{13  19}

Financials

Revolutionary Workers’ 2024 tax filing reported $55,819 in revenue, $80 in expenses, and $55,739 in year-end assets. ²⁰

The organization’s website solicits donations. Cause IQ reported that its 2024 revenue consisted of contributions and that the organization had no reported employees. No significant government funding was identified in publicly available sources. ^{21  20}

Leadership

Kshama Sawant is Revolutionary Workers’ founder and as of 2026, principal public figure. Sawant previously served on the nonpartisan Seattle City Council as an open socialist from 2014 through 2023 after first being elected in 2013. Sawant was previously a prominent member of Socialist Alternative, co-founded Workers Strike Back, and was listed as one of the Revolutionary Workers board members in nonprofit data. In August 2026, Sawant stood as an independent socialist candidate for Congress in Washington’s 9th Congressional District; she was defeated in the nonpartisan blanket primary. ^{3  20  14 22}