I created this document to collect the understanding of the Dustin Ponder cases that Alpharius and I had.

There are inaccuracies in it because we were operating from limited information (a consequence of FRSO’s need to know policy), most notably, we were under the impression that the people in Tampa were reraising the issue of Dustin’s 2013 assault in Gainesville, and the prior assault that Steff Yorek referred to was an assault before Gainesville. This misunderstanding was not corrected in our meeting with Andy Koch, nor the meeting with Mick Kelly.

I’ve flagged instances where inaccuracies exist in the margins to correct them with what we know now, and used pseudonyms where the real names of myself, Alpharius, and others were originally. It also extensively linked to screenshots of the facebook group conversations where the Dustin Ponder cases were made public. I’ve removed those links because the screenshots have real names of the VA and others involved. The contents of those links are reproduced in our anonymized reproduction of the same conversations. I direct you to read that before proceeding with this document. The rest is presented unedited.

This document is largely superceded by our comprehensive report featured on this website. We present this document as historical record.

It is all the more clear what we have to accomplish at present: I am referring to ruthless criticism of all that exists, except for the Central Committee of Freedom Road Socialist Organization.

Karl Marx

Why? #

First, why did we start looking into Gainesville? After the Dallas District Committee took Dan’s actions as a resignation, Tom Burke called Alpharius and threatened expulsions if we don’t “struggle with” Dan. This caused Alpharius to reflect on his past experience in this organization, and he started to piece together a troubling trend. Not only did Dan have political errors, not only was his behavior straight out of the playbook of state agents, not only did he continuously violate the rules of FRSO, but he also has a storied career of chauvinism. Despite these issues, Tom felt Dan has a role to play in building the party, and defended some of the worst instances of Dan’s behavior.

Tom’s comments reflect a false kind of pragmatism that says Dan’s (percieved) value to FRSO outweighs his problems. Dan isn’t the only example of this thinking. Most recently is Mantak Singh, a former student cadre from Seattle. Our student unit complained about his chauvinistic behavior at a student commission meeting. Women were not comfortable working with his local SDS because of his behavior. Alpharius brought Mantak’s behavior up to Tom, who flatly refused to do anything about it, on the basis that he is a good organizer that does good work, and insisted Mantak simply had to be struggled with.

Then there is Gregory Lucero, the DO of Salt Lake City, Utah for a time, who was a notorious alcoholic to the point where there was a running joke about “Old Crow Thought”. Greg got into a physical altercation with his girlfriend. Tom investigated this and determined the best solution would be to keep them both in the organization, but separate them in the work. Greg was eventually expelled for alcoholism and abusive behavior.

And last but not least, we have Dustin Ponder, who the rest of this document is about.

We could say that the problem is solved because these people are no longer part of FRSO, but with each of these instances the problems were tolerated for much longer than they needed to be, justified by this false pragmatism. It’s not enough that the individual people are gone. The thinking which led to their continued membership and allowed them to cause issues in the first place needs to be challenged.

We could say the Dustin Ponder situation isn’t relevant anymore because now we have a policy and guidelines for dealing with sexual harassment. The problem is, that policy only comes into effect after someone has already been harmed. We need to be very careful about giving people who display misogynistic behavior a pass. While in some cases male chauvinism can be struggled through, we do not have the resources to . We need to identify misogynists and oust them before they harm our comrades.

In “Left-Wing” Communism: an Infantile Disorder, Lenin said:

The attitude of a political party towards its own mistakes is one of the most important and surest ways of judging how earnest the party is and how it in practice fulfills its obligations towards its class and the toiling masses. Frankly admitting a mistake, ascertaining the reasons for it, analyzing the conditions which led to it, and thoroughly discussing the means of correcting it - that is the earmark of a serious party; that is the way it should perform its duties, that is the way it should educate and train the class, and then the masses.

There are no self-criticisms from the Center on the handling of any of the above people. There is no way for us to know if the Center has learned anything, and judging by the way the Center has handled Dan, I’d argue the Center hasn’t.

Conflicting Narratives #

There are six sources of information we have regarding Dustin Ponder. The first is what Dan told Alpharius when events were unfolding while he was part of FRSO. The second is the narrative that is available on the internet, publicized by the victim’s advocate (VA), and a former cadre of FRSO. The third is Greg Lucero’s account of things. The fourth is what Mick communicated to Xavi at the Southwest Conference. The fifth is what Andy communicated to us when he came to our District. The sixth is what Mick communicated to Alpharius and I in a zoom call that was meant to address the situation and alleviate our concerns.

Facts #

Before getting into the different narratives, there are a few things that we can establish as facts with a high level of confidence.

  1. Dustin Ponder was accused of raping a member of the Gainesville SDS chapter in 2013. Some time after, the Gainesville SDS chapter collapsed.
  2. In 2016, the VA and others confronted Steff Yorek of the FRSO Central Committee, where Steff revealed some facts:
  3. Dustin moved to NYC by 2014 and started a new district.
  4. In November 2014, over a year after the Gainesville incident, people from Tampa went public about Dustin Ponder on Facebook. Jason Unruhe made a video covering it, with screenshots included in the description. This is the source of the second narrative described below.
  5. Dan Sullivan and Gregory Lucero clumsily defended FRSO and attacked the accusers on Facebook.
  6. Dustin Ponder moved to Jacksonville by 2016.
  7. At some point, Dustin Ponder was no longer part of FRSO. I estimate 2018; Dustin stops showing up on Fight Back News after 2018, and is on a DSA facebook group in 2018.

Current leading members of FRSO were involved in closing ranks around Dustin Ponder. These include:

1. Alpharius #

The Dustin Ponder situation blew up online shortly after Alpharius joined FRSO. The controversy reverberated to the UT Arlington SDS, where a member spoke to the VA. The membership of the UTA SDS was not comfortable with how FRSO handled things. Alpharius’s understanding of the situation was communicated to him by Dan. Dan made several claims:

Since then, Alpharius has had the understanding that the controversy in Gainesville and Tampa was the result of wreckers who wanted to destroy FRSO. There was no summation of errors that was communicated to the broader organization. Instead, the line was laid down that the collapse of Gainesville and the controversy in Tampa was the work of wreckers, and that’s it.

2. The Internet #

  1. The Tampa student unit puts sanction on Dustin. Dustin was barred from interacting with the student movement, and had to provide proof of going to counseling. He refused to comply with both sanctions.
  2. After Dustin became a topic in Tampa, FRSO cadre isolated SDS members who asked questions about it, refused to discuss the situation, removed them from SDS facebook pages, blocked them, and covered for Dustin.
  3. FRSO did not address the situation, speak to the victim, or speak to the victim advocate for several months. This is a consequence of our misunderstanding of the reconstructed timeline, working backwards from the preconception that the event took place in 2013. FRSO took it’s time to reach out, but it wasn’t several months.
  4. It was the DO of Gainesville at the time (Fern?) who sent Dustin to NYC.
  5. Daniel Sullivan says the allegation was raised “a week ago”. It’s unclear what he means by that because the incident being discussed happened in 2013. He admits that FRSO has been unable to talk to the victim. Again a consequence of the aforementioned misconception.

3. Greg Lucero #

Greg Lucero was the leader of the student commission and DO of the Salt Lake City District when this situation unfolded. He also has his own problems, as described above. Alpharius spoke with Greg, and Greg gave his account of the situation. Greg spoke to Tom Burke about what was going on in Gainesville and Tampa. Tom never gave Greg any confirmation that Dustin was innocent or that Dustin was guilty, but Greg is confident that the official narrative in FRSO is not the whole truth. Greg also recalls that FRSO was eager to build a presence in NYC, and was eager to build a presence in the Teamsters - at the time FRSO’s presence was minimal. Losing Dustin would mean damaging both of those opportunities. Tom said to Greg that if Dustin wasn’t a teamster, they would just expel him.

4. Representatives of the Center #

1. Mick (at the Southwest Conference) #

A comrade brought up concerns we were having about Gainesville to Mick at the Southwest Conference. Mick was willing to bet his life savings that Dustin was innocent, and he was willing to “eat shit” over it. He said the victim’s advocate did not have the consent of the victim to represent them. Mick said that despite being unable to speak with the victim, they were able to work around them and prove Dustin’s innocence - contradicting the historical narrative that the investigation was stalled due to a lack of cooperation from the victim. He said Dustin left FRSO for political reasons. He did not provide more information or details to corroborate these claims.

2. Andy #

When Andy visited us, he told us that there was a sexual encounter with Dustin and two other people. Group sex was proposed and declined, and the encounter was terminated. Over a year later, people in Tampa with political issues with FRSO learned about this and took the opportunity to attempt to wreck FRSO’s work. FRSO was not willing to bow to pressure from outside forces by removing Dustin. According to Andy, the victim advocate had no connection with the victim. Dustin left FRSO because he got demoralized after failing a union election, and not for another sexual assault.

3. Mick (Zoom Call) #

Alpharius and I had a call with Mick to address some of our concerns. Mick claimed that Steff misspoke when confronted and that there was no sexual assault prior to Gainesville. Mick did not have any concrete evidence to corroborate anything. He repeated there was no sexual assault, but did not provide anything else.

Summary #

To summarize, judging by available information, Dustin Ponder sexually assaulted one person prior to Gainesville. He was accused of a second assault in Gainesville in 2013. Dustin was then sanctioned by the Tampa student unit, and he violated those sanctions. FRSO did not try to reach out to the victim until 2014, a year or so later, when news about Dustin spread among members of Tampa SDS. These members brought concerns to FRSO cadre in the SDS chapter. Particularly, they were concerned about Dustin’s continued membership in FRSO. They were treated with hostility, shut down, and boxed out from SDS. They made the story public by posting about it on Facebook, and Dan Sullivan and Greg Lucero come to the organization’s defense. FRSO was unable to conclude the investigation into Dustin because the victim did not speak to FRSO. So, Dustin was allowed to continue as cadre, and despite having one confirmed sexual assault and an allegation of a second one, he was allowed to start a new District after moving to NYC. There is a major discrepancy in what Mick and Andy communicated. Both were emphatic that Dustin Ponder is innocent. Mick in particular claimed that they were able to verify Dustin’s innocence without talking to the victim, but did not share any details. However, Alpharius and Greg’s recollection is that the investigation was stalled. This is corroborated by Steff as of 2016, in the video referenced above. So, even if we suppose that FRSO was able to eventually prove Dustin’s innocence years later, when FRSO decided to close ranks around defending Dustin Ponder in 2014, FRSO did not even know if he was guilty or innocent in Gainesville! Further, FRSO knew he was guilty of one sexual assault prior!

The Center’s Reaction #

Andy was dispatched to Dallas immediately after the Center learned people in Dallas were talking about Gainesville. He spoke with two comrades on the District Committee as preliminary investigation. He did not provide information to these comrades about what happened in Gainesville.

When Andy was here, it became clear that he was not speaking with us in order to provide clarity around Gainesville. He was primarily focused on scolding us, and insinuated that I was a wrecker. He alleged that I was upset about the Center’s handling of Gainesville and He explained his narrative of what happened in Gainesville. We asked several follow up questions and pointed out discrepancies. Andy admitted he couldn’t answer our questions and that he had no receipts to corroborate the narrative he told us, because he only knew what happened second hand. We requested a conversation with someone who knows enough to answer questions.

So, after finding out we were talking about Gainesville, instead of simply providing me or anyone in the District information about Gainesville to clarify the situation and demonstrate Dustin’s innocence, the Center sends Andy here to chastise us and demand we stop talking about Gainesville, with no information to clarify the situation and demonstrate Dustin’s innocence.

Some weeks later, Rick - our DO - communicated to Alpharius that Mick would talk, but only to me and not Alpharius, because “Alpharius’s loyalty is not in question.” Alpharius reached out directly to Andy to request that he be part of the conversation, and Andy clarified that anyone who is concerned may talk to Mick. Most of the District Committee was interested.

After that, the Center rescinded the invitation for everyone, and limited the call to just me and Alpharius. Nova was not happy with this and asked Rick if she could be on the call. Nova told Rick that she shouldn’t want to be on the call because her “loyalty is not in question.” Rick also attempted to invoke blind faith to convince Nova that FRSO handled Dustin Ponder by questioning why Nova was taking the narrative of people on the internet who want to destroy this organization, rather than trusting the women in FRSO who supported Dustin. He also said that if FRSO declared Dustin as too important to lose, he would accept that explanation. When Nova brought up that Steff admitted on video that Dustin had been guilty of one sexual assault prior to Gainesville, Rick suggested that Steff misspoke because she was under pressure.

When Alpharius and I finally spoke to Mick, he also argued that Steff was caught off guard and answered incorrectly. Alpharius brought up the sanctions that were put on Dustin several times, but Mick avoided addressing the sanctions.

Andy mentioned that several Districts have collapsed because of Gainesville, that this topic is “toxic” and “has a record of fucking shit up”. Given the shady and hostile way the Center has handled this with us so far, that’s not surprising. This suggests several Districts have been down this path before, and the Center did not provide a satisfactory explanation to any of these Districts.

The Center insists on Dustin Ponder’s innocence, and expects the blind trust that Rick was attempting to invoke in Nova. Sexual misconduct has plagued the left for decades; while I’d like to believe that FRSO is an exception, I’m not willing to rely on faith alone. The simplest way to defuse this situation would have been for the Center to provide information which exonerates Dustin. The Center has not provided any information in the past weeks.