The Progressive Labor Party (PLP)-led contingent of transit workers from ATU Local 689 electrified the May Day rally at the AFL-CIO headquarters in D.C. This group of industrial workers was the only significant contingent of such key workers at the rally, showing the absolute necessity for the PLP to deepen its work to bring more industrial workers into the struggle for communism. The AFL-CIO has no intention of doing this, or even militantly fighting back. But at the rally, a member of PLP gave a stirring speech attacking capitalism and calling for international unity of the working class in the fight against racism, sexism, imperialism, and war.
Here is a slightly revised version of her speech:
Today we are celebrating May Day, the international working class holiday. All around the world workers are marching today to intensify the fight against capitalism and to remind us that unions are for resistance and not just an arm of capital.
May Day has a long history honoring the struggles of the working class.
We march today to honor those who fought at Haymarket Square in Chicago in 1886 to fight for the eight hour working day.
We march to honor those who organized against the First World War, like William Z. Foster and Eugene Debs.
We march to support those who fought and marched on May Day in the 1930s to free the Scottsboro Boys from the racist injustice system in the southern United States.
We march to honor those who organized to fight the rise of fascism in Italy, Spain and Germany in the 1930’s.
We march to honor the soldiers of the Red Army, who raised the red flag over the Reichstag in Berlin to signify the defeat of Nazi Germany on May Day 1945.
We march to honor the heroes of the Civil Rights Movement who waged a massive struggle against racism in the 1960’s.
We honor the massive May Day marches in South Africa in the late 1980s as part of the fight against apartheid.
As a member of ATU Local 689, we honor those who led and participated in the 1978 Metro transit strike to protect our wage and benefit package by closing down the entire city of D.C. for over a week. We honor the Metro workers at Cinderbed Road who went on a wildcat strike in 2019 for 85 days to fight privatization. We honor the few but growing number of operators who refuse to drive buses wrapped with recruitment ads for the racist Border Patrol.
The lesson we learn from these actions is that when workers stand up and fight back, we can win.
The labor movement has been under attack since its inception. Our numbers in the U.S. have shrunk dramatically. To reverse this trend, we must spread class consciousness and awareness of our strength to millions more. Our labor runs the system. If Metro’s General Manager doesn’t come to work, no one notices. But if Local 689 doesn’t go to work, the whole world notices.
The politicians -- both Republicans and Democrats -- make promises but they both serve the capitalist class. The whims of corporate controlled politicians may be in our favor one moment and against us in the next, depending on what will advance their goals. Never forget that when the nation-wide rail workers unions voted to strike in 2024, both Republicans and Democrats broke the strike effort with Joe Biden signing off on the union-busting legislation. This shows how much the capitalists need us and will stop at nothing to continue to exploit us even when all we want is sick days!
The drive for profit mandated by the capitalist system is responsible for genocide in Gaza, the war on Iran, murder in the Congo, the conflict in Ukraine, and a changing climate that threatens our very existence. Capitalism needs racism to divide us, poverty to threaten us, and police and ICE to murder us. The capitalists try to get us to embrace nationalism, to fly flags, and to fight each other in wars for the benefit of the bosses.
For these reasons we do not fight capitalism hoping for a nicer capitalism, a minority-owned capitalism, or a female-empowered capitalism. Scandinavia’s wealth is propped up by African children mining metals for their cell phones and Asian children sewing their clothes in sweatshops.
No, we fight all forms of capitalism and we fight with workers’ power. We need international solidarity to advance our cause. Ending capitalism and fighting for workers’ power is what May Day is about.
Right now, our city is occupied by thousands of National Guard soldiers. We should be organizing them to march off our streets. They are mostly workers like ourselves who need a second source of income to survive, but they do not need to do so in DC, heavily armed and representing the racism inherent in capitalism.
On this May Day let us commit to organizing the unorganized, ending the strategy of supporting politicians, and building a mass movement to bring down capitalism and establish workers power.
The bosses can’t profit when the workers strike, shut it down and shut it tight.
