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Jamaal Bowman and I first met on MS NOW, and I knew immediately I needed to get him on for a longer conversation. He is someone whose ideas deserve more time than short cable news segments allow for. So today, he joined me for a Substack Live conversation. He was in Dublin, Ireland, where he had just delivered a keynote at a workers' rights and human rights festival. What followed was one of my favorite Substack Lives I’ve ever hosted.
Jamaal Bowman came to this conversation with a substantive perspective. Bowman represented New York’s 16th congressional district from 2021 to 2025. An educator at heart, he was a former Bronx middle school principal and founder of the Cornerstone Academy for Social Action. Now, he’s been helping progressive candidates across the country and is the author of an upcoming memoir called Unpolished, out this November.
We covered an enormous amount of ground. We talked about where the Democratic Party is heading and why Bowman believes the progressive wing is on its way to becoming the mainstream wing. We got into the fact that Bowman was primaried in one of the most expensive congressional races in history for holding positions that are now being openly argued in the pages of The New York Times by a mainstream Democratic senator.
We discussed Trump’s Iran War, the Tupac quote Bowman delivered in Dublin that perfectly encapsulates this moment, and the economic case for investing in working people rather than endless military spending. We went deep on education in a way I almost never get to on this show, and it was probably my favorite part of this conversation.
From there, we talked about who has what it takes to win in 2028, why stances on Gaza could be a litmus test, and what is actually happening inside the Republican Party right now. And we ended with Bowman’s upcoming memoir Unpolished, his remarkable life story, and what it means to be a Black man in America trying to set a good example for generations of Black boys to come.
I appreciate those of you who tuned in live, made Jamaal feel welcome by showing love, and who contributed so much to the conversation. This is truly the best community on Substack. If you’re just catching it now, feel free to leave your thoughts in the comments.
This conversation was top-notch. I promise it will leave you feeling smarter and more empowered to keep fighting for a prosperous and inclusive democracy. You can watch our full conversation above and read key takeaways below. Like, share, and, as always, thank you for supporting independent media.
The Progressive Wing Is Becoming The Mainstream Wing
Bowman came out of the gate with a clear argument: the progressive wing of the Democratic Party is not a fringe. The American people are ahead of party leadership on issue after issue, and leadership needs to catch up.
The working-class-first orientation is becoming the dominant force in Democratic politics. Bowman made this case with conviction: from the very beginning, the progressive wing has been centering politics in the needs of working people, making sure affordability is at the top of the agenda, that housing is treated as a human right, that healthcare is a human right, that public schools are fully funded with real post-secondary opportunities behind them. He has been saying this since before it was popular, and the results in primary after primary this cycle are proving the point. The energy is with the candidates who lead with working-class economics first.
Bowman’s specific policy vision aims to push the Democratic Party further toward the people. His agenda includes a federal jobs guarantee, ending mass incarceration, ending poverty in America, and a foreign policy rooted in diplomacy and cooperation that pushes back against genocide, apartheid, and occupation. These are not positions the whole party has embraced, though they increasingly are. But the broader working-class economic orientation, the affordability message, the anti-war instinct, is gaining ground rapidly in ways that would have seemed unlikely just a few years ago.
The American people are aligned with the progressive wing. Party leadership is not. Bowman made this distinction explicitly: poll after poll shows the majority of the American people want to get big money out of politics, want healthcare accessible to everyone, want an end to policies that make affordability impossible. It is not the voters who are out of step. It is the people who lead the party, in Bowman’s view. And if leadership does not get on board, Bowman warned, the party is going to continue to struggle in the biggest elections, including the presidential in 2028. The grassroots will stay home if Palestine and affordability are not front and center, Bowman says.
Bowman Was Primaried For What Is Now Mainstream Dem Politics
One of the most telling moments of this conversation was watching Bowman describe what it feels like to watch the Democratic Party shift toward positions he was primaried for holding. The shift is real. It is documented. Bowman was calling out the Netanyahu government when it was genuinely costly to do so politically. Now, it seems to be the mainstream Democratic position.
Senator Chris Van Hollen argued for policies in The New York Times that were similar to what got Bowman primaried. In an op-ed published two weeks ago, Senator Chris Van Hollen (D-MD) wrote, “The Democratic Party has provided reflexive and unconditional support to Israeli governments, even as their actions have increasingly undermined American interests and values.” He went on to call out the “brutality” of Netanyahu’s government, the violent settlers in the West Bank, and the humanitarian crisis in Gaza. He also called for conditioning aid to Israel, which was seen as controversial not too long ago. That ran in The New York Times. Van Hollen is not a far-left firebrand. He is a mainstream Democratic senator. The Overton window has moved, and it moved in the direction Bowman was pointing out years ago.
Bowman’s response was grounded in policy and moral clarity, not grievance. He did not spend the moment gloating. He looked forward. He said what we need is for Israel, as an ally, to end the occupation in the West Bank, address what the United Nations and Human Rights Watch have called apartheid, and have a genuine conversation about a two-state solution.
Criticizing the Israeli government is not antisemitism, and Bowman has always been clear about that. He said it directly: we fight antisemitism exactly the same way we fight anti-Black racism, sexism, homophobia, and all other forms of hate. Criticism of a government is not criticism of a people. I added from my own experience that as someone married into a progressive Jewish family and has Jewish friends, plenty of Jews, from progressive to moderate, have acknowledged that Netanyahu has gone too far. Bowman gave a shout-out to IfNotNow and Jewish Voices for Peace, organizations that have been saying the same thing for years and whose work makes the fight against antisemitism stronger, not weaker.
Money For Wars, Can’t Feed The Poor: The Need For Rising Tide Economics
Bowman delivered a keynote in Dublin where he quoted Tupac’s “Keep Ya Head Up,” saying “we got money for wars but can’t feed the poor.” That line has been increasingly relevant since Trump’s Iran War began, and it opened one of the sharpest economic exchanges of this live.
Trump’s Iran War costs are a concrete illustration of Democratic economic priorities. I laid this out directly: what has already been spent on the Iran war could fund the Enhanced Affordable Care Act premium subsidies multiple times over. It could fund a year of subsidized college. When people ask where the pay-fors are for working class policies, this is the answer. The money exists. The political will has been lacking.
Build Back Better proved the policy and the pay-fors already exist. Bowman made a point that does not get made enough: Build Back Better was not written by the Squad. It was President Biden’s bill. Chairman Richard Neal of the Ways and Means Committee, not a progressive, ensured it was paid for and supported it. It was killed in the Senate by Joe Manchin and Kyrsten Sinema. The infrastructure for transformative working-class policy has already been built. Anyone running in 2028 needs to run on it.
Rising tide economics versus trickle down. I called it plainly: we are still in the Reagan era. Trickle down does not work. You cut taxes for corporations, and you get stock buybacks, not wages. You cut taxes for billionaires, and you get Elon Musk. Bowman said that what we need is rising tide economics where everyone contributes their fair share and the investment comes back through the community. I made the Keynesian economics point: you invest in the economy through the people, and they invest back. It is FDR. It is what built America into the global power it became and then got systematically dismantled through decades of Reaganite mythology.
Bowman’s moral and economic case for investing in communities is the same argument. He made this with real force: when you pour love and resources into neglected communities, those communities thrive. Education, healthcare, innovation. GDP goes up. Costs for mass incarceration and militarism go down. He cited the robber baron parallel and pointed out that this concentration of wealth at the top, the rest of us working class, is America from the beginning. The difference now is that the people heading toward trillionaire status are doing it while data centers make the climate worse and they pay nothing for any of it.
The Revolutionary Education System We Need
This was my favorite section of the entire conversation and one of the best discussions I have had on this platform. Bowman isn’t just a former Congressman with opinions about education. He is a doctor of education leadership who founded a public middle school in the Bronx, took it to number one combined growth scores in New York City in 2016, and has done the primary research on what actually works. Everything he said here was backed by evidence.
The Lost Einsteins study is one of the most important pieces of research in American policy, and almost nobody talks about it. Bowman brought this up, and I want everyone to look it up. The study examined third and fourth-grade academic achievement across the board and found that gifted kids from poor Black and brown communities are just as gifted as kids from wealthy suburbs at that age. The suburban kids go on to file patents, become inventors, build companies. The kids from underinvested communities do not get those opportunities. The study’s conclusion: if those kids had equal access, American GDP would increase by 33 percent. That is not just a social justice argument. That is an economic argument. And it is hiding in plain sight.
Universal childcare is the single most important education policy we could pass. Bowman said this plainly and backed it with his own doctoral research: from birth to age three, the brain develops 90 percent of its growth. When a child experiences trauma during that window, the development of the prefrontal cortex, the reasoning and decision-making center, is stagnated. That child enters kindergarten already behind. Without intervention, they are more likely to be placed in special education, more likely to enter the school-to-prison pipeline, more likely to be suspended. Universal childcare is not a nice-to-have. It is the foundational fix that every other education reform depends on.
No Child Left Behind was an educational catastrophe, and the effects are still with us. Bowman laid out the mechanism: by tying everything to English and math test scores from grades three through eight, the policy caused school districts nationwide to eliminate gym teachers, arts teachers, and music teachers. There are kids who struggle in English and math because of dyslexia or learning differences but who are maestros on an instrument. That was taken away from them. A holistic education that includes sports, music, drama, and the arts is not a luxury. It develops transferable skills and keeps America healthy, innovative, and competitive.
Socratic seminar is AI-proof. Bowman trained his teachers in it. Cornerstone Academy became number one in New York City using it. The method: students read a high-level text, annotate it with their questions and connections, and then the teacher facilitates a real discussion about what they read. That is it. When Bowman describes this method to teachers in certain schools, they say that is just how you teach. But the majority of schools do not do this. I made the point that everything I know about politics I learned by forcing myself to write about it and explain it in articles. When you are required to debate and argue something with a pen in your hand, you actually have to understand it. That cannot be outsourced to AI. Bowman held up his journal as evidence. Write by hand. It still matters.
The Green New Deal for public schools is a comprehensive vision. Bowman introduced this legislation while in Congress: rebuild the physical infrastructure of public schools in alignment with the climate emergency, bring interdisciplinary project-based STEM and STEAM into classrooms, restore the humanities and Socratic practice, ensure every child who wants to has access to a sport, an instrument, and the arts. He made the point that this is bipartisan in practice. When Trump and Musk tried to cut the Department of Education, rural Republican communities in Arkansas who voted for Trump spoke out, because Title I funding is what keeps their schools running. The issue is bigger than party.
Will Gaza Be The 2028 Litmus Test? And The State Of MAGA
With ideas for the 2028 primary field beginning to take shape, Bowman had clear opinions about who is positioned well, who is not, and why Gaza is going to be a defining issue whether candidates want it to be or not. He also had a sharp read on where the Republican Party actually is right now.
Gaza could be the moral litmus test of the 2028 primary. Bowman said this directly and without hedging: if you are not on the right side of that issue, you are going to struggle. The grassroots will not show up for candidates who continue to enable or ignore what is happening. He was clear that he does not even require the word genocide. Just acknowledge the reality. Just say we should not be supporting this. Just come with a policy that reflects what the American people, particularly people under 45, actually believe. Candidates who are AIPAC-supported and unwilling to risk that relationship are going to find themselves on the wrong side of history and on the wrong side of the primary electorate, Bowman said.
Rep. Ro Khanna and Senator Chris Van Hollen are two names Bowman mentioned as positioned well. Khanna has had an extraordinary year, leading on the Epstein files and being consistently right on Gaza, and Bowman said his name comes up everywhere when he travels the country. Van Hollen has already put his position in The New York Times. AOC, if she runs, has a real chance, Bowman feels. Ossoff has the riz and the swag, Bowman’s words, but needs to make his stance clear on Gaza. Wes Moore has not said enough, Bowman says. And the candidate who runs on the policies that were contained in Build Back Better, affordability, and a free Palestine, according to Bowman, wins in a landslide if they have the charisma and communication skills to go with it.
MAGA is weakening as Trump weakens, and the Republican Party does not have a new playbook. Bowman made this case clearly: MAGA and America First were one and the same for a while, and that gave Trump enormous power. Now they are diverging. Marjorie Taylor Greene is pulling away and doing her own thing. The convergence Bowman finds interesting is between America First and progressive positions, because affordability, anti-war, and childcare are all America First policies if you actually mean putting American people first. His prediction: JD Vance will run, Marco Rubio will run, they will rebrand and claim they told Trump not to do this, and a lot of Republican voters will fall for it. He would not be surprised if MTG is being considered as a vice presidential candidate for Vance right now.
The political establishment is underwater on both sides. Bowman made this point with data: the last congressional approval rating he saw was under 30 percent, Republicans and Democrats combined. When the whole establishment is that unpopular, what voters want is new voices and fresh ideas. He does not see that coming from the Republican side. He does see it on the Democratic side, and the primary results this cycle are beginning to reflect it.
Unpolished: Jamaal Bowman’s Remarkable Life Story & An Example For Black Boys
Bowman started writing his memoir in early December 2025, four weeks after the Mamdani win, after a run of keynotes in Philadelphia and Chicago that left him in a reflective place. He sat down and just started writing. Four weeks later, he had 83,000 words.
The story goes from the crack epidemic to the classroom to Congress. Bowman describes it as the story of a Black boy raised by a single mom in New York, no private schools, no HBCU, no Divine Nine, no trust fund. A kid who barely survived shootouts on the streets of New York in the early 90s, got a chance to move out of the city to finish high school, became the first in his family to go to college, started teaching, opened his own school at 33, took it to number one in New York City, won a historic congressional race against a 16-term incumbent, served in Congress with the Squad, lost a historic primary, and is still here doing the work.
Every chapter is named after a hip hop song, because hip hop has been the soundtrack of his life. The first chapter is Run’s House. The second is Windows. The third is Know the Ledge. Each track is a thematic lens on the chapter it opens. Bowman said hip hop is almost a religion for him, and the way he structured the book reflects that. I told him it reminded me of what Tupac did as a storyteller, bringing the world inside the community to people who had never seen it from the inside.
The central framework of the book is the hunger versus the healing. Bowman named the evils that continue to plague us - racism, sexism, classism, homophobia, antisemitism, colonialism - and gave them a collective name: the hunger. The book argues that the only thing that defeats the hunger is the healing. That framework runs through every chapter and connects his personal story to the broader political argument he has been making his whole career.
Survivor’s responsibility over survivor’s guilt. Bowman made this distinction, and it landed hard. He said he feels a responsibility to go as far as he can go so that young kids can see him and think they could do that. I told him about one of my best childhood friends who was shot and killed at 23, tattooed on my chest. Bowman said what I described is something uniquely particular to Black men in America: you can meet any random Black man from certain communities anywhere in this country and go down a list of five to ten people he grew up with who were killed. That is not okay. It is a trauma that should not be normalized. And it is exactly what Unpolished is trying to make visible.
Unpolished means decolonize. It means uniqueness. It means consistent growth. Bowman explained the title directly: it means not needing to fit into any box, not needing to perform a version of yourself that someone else designed for you. It means recognizing that we are not finished products. We will learn and grow for the rest of our lives. Therefore, we will be unpolished for the rest of our lives. He said he takes a lot of pride in being a regular dude, not Obama-level exceptional, not Harvard and Columbia, but someone who came from the same place a lot of these kids come from and made it to Congress anyway. That is a model that he wants Black boys to see.
Bottom Line
My conversation with former Rep. Jamaal Bowman was one of the most substantive I’ve had on this platform. We covered a lot. The progressive wing is becoming the mainstream wing. The Van Hollen op-ed is proof that the party is catching up to positions Bowman paid a real price for holding. The economic argument, invest in people and they invest back, is not radical. It is Keynesian. It is FDR. And the education conversation we had was a reminder that the answers to America’s biggest problems are hiding in plain sight in underinvested communities across this country.
Unpolished drops in November. Follow/subscribe to Jamaal Bowman here on Substack.
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