INDIANA, May 16—Progressive Labor Party (PLP) played an active role against racist incarceration during a rally and car action at Indiana State Prison (ISP).
The racist disregard of workers in prison is not new and continues to be a tool for capitalism. Mass incarceration profiteers have long used racism and sexism as their primary ways to keep incarcerated workers separated from one another. They are also used to keep the wider public from empathizing with the class struggles inside of the prisons.
The number of Covid-19 infections and deaths among prisoners continues to rise, with no illusion of concern among bosses. The only solution to ending this capitalist-caused cycle of systemic exploitation and victimization is to smash capitalism with an armed communist revolution, led by an international PLP.
Putting the line on the line with workers
The PLP collective arrived early to the rally, giving us an opportunity to talk with other workers about our connection to the prison and other struggles against capitalist violence.
We discussed how the coronavirus and the state government’s mishandling of the pandemic are affecting our base . PLP comrades shared that if society were under control of the workers under communism, operating in the best interests of the working class  instead of capitalist gain, there would be a drastic reduction in the loss of lives.
Workers talked about issues their family members in the prison have been going through long before the Covid-19 crisis. . Abuse at the hands of guards in the form of food tampering, forced isolation, suspension of visits in all forms, physical abuse, and unwarranted, harassing searches all made the list.
All these result in worsening conditions for workers, specifically their physical safety as well as their mental and emotional health. This is proof that rehabilitation is far from the goal of incarceration under capitalism. Brutalization of the working class, control, and profit is the bottom line under this system.
The fight against capitalism includes all workers
When the featured speakers arrived, they gave comments about their organization’s platform and the current demands laid out for the well-being of inmates. During open comments, a former guard of the prison spoke about the shared hazardous conditions for employees and inmates.
Their point was that the risks were related, and everyone had an interest in pushing back against the refusal of prison administrators to initiate safety precautions. Some in the crowd were surprised to hear how the lives of guards were also endangered by their money-hungry bosses. The shared interests of workers, incarcerated or not, to demand change and improvement in conditions from administrators to increase the safety of all was made clear.
The speaker quit their job due to how great of a risk they all faced, and due to the clear intention of their bosses to do nothing about it. After the invited speaker read a list of reformist demands, a PL’er shouted out that there’s no negotiating with the prison bosses. The PL’er said real justice for incarcerated workers means smashing capitalism and their system of for-profit torture.
Speaking on the bullhorn, the comrade expanded the conversation by saying that workers coming together and showing opposition in events like these is important. It steels us for the fight that the whole working class must wage against this deadly system that would rather see us all caged and broken than free. Smashing the capitalist system is the only key to freedom for us all.
The comrade led the crowd in Party chants after they showed an interest in the revolutionary line she delivered. PLP distributed CHALLENGE newspaper and made contacts. When the main speaker took to the mic again, they agreed with what the PL’er had stated and added ending imperialism to their group’s list of demands.
No reformist retreats!
Mass incarceration remains a valuable weapon for the ruling class. The reasons, and many of the methods, remain unchanged in the U.S. since the era of post-Civil War Reconstruction. Black workers, newly “freed” from one form of enslavement, were thrown into another form in jails and prisons. Racism and sexism are clearly used by poverty and prison profiteers as tools of control, separating workers on both sides of the wall.
Workers in prisons are waging fights for basic humane treatment against capitalists who continue to profit from withholding it. Being a part of collectives that support that fight is an important area of mass work for our comrades to engage. Actively leading with our line will win us supporters, who will become our base, and then our comrades. It all starts with putting our line on the forefront of the struggle.
We push people past the point of asking for kinder abuse from capitalists. This is the essential difference between reform and revolution. PLP comrades must build for the latter everywhere we are present. It is through personal and political relationships that we will win others away from reform and revisionist movements, to fight directly for revolutionary communism.

MEXICO, May 27—"I no longer have faith, this is horrible...I am demanding a public apology from Smith Medical and they must assume responsibility for destroying my family...They are scoundrels," said Juan, a Tijuana worker, who was tearful, who lost his wife and 25-year-old daughter, both to coronavirus. Mother and daughter both worked in the company and did not receive adequate and timely medical attention. Despite having all the symptoms of COVID-19, the doctor at the plant told them it was a simple flu. He only prescribed pain relievers to get them back to work. Until, both worsened and died in a Social Security hospital, just over a week apart. This news was released weeks before the peak of the pandemic and shows that neither companies nor the government care about the lives of workers.
No solutions under a profit system
On March 31, the General Health Council of the Mexican government decreed a health emergency because of COVID-19. Therefore, non-essential activities in the public, social, or private sectors should have been suspended. Many businesses did not comply with that provision and the government let it be. In the state of Baja California, largely due to worker protests at some plants, some 50 companies that were not performing essential activities were successfully suspended. But, the governor and businessman Jaime Bonilla, who is a member of the ruling party Morena, reopened them on May 4 saying that they were part of the supply chain of essential products.
The Progressive Labor Party mourns the death of our working-class sisters and brothers. We also mourn the deaths of all the workers who have died from the inability of this criminal capitalist system to care for their lives and health. We honor their memories with courage to fight this murderous system and build a new society where no worker dies for the profits of a few. We fight for workers like Juan N. to regain confidence in their own class and in a future of social equality.
Unfortunately, the case of Juan N, his wife and daughter are not isolated. As of May 16, in Baja California, 519 people had died from COVID-19, of those 432 were maquiladora workers. At the national level, the State ranks second in deaths and third in infections. While the maquilas hide the outbreaks, the workers are the ones who report their health and that of their colleagues. A worker at the U.S. subsidiary Breg, Inc., which manufactures medical supplies, said she contracted the virus at the plant where she worked. Although there were positive cases within the company, the bosses did not apply any measures to prevent the workers in the factory and their families from becoming infected.
Communism is the cure
Under capitalism the lives of the workers do not matter; we have no value; we are disposable. The only thing that matters is the bosses' profits. The bosses use their state power to appropriate the wealth workers produce when they transform raw materials into merchandise.
Under a communist society led by the working class, our lives and needs will be the main social interest. Under communism, if necessary, all activity to protect the lives of workers would be stopped; social organization and the strength of the communist state would guarantee that this would be the case.
This was the case when workers in the Soviet Union and China faced and eliminated many diseases that continue to plague millions of people in the world today and others that re-emerge such as tuberculosis and leprosy.
Even in the current pandemic, there are workers organizing collectively to face the virus. Lessons from this period are nuggets for building a new communist society. We encourage all workers to read CHALLENGE and build social ties with workers on the basis of fighting for a better world.

OAKLAND, CA, May 22—The 73-car caravan to cancel rent and mortgages was loud and militant involving hundreds of members of the National Day of Action, the Alliance of Californians for Community Empowerment and the Progressive Labor Party (PLP). The workers arrived with signs on their cars and flags flying with messages, “Rent Strike Today, Cancel Rent Tomorrow!”  The PLP contingent exposed capitalism. “Workers Build Houses, Capitalism Creates Homelessness” – “Capitalism is Killing Us” -“Communist Equality, Not Capitalist Inequality.”
Most cars had two protesters. From the sidewalks and balconies, workers cheered and raised their fists in solidarity. Many were tenants of real estate racist capitalist Neveo Mosser. The worker’s response inspired us. We drove to San Francisco and protested at the home of rent profiteer Mosser, who owns 600 apartment units in Oakland and is steadily raising rents forcing tenants into homelessness. We placed a notice on his door to quit or be evicted, made speeches, and passed out leaflets. PL’ers sold CHALLENGE, promoting communism, a system  where workers would distribute housing based on need.
 Community groups around the U.S. have been organizing rent strikes, as the Communist Party did during the Great Depression. “The rent strike is a cry for dignity: We are all deserving of a home, no matter the color of our skin, financial status, or culture,” said Donnette Letford, an undocumented immigrant from Jamaica and a member of the group New York Communities for Change (The Intercept, 4/25). Capitalism can never provide what Donnette wants. Communism will eliminate both profits and homelessness.
Homelessness in Oakland, California
To pay the high rents in Oakland requires a full-time job at $45/hour. That means with 4,000 homeless in Oakland before the pandemic, 70 percent Black workers, there are four empty units for every homeless person. Land speculators like Mosser hold the empty units, waiting for the higher rents coming with gentrification. In November 2019 four Black mothers occupied an empty home, saying “it is a crime to keep homes vacant while people suffer on the street from the California housing crisis”. They won a concession from the landlord but homelessness continues (see CHALLENGE, 2/5). Also, demonstrators took over  Mosser’s restaurant in San Francisco in February (see CHALLENGE, 3/18). But until workers take political power and run all of society the struggle continues.
Covid-19 exacerbates exploitation and inequality
Increased homelessness and starvation during the pandemic is inevitable. First, every Federal government since the Clinton administration has closed down public health agencies and barely prepared for the predicted pandemic. Medical personnel and equipment were disorganized as the government and corporations competed instead of cooperating. For-profit privatization had led to multiple hospital closures. During the chaotic state government lockdowns tens of thousands big and small businesses have closed or gone bankrupt. So that 40 million workers have had to apply for unemployment (democdracynow.org, 5/21), not counting millions of undocumented workers who don’t qualify. Over two-thirds of workers live pay-check to pay-check (Forbes, 1/14/19) and can’t pay an unexpected expense. Once laid off, many could not and did not pay rent. As the rent strike says, “Can’t Pay?  Won’t Pay”. That’s capitalism: 1) inadequate racist health care, 2) a racist housing crisis, and 3) racist layoffs. The Progressive Labor Party says join the fight. For housing. For jobs. For healthcare. And for a communist revolution.
Governors Gavin Newsom of California and Andrew Cuomo of New York have declared temporary moratoriums on evictions. San Francisco, Oakland and San Jose temporarily cancelled evictions and rent increases, but refused to cancel rent or utility bills. San Jose said it would be unconstitutional to cancel rents, which are private property. Right! The constitution protects property and not workers!!!
Capitalism is the disease; communism is the cure
The capitalist system caused this pandemic.Communist society would put workers’ health and well-being as the first priority through disease prevention and creating a healthy environment. Experiences in post-revolution Soviet Union and China show that when workers control society, disease is prevented. China is now a capitalist country, and initially tried to cover up the outbreak to protect their stock market. But after the revolution in 1949, workers ran China and placed workers’ needs as the top priority. All workers were housed, and they eliminated several devastating diseases like syphilis and schistosomiasis using public health education and working class ingenuity.
But capitalists put profits first, endangering workers’ lives on the job and in their imperialist wars. This is especially true for health care and front-line workers during the pandemic. Internationally they are leaving refugees to die in camps (rescue.org) and in ICE detention and jails, and on indigenous reservations where the Navajo have the highest rate in the U.S. (Wired, 5/23). Capitalists can’t change because the laws of capitalism (profits first, exploit to the max) make them the murderers they are.
The blatant racism and inequality of capitalism make building the communist movement more important than ever. At the caravan, one new recruit saw all the people out demanding rent cessation and commented that revolutionary thinking may be awakening. Break the chains of capitalism! We have a world to win!

Making inroads towards communism with transit co-worker
I've had discussions in recent months with my Metropolitan Transit Authority (MTA) train operator classmates about the bosses' racist attacks against us on the job. For some time, I was not confident my efforts were bearing fruit. My colleagues oftentimes laughed me off as just some crazy anarchist guy rambling. It felt like a hopeless endeavor. Though I still kept trying.
But recently, a classmate texted me that he was seriously interested in becoming a union representative because, “[L]ike you said, stand up for the little guy,” referencing a conversation we'd had around late January.
During the aforementioned talk, I spoke with him about how the MTA blames its workers for fare hikes during contract negotiations, and how the racist media parrots the same lies. He was amazed to discover this information.
He asked me a question later that same day: “Would you rather be the corporation going up against the little guy? Or the little guy going up against the corporation?”
“I'd rather be in a collection of little guys (and gals) teaming up against that corporation and this system,” I responded.
Though we as communists know that bosses have today's unions under their boots and use them as campaign vehicles for their stooge politicians, this worker's shift shows his rising class-consciousness.
He sees how capitalism is devastating workers at the MTA, with over 120 of us dead from Covid-19, within a two-month time span, because Transit bosses didn't give a damn about safeguarding us from the virus.
He wants to bring change, but just needs nudging in a more communist direction. Before this discussion, he may not have seen much reason for us to organize. We plan on going to union meetings when they reopen again, and I'm looking into books about the TWU Local 100's communist roots for us to read together.
I'll continue talking with him whenever I can.
Eventually, I want to give him CHALLENGE as well. But for now, baby steps. I'm taking this as a lesson well learned. NEVER give up on workers, and never assume they'll never be able to get it.
You just might be surprised.
*****
CHALLENGE is essential news
Around the world, workers are finding creative ways to continue to fight back amid the Covid-19 Pandemic. Progressive Labor Party knows that an important way of fighting for the working class is spreading communist ideas with CHALLENGE newspaper. In order to do this many have been encouraging people to check out www.plp.org or sending their contacts the newspaper in the mail.
Another approach used recently in NYC, the center of the pandemic, was to build a portable CHALLENGE stand and place it near a line of folks getting food as well as a protest against racist ICE incarceration. It was then possible to offer it to people “hands-free“ and many eagerly took the paper as they passed. Let’s keep creating new ways to resist and spread our important message.
*****
Sanitation workers on strike
I have been working in New Orleans testing folks for HIV and Covid-19 in a Federally Qualified Health Center. We serve workers like the sanitation workers who have been collecting trash without safety equipment. These front-line workers are subcontracted by People Ready and paid $10.25 an hour with no benefits or health insurance. They work long hard hours starting at 4 AM sometimes until 6 PM. As summer heats up in New Orleans their job gets even harder. Between the heat, the increase in people doing yard work—disposing of tree branches and such in the trash—there is even more to do. They are not provided with masks or gloves and work closely with others. On May 5 some “hoppers” (those who jump on and off the truck collecting trash) went on strike with these demands:

• PPE for all workers each day starting NOW
• Fix broken trucks that leak toxic hydraulic fluid on workers every day
• Provide hourly pay of $15/hour
• Provide weekly hazard pay of $150/week

The first day on strike a boss told them they were fired and some returned to work the next day. A week later they received a letter saying they weren’t fired, and they are hoping that will motivate others to join them. The company (Metro Services Group) has started bringing in prisoners on work release to scab during the strike.  Those on work release were threatened with being sent back to jail if they did not comply.  These workers are paid about half of what the sanitation workers were making – definitely forced slave labor. As of May 21, the bosses were still not meeting with them. The workers are trying to form a union—the City Waste Union— and have gained support, including solidarity with striking baristas and a large rally at City Hall on May 18.
The worker’s signs say I AM A MAN, a reprise of the slogan of the famous Memphis sanitation workers strike that brought Martin Luther King Jr to the city where he was assassinated.  I have been talking with the strikers and put support signs in my apartment windows in the gentrifying area of Bywater, New Orleans.
I will be bringing revolutionary ideas and CHALLENGE to the picket line. This fightback has inspired other workers to donate nearly $60,000 to support the strikers through a Go Fund Me page: https://tinyurl.com/y7duxffg. Workers of the world unite!
*****
Communism: news bosses too scared to print
The New York Times, mouthpiece of the main wing of the U.S. ruling class, proclaims itself as reporters of “All the news that’s fit to print.” But that “All” doesn’t seem to include the truth about communists.
The editorial in its April 29 issue is headlined, “Another Way the 2020s Might Be Like the 1930s.” What “way”? In alluding to current strikes by Amazon workers and others protesting the rulers’ ignoring the unsafe effects of the coronavirus, it recalls “The consequential strike wave of 1934…a year of unrest in workplaces across the country,” when workers could “look to President Franklin Roosevelt as an ally.”
It fails to mention that this “unrest” was a product of massive sit-down strikes led by communists in the auto plants and among basic industries like electrical and steel. Six of the seven members of the strike committee that organized the 1936-37 44-day Flint sit-down strike that smashed the open shop and established the auto union at General Motors were communists.
That strike sparked scores of others across the country, battling the National Guard and U.S. Army troops. It was part of a red-led movement that championed the eight-hour day. Communists organized 800,000 workers into the National Unemployment Councils which forced Roosevelt to quell the workers’ protests and establish the Unemployment Insurance and Social Security systems and the 40-hour work-week.  Somehow the Times’ editorial writer didn’t feel that this news about these communist-led movements in the 1930s was “fit to print.”
Just below that editorial was an op-ed piece by Thomas Friedman in which he labeled the coronavirus a “war,” asserting that “wars are fought and won by humans.” So who were the humans that won the Second World War? That happened, says Friedman, because “We” — meaning the U.S. — “could out-mobilize the Nazis and Japanese to win World War II.” (!)
Somehow he “forgot” that the working-class in the communist-led Soviet Union was squaring off against 80 percent of Hitler’s armies on the 2,000-mile-long Eastern Front, from the Arctic to the Crimea, smashing them at Stalingrad, which was universally viewed as the turning point of WWII. It was their heroism that greatly reduced the number of Nazi divisions that the U.S. and Britain had to face in the West, enabling them to open up the Second Front in France in 1944. This, after the Soviets had fought alone for three years.
Perhaps Friedman never read what the U.S. General Douglas MacArthur told the Associated Press on February 23, 1942: “The hopes of civilization rest upon the worthy banners of the courageous Russian Army.” Their heroic “resistance to the heaviest blows of a hitherto undefeated enemy, followed by a smashing counterattack which is driving the enemy back into its own land” is “the greatest military achievement of all time.”
Now THAT is “news that’s fit to print.”