About Us
We are JCUA Votes, the 501(c)4 electoral sibling of the Jewish Council on Urban Affairs (JCUA). We work to elect, co-govern, and hold accountable progressive leaders at the local and state levels. In doing so, we seek to effectively combat economic injustice, white supremacy, and antisemitism — creating create communities where everyone can flourish.
Our Principles
Community
- We prioritize relationship over task.
- We center the perspectives of those directly affected by the issues and campaigns we work on.
- We strive to make our work joyful, soulful, and connective.
Judaism
- We are grounded in Jewish values.
- We combat white supremacy, Christian hegemony, fascism, and antisemitism.
- We strive to create olam haba, “the world to come,” in the here and now.
Power Building
- We support candidates and campaigns that align with our vision and support our issue campaigns, not based on money or connections.
- We strive to elect organizers and grassroots members of our communities — leaders who will govern from their base at the forefront.
- We expect to co-govern with elected officials and to make powerful demands of them.
Democratic Decision-Making
- We are a member-driven, member-led organization.
- We strive to decentralize decision-making power within the organization, and we support decisions made via our agreed-upon processes.
- We prioritize political education and trainings so that all members feel empowered to contribute and make decisions within the organization.
Risk Taking
- We lean into and welcome tension and generative conflict.
- We do not shy away from decisions or conversations because of political or ideological conflict.
- We assess risk honestly.
Accountability
- We hold ourselves compassionately accountable to our ideals and values, one another, and our broader movement and political community.
- We hold leaders within our organization, our movement, and our political systems accountable to our values and vision.