NEW YORK CITY, August 25—CUNY students and faculty from three campuses are responding to the recent earthquake and hurricane in Haiti, and the four month-long coal miners’ strike in Brookwood, Alabama. Over the summer, members and friends of the revolutionary communist Progressive Labor Party (PLP) held weekly organizing meetings and political discussions with students and coworkers, in preparation for the fall semester. And our campuses are kicking the fall semester off with antiracist and anti-imperialist politics at the forefront of our organizing (see CUNY, page 5). These struggles are opportunities to build international working-class solidarity, which can build confidence in the working class to run society. We need to struggle with everyone involved in these fightbacks to commit to joining Progressive Labor Party.
Solidarity with students and workers in Haiti
Our local PLP club has been involved with the #SOSColombia movement against racist police terror in Colombia, with several members attending a rally in Washington, DC (see CHALLENGE, 6/10). We also followed the fightback in Haiti that began in 2018, sparked when the now-assassinated former President Moïse raised prices on fuel by 50 percent. To kick off the fall semester, we plan to hold a demonstration for international solidarity and connect the fightback in Colombia with the ongoing fightback in Haiti.
At Kingsborough Community College, our organizing has brought us into struggle alongside students from Yemen, Palestine and other Muslim-majority countries. Despite the Covid-19 pandemic, this picked up again with the recent fascist Israeli bombardment of Gaza. Some Students fighting against Israeli terror expressed interest in supporting the workers in Haiti and Colombia. Haiti, Colombia and Palestine—the appearance may seem different in language and culture, but the essence is workers fighting against capitalist terror and exploitation.
“We are choking on nationalism”
Our club’s planning meetings for this solidarity demonstration have been spaces for sharp and enriching political discussion and debate by friends brand new to our Party. During one meeting, a veteran fighter in the struggle in Colombia and new to PLP noted how little they or many know of the history and struggle in Haiti. She noted, “We are choking on nationalism. So many groups only focus on Colombia and don’t want anything to do with internationalism. These borders are not real. Haiti was the first to resist colonization, and we need to make this connection.”
The connections between workers in Colombia, Palestine and Haiti run deep. The Israeli racists have been training the racist Colombian police and paramilitary forces since the 1980s (Al Jazeera, 6/5/03) and have been deploying and training the Haitian police fascists since 2010 (Jerusalem Post, 12/23/10).
The fact that workers are fighting back in all three areas is an opportunity for communists to build international working-class solidarity. Our club is growing with new friends and has moved into high gear since the earthquake and hurricane struck our sisters and brothers in Haiti. On September 4, join us in Brooklyn at Church Ave and Nostrand Ave at 12pm for an internationalist, anti-imperialist rally.
Solidarity with striking miners, Amazon workers
Our club is sending a delegation of students and faculty to Alabama to meet with striking miners of the Warrior Met Coal company. Since April, a multiracial group of 1,100 miners have been on strike for higher wages, benefits, and time off after the company broke off negotiations with their union, the United Mine Workers of America (UMWA). Striking miners have been attacked by scabs and company goons on the picket lines, right down the road from Amazon’s Bessemer warehouse, where 3,215 workers were recently intimidated out of voting for union representation.
One of Warrior Met Coal’s owners is BlackRock, a major investor in private, for-profit ICE detention centers along the U.S.-Mexico border. BlackRock’s CEO, Laurence Fink, is also a New York University trustee, and in 2019 was an honored guest at a CUNY-Hunter College event. Same enemy, same fight! Workers of the world unite!
After Contacting striking miners, we received an invitation to a rally in Alabama. We began reaching out to our base of CHALLENGE readers. We received very positive responses and pledges to help raise money and awareness about the strike, and connect our struggles at CUNY with the coal miners and Amazon workers. More in the next issue. Stay tuned!