BROOKLYN, October 1—“You are Scholars, Not Suspects!” That is the message the mainly Black and Latin students received as they entered their school building for the first day of school from a multiracial group of 40 parents and teachers. We met dozens of students as they lined up to walk through metal detectors on their first day back in a school building after more than six months. Racist metal detectors are the welcome back that thousands of mainly Black and Latin students have been given by the racist NYC Department of Education (DoE),  and City bosses who refuse to make any real antiracist changes even as they spew their empty promises of “equity.” As one chant said, “How do you spell RACIST? D-O-E!”
Members of a Brooklyn high school Parent Teacher Association (PTA) organized and rallied on the first day of the school buildings’ reopening, demanding the racist metal detectors be removed citywide (see box). This multiracial group has a long history of antiracist fightback against the many racist attacks hurled at students.
These past fightbacks include:

• demanding the removal of scanners for years
• demanding more and integrated sports teams
• defending students arrested inside the school for failing to remove a pin holding eyeglasses together
• protesting the disrepair of the school building itself to organizing to defend an anti-communist attack on members of the school.

In the wake of mass antiracist rage
When we can organize antiracist and antisexist actions we can build the confidence within our own class. Our PTA was touched by the explosion of mass anger coming out of the racist murders of George Floyd and Breonna Taylor at the start of the summer.  Time and again parents responded to our calls to join demonstrations and fight for communist ideas. Our multiracial and intergenerational leadership changed the tenor of several huge marches.  
In the run-up to Thursday’s picket line against racist metal detectors parents active with us over the summer, and who had seen liberal racism in action over a period of many years before that, rejected the notion that we ought to rely on misleader elected officials like Councilmember Brad Lander or NYC Public Advocate Jumaane Williams to help lead our event.
Thursday’s demonstration also came in the wake of a series of club meetings, crowdcasts and zoom calls where Progressive Labor Party (PLP) members moved friends, student families, and coworkers into a discussion where the need for organizing against the racist attacks on students in the lose-lose scenario of remote vs. live instruction was hammered home.
These locally and nationally organized virtual meetings, along with responsibly distanced socializing, gave us a firm foundation to call for sharp action as the first day of live instruction for students approached.
Metal detectors, tool of terror and division
It is not always clear to students, parents, or school staff why metal detectors in schools are a racist attack. Some believe that they are there to provide safety. This is the lie that is sold to workers by a system that relies on racist divisions and fear mongering to keep the working class divided.
Metal detectors in school means that students are seen and treated as potential criminals. “In 2016, 99 percent of all New York City public school students handcuffed during incidents of emotional distress were Black and Latin. New York City’s Black students had the highest rate of suspension, accounting for 27.1 percent of the population but almost half of all suspensions. Statewide, 1 in 5 Black boys and 1 in 7 Black girls are suspended from school” (Alliance for Quality Education, 6/19).
This year, during the Covid-19 pandemic, scanning will result in even more harm, clogging entrances to schools where the urgent priorities should be maximizing physical distancing and instruction time. Even if it goes against any common sense or costs the city more money amidst  a budget crisis, one thing the bosses’ always give priority to is more racism!
Metal detectors in schools also build suspicion among students. They teach students to be fearful of one another. This ideology builds disunity within the working class, weakening our ability to unite as one working class against capitalism, the racist, sexist, exploitative class system. It builds the illusions that we cannot rely on each other for the solutions to the worlds’ problems. It builds the cynicism that therefore our only option is to put our hope in one politician or another’s empty promises to “fix” the very system they represent.  
Building our class muscles through struggle
This small, but significant action reflects the  kind of organizing that really can make a change. As we near the elections, it is hard to escape the pressure to view voting as the real way to make a change. Elections under capitalism are a lose-lose for workers because they reflect workers’ cynicism that the international working class does not have the potential to run society in our interests and builds the illusion that this system can be reformed in our interests  (see editorial, page 2.) The horrible handling of this pandemic from the beginning and the disorganized reopening of schools (some NYC schools are already reclosing following a rise in infection rates) illustrate how the bosses see our working-class children as completely expendable.
Only when the international working class controls all of society in the interests of our class, and not for the profits of a few, will we be able to truly build an antiracist, antisexist world that ALL of our children can thrive in. We still have a long way to go for the masses to turn these ideas into action and to turn action into a fight for a communist world. This rally was a small but hopeful step in that direction.

South Bronx, October 9–The crisis at the City University of New York (CUNY) is sharpening, as the capitalist trustees and politicians pursue their plans of implementing budget cuts, packing virtual classes with as many as a hundred students and laying off thousands of part-time instructors and college workers. CUNY administrators have increased class sizes, launching a racist attack on students’ education. This is a racist attack because the students at CUNY are disproportionately Black and Latin. But racism divides and hurts all working class students. So several student clubs and some union members from two Bronx CUNY campuses took to the streets and held a militant, multiracial march against racist cutbacks.
We began with a short rally near the courthouse, where students and faculty had an informal “warm up” of speeches. (see letters on page 6). We spoke about the need to fight back against these racist cuts, about why we need to strike, and about the need for unity between workers and students. Many faculty & staff have lost their health insurance in the midst of the pandemic that has disproportionately stricken Black and Latin workers and students.  Colleges throughout CUNY are pressuring staff to risk their lives at unsafe campuses. Our speakers included students from both campuses, who called on us to continue the fight back.  They pointed out how the problem is capitalism. Politicians are part of this capitalist system. An adjunct made the point that voting for the Democrats will not resolve this crisis. In New York City Democrats run everything. They are the problem. The adjunct said, “We are the ones we are waiting for.“ That’s right and the future for us as workers is communism where we run all of society.
Progressive Labor Party (PLP) members are active in our union committees and student clubs. We were happy to be joined by comrades from the Bronx and to see so many workers responding to CHALLENGE newspaper. In these mass groups that we work in, we are trying to bring workers and students closer to our communist ideas through discussion, struggle, and action. Our study group has discussions about how racism and capitalism go hand in hand, and why capitalism cannot provide us with the education we need.  We look forward to more of our co-workers and students joining PLP as we battle on!
The march ended in front of one of the Bronx campuses, where a number of security guards began approaching us and calling for backup until they realized we were “livestreaming” the march and backed off. It was a clear message to the marchers that we must demand COPS ARE REMOVED FROM  CAMPUS as well as the end to austerity. The closing speech was very inspiring as a professor who was laid off explained what it had been like for her to lose her livelihood. She thanked everyone for coming. “I love you all for standing by me” she said and then proceeded to call for us to continue building a movement to shut down CUNY and fight back against capitalism. We ended with a bang and formed a “human chain” extending from one end of the block to the other. With our signs and a huge banner facing traffic we called on drivers to honk in support.
One of the student leaders shared her reflections after the march. “It was amazing to come out to the march and get the message out about striking for a fully funded CUNY. Our voices were loud and clear, which encouraged passersby to join us and strangers to proudly honk their horns in support. I hope to attend more marches and be part of this collective fight.”
This march was powerful. It represented the class anger we feel at what is happening to our students and colleagues.  It was a collective effort with different people volunteering to plan the route, translate the leaflet, post the fliers on the Internet, etc.  It is a glimpse of how powerful the working class can be. Join us in the fight against racism and for communism!

COLOMBIA, Sept 24—After two cops murdered Javier Ordoñez, thousands took to the streets, leading to clashes with the state-sponsored thugs. As crisis in Colombia deepens, the working class needs to reject working within the system and embrace building outside the system: communism.
These demonstrations demand a restructuring of the police, the resignation of the Minister of Defense, Carlos Holmes Trujillo, and the end of political assassinations of social leaders. Demands also include a solution to unemployment, and the annulment of Decree 1174, which is the “most aggressive labor and pension reform in the last 30 years.”
What the spontaneous movement needs is communist leadership to raise the consciousness of workers. Through struggle, our class needs to see how the police are a murderous institution that cannot be reformed. We must understand that it only protects and serves the interests of the ruling class. Only communist revolution can put an end to the present waves of state terrorism against our class and build a new society free from all forms of racist, nationalist, sexist oppression, bosses wars and wage slavery.
Crisis intensifies
This year, we have seen the horrible return of massacres, the racist displacement of communities in fields and cities, the constant threat from paramilitaries, and the increasing murder of social leaders. On top of that, working-class fighters, former FARC guerrillas, peasant, indigenous and Black organizations have experienced this extermination with greater force during the quarantine. Much of this repression is carried out by the military and groups of thugs at the service of the state and local capitalists.
Health, government, and recycling workers and strike committees continue to carry out cacerolazos (demonstrations with the banging of pots and pans) and demonstrations in squares, parks, and public spaces. The protesters call for the dismantling of ESMAD (Colombian anti-riot police), responsible for repression and deaths—like the murder (still unpunished) of Dylan Cruz on November 21, the day of the first national strike. The mass demonstrations are called by community organizations, women’s student organizations and other organizations belonging to the National Unemployment Committee.
The police repression during the demonstrations left at least 14 murdered, more than 250 wounded, and at least 150 shot. The number of live bullet injuries reached 74. Several reports of abuse and rape by the police during the illegal arrests were also recorded. According to the magazine “Noche y Niebla” (Night and Fog), the biggest “human rights” violators in Colombia in 2019 were the paramilitaries and the police. By human rights, they mean violence against the working class.
The repression also had a vigilante character: “sexual abuse, against two detained women, obstruction of information, and even arrests in clandestine centers as evidenced in videos where, in addition, it is proven how the police exchange weapons with thugs in plain clothes, who shoot as a team, and also aim directly at the body of the protesters and beat them while they were defenseless.”
Workers organize against police attacks
Residents of many neighborhoods in the capital and other cities organized to prevent the police from entering their residential complexes, beating, and shooting at people. There are many reports of police infiltration and of having seen plainclothes agents behind the fires of shops and looting. In many videos, the police are seen fleeing attacks from organized neighbors with stones and sticks.
During the protests, more than 30 CAI (Rapid Response Police Centers) were burned or destroyed. Neighbors denounce that these are the “booths” where drugs are traded, and bribes are paid for mafia activities. After the fires, many of these CAIs were transformed into popular libraries and community meeting centers by protesters.
PLP is building a base within the working class as part of our international work. Members of the Party, friends, and readers of our newspaper CHALLENGE are participating in these demonstrations and joining our sisters and brothers who fight for a better society. We discuss and continue to be involved in the class struggle as a way to move forward to communism.

The naked partisan brawl over their hallowed Supreme Court seat is another reflection of the bosses' inability to govern "in the old way"–of their turn toward fascism.  It wasn't so long ago that Ruth Bader Ginsburg and arch-racist "intellectual" Antonin Scalia were besties who went to the opera together. It was like Joe Biden's warm and collaborative relationships with Jim Crow senators James Eastland and Strom Thurmond ("one of my closest friends," Biden once said). Whatever their disagreements, they were on the same team. But given the sharpening contradictions of capitalism, that era is gone.
As the fight among the bosses sharpens, the death of Ruth Bader Ginsburg exposes some of the problems the Big Fascist bosses are having within their own ranks with selfishness. Ginsburg as a judge willingly defended the racist anti-working-class policies of the Big Fascist liberal bosses, but when push came to shove, she, like many in the capitalist class, put herself above the class needs of the bosses. When then President Barack Obama took her to lunch and hinted that she should resign so he could appoint her successor, she refused. This type of subjectivity is causing problems for the Big Fascists as they struggle to take down Donald Trump and his Small Fascist backers in preparation for war with China.
The Big Fascists bosses are trying to mobilize around the mythology that the Supreme Court has the power/potential to defend the working class against rogue presidents or a right-wing Congress. The Big Fascist bosses want us to believe that it's essential to elect Biden (and Obama and Hillary Clinton before him) to appoint "progressive" justices and in particular to preserve Roe v. Wade.  This big lie that liberal politicians or judges will defend the working class has led to disasters such as Bill Clinton and Biden teaming up to throw millions of Black workers into prison. Where was the Supreme Court then? The Court (like the President and Congress) responds to mass militancy in the streets and mass movements in general. Reforms, however temporary, are driven by class struggle, not a group of nine ruling-class stooges in robes.
For her part Ginsburg was an eager stooge of the bosses racist system. She consistently carried out her job to enshrine and protect racist policies. In her decision in Sherrill v. Oneida, she ruled against indigenous people with “the language in that opinion…considered some of the more overtly racist language in its challenge and skepticism of tribal interests” (Marshall Project, 9/23/20). In United States v. Sineneng-Smith, Ginsburg argued for prosecution of advocates for migrant workers who “encouraged” those workers to enter the country. She supported the Atlantic Coast Pipeline and the Trump administration's policy of speeding deportation of asylum-seekers (Politico, 9/20) This is on top of her rulings in support of prosecutors and searches by police officers (Ohio State Law Journal, Vol. 70:4).
Ginsburg was a "federalist," which is short-hand for the racist "states' rights" movement that goes back to slavery days. Her racism sometimes slipped through her "progressive" façade. Most famously she was particularly tone deaf when she called Colin Kaepernick’s protests “stupid and dumb.” (She was later forced to apologize for this). She also had the worst record of any current justice in hiring Black law clerks, a coveted pathway to becoming a judge, having only one in her 27 years in the Supreme Court.  As devoted as Ginsburg was to defending a racist system, she exemplified the contradictions within the ruling class’ politicians, and in this case a judge, who demanded seemingly unlimited fame or money or both in reward for their service. Her individualism and refusal to retire when Obama was President is another example of the lack of discipline within the capitalist class.
Just a quick look at the ages of the leading politicians says a lot about the rulers failure to create space for younger leadership. Trump 74, Biden 77, Mitch McConnell 78, Nancy Pelosi 80. It raises a question as to whether Biden will, should he win, be willing to step down after one term or insist on running again at the age of 81. But it’s not just the age issue for the bosses. While the working class has been bearing the brunt of the capitalist crisis in lowered life expectancy, increased poverty and miserable health care, the bosses servants in Washington are demanding and receiving more and more for their loyalty.
As the political class makes demands, the culture of self-servingness dominates. Bill Clinton was caught sleeping with an intern, yet to this day he is defended by his fellow Democrats. Then, after leaving the White House, the Clintons raked in millions through donations from bosses from other countries to their foundation as well as big bucks for speaking on Wall Street. The Obamas have taken in over $60 million in television and book deals since leaving the White House. The Biden and Trump families have gorged themselves at the trough of capitalists from around the globe by selling their connections. In a period where the ruling class is preparing a fascist crackdown to prepare for war, the gross selfishness of their front people is becoming untenable for them.