The racists on Staten Island are not stopping their attacks on the asylum seekers being housed in shelters there, but the Progressive Labor Party (PLP) and other antiracists are stepping up our efforts to support and defend them.

By order of New York City officials, St. John's Villa, a former private school that was the site of two previous pro-migrant vs anti-migrant demonstrations, is to be emptied of its residents by November 15th. The racists are now concentrating their attacks on migrants in the former Island Shores Senior Residence on Father Capodanno Blvd. Every night, the racists have been congregating in smaller or larger numbers to loudly spew their anti-immigrant filth to disturb the residents. Their continued presence has caused the NYPD to set up barricades on the streets surrounding the facility, ostensibly to prevent any confrontations.

When members of the coalition of antiracist organizations arrived at the facility for our planned demonstration, we found these barricades in place. Some of the racists were already there, and when we demanded that the cops allow us to demonstrate on the Island Shores side of the boulevard, we were told we had to cross to the other side. The racists were allowed to remain, showing once again on whose side are the police.

Undeterred, we used a bullhorn and our voices to chant support to the migrants. The police then forced us to stop using the bullhorn. To show their "impartiality," they also stopped the racists from using theirs. We then formed a picket line and continued chanting vigorously and loudly. Before we left, members of Peace Action Staten Island, the Democratic Socialists of America, and the PLP made speeches, stressing  the need for antiracist worker unity. The Party members who spoke made it clear that the only solution to workers' problems worldwide is communist revolution.

Prior to the rally, some of the Peace Action members had leafleted at the College of Staten Island and in the Port Richmond neighborhood, which is populated by many immigrant workers. The rain may have had some effect on discouraging students and workers from those areas from coming to the demonstration. Our rally still had double the number of the racists, but about half of us were from outside Staten Island.  We distributed CHALLENGE there and continued to talk afterwards about our plan to build the Party and fight for communism.
The racists have a fairly well-organized core in the community, backed by most of the politicians on the Island.

They attack the immigrants, but they also attack Democratic NYC Mayor Adams, blaming him, Governor Hochul, President Biden, and "white liberals" in general for the immigrant problem and all the other ills facing the working class. Just as did the Nazis in the early days, these racists claim to represent the interests of blue collar workers. Their racism is dangerous to the entire working class. The Democratic Party politicians agree with them about limiting immigration, cutting back  benefits to the poor and other workers, and supporting a bigger military to prepare for war.

It does present an obvious danger, but even more dangerous to workers are the "white liberals" that the openly racist "Small Fascists" decry.

Biden and his cohorts represent the interests of the dominant "Big Fascist'' capitalists. It is their vicious exploitation of workers in Central and South America that has led to the desperate increased migration to the United States from those countries. As the workers struggle across the border, “Small Fascist” governors ship them to cities in the North. Once there, supposedly liberal politicians  crowd our fellow workers into unhealthy shelters, tent cities and even throw them onto the streets. The Democratic Party liberals have no plan to help the migrants and are happy to see the racists attack them and divide the working class.

In NYC, and especially Staten Island, the PLP  and its antiracist allies must continue to build a movement against the open racists. At the same time, we must struggle to show our friends and other workers and students that fighting racism within the system is not enough. We must smash capitalism to destroy racism. THE ONLY SOLUTION IS COMMUNIST REVOLUTION!

INGLEWOOD, CA, October 15—Over the last two days about 100 family and friends showed up for the services of our fallen working class brother Ivan Solis Mora. Ivan, who was suffering from a mental health episode (see CHALLENGE 10/18), was treated with bullets by kkkop instead of compassion and medical care. That’s kkkapitalism for you! Mental illness is a death sentence under a system that routinely treats sick and disabled workers as disposable.

Friday evening was the viewing followed by the morning mass and burial on Saturday.  At the viewing, a family member made green ribbons for us to wear to bring awareness to the growing mental health crisis, along with pins with Ivan’s picture. Surrounding his casket were floral arrangements, most with religious messages, and one shaped like a guitar. Petra, his mother, told us how much he loved playing his guitar and writing music. His actual guitar was also on display.  

Student and teachers organize for Ivan
In addition, there were four large foam poster boards in front of each easel with over 400 signatures of students and teachers from a PL’ers high school with the message, “a mental health crisis does not warrant a death sentence.” This activity was spearheaded by our comrade teacher who created an advisory lesson on what happened to Ivan. With the advisory lesson, all teachers in the school then taught their students about what happened to Ivan as part of a larger problem of police violence disproportionately impacting those with underlying mental illness. Afterward, students from the comrade’s after school club took the boards to every classroom and approximately 400 out of 600 students and teachers signed them. Later, the comrade visited the family to share the story and the messages from the school community. The family chose to display the boards right out front for all to see.  

While these two days were surely tearful and somber, they didn’t lead the family to pacifism.  Over the preceding two weeks the family led two actions that the Progressive Labor Party (PLP) participated in, including a rally and march to City Hall to confront the City Council and a second march from their home to the Inglewood police station.

On the day of the City Hall action, about 30 family members and friends showed up at a nearby intersection.People passing by, whether in cars or on foot, were very supportive, honking horns, stopping to talk about what happened. Groups of high school students walking home after school were particularly interested in learning about what had happened. As they began their march to City Hall, a comrade inspired others who were initially quiet at the rally, and led them in fight back chants as they entered.  

Liberal politicians response: crocodile tears and more dead-end reforms
The City’s head of security first told everyone that only five people could go into the meeting.  After some struggle, he allowed more of us in, but said “none of the protestors.”  So much for open government meetings and free speech under capitalism.  Not surprisingly, despite hearing from the family members, Council members could offer the family nothing more than the usual phony “thoughts and prayers.” There is another group that is also giving leadership in this struggle. One of their leaders is running for Los Angeles City Council.  

At this particular event, not only did he call for the typical tried-and-failed reforms like body cameras, but also invited the City Council to the family’s next action and had the cop-mayor take a photo with the family. There is a clear lack of understanding of the interconnectedness between the state and the police when this is the approach.  

Contrastingly, PLP understands that the entire ruling class and their police state are the enemy. Politics is everything in determining if we will one day end this system once and for all.Different Party members are getting to know members of the family independent of each other making home visits. One comrade had talked with Petra about us working on an article about Ivan for CHALLENGE, and today two other comrades visited the family and showed them the front-page article.Some groups “fight” police brutality by running for elections, but this only makes them part of the bosses’ state. The Progressive Labor Party instead calls on all workers, students, and soldiers to build the revolutionary communist PLP so that we can destroy their state and lead us into a communist world.

New York, NY, October 13—Thousands of workers and students gathered near Times Square and thousands more protested elsewhere in New York City to demand the end of Israeli bosses’ fascist occupation and genocide of Palestinians in Gaza and the West Bank. The righteous rage of the working class was potent as hundreds tore away from the sidewalk and took to the streets near Grand Central in an illegal march. Many workers took leadership by passionately leading chants with energy.

Multiracial and multigenerational protesters chanted “El pueblo unido jamás será vencido! (The people united will never be defeated), and Arabic chants. Several members of Progressive Labor Party (PLP) were in the crowd and we passed out at least a hundred copies of CHALLENGE. We also passed out flyers titled “War in Israel/Gaza means: Fight for the international working class, Join PLP.” One friend of the Party started up a sharper chant, “Biden you can’t hide, we charge you with genocide!”

PLP Fights to end all nationalism, Workers of the World Unite!
Nationalism is a deadly ideology that has unfortunately afflicted students, soldiers, our coworkers, and our friends’ understanding of the war. The most deadly side of the nationalist coin at the moment is Zionism. One Jewish education worker responded to an article about Palestinian civilian deaths by commenting that “Hamas started this, they’re a terrible group, terrorists.”

This misconstruction echoes the line of the U.S. ruling class and of Israeli bosses. It is imperialist rivalry and the United States’ funding of Israel’s fascist regime that is driving this war. While Hamas’ hands are certainly drenched in blood, their murders of workers do not add up to the genocidal nature of the U.S. imperialists or the Israeli bosses who kill far more with their bombings.

As fiercely as we must smash the Israeli bosses for their murderous 75-year reign of terror, genocidal occupation, and bombing of Gaza, we cannot replace the calls with another form of nationalism; we cannot support the Palestinian bosses by cheering on Hamas. Many Hamas leaders live in fancy apartments and hotel suites, funded by bosses in Iran and Syria, among other sources (algemeiner, 7/28/14).

Meanwhile, the average worker in Gaza lives in squalor, with little to no access to food, water or sanitation.  This form of all-class unity, that is, believing that Hamas will make a Palestine for the best interests of Palestinian workers, is a dead-end. The nationalism put on full display in these protests will not free workers in Palestine or around the world.

Protest organizers asked attendees to bring Palestinian flags, which coated the march, as protesters chanted “From the river to the sea, Palestine will be free,” and “Free, Free, Free Palestine.”

In perhaps the most obvious display of this irony, one worker led those chants while waving an American flag.
“I don’t see how anyone could take the Israeli side or support Hamas for that matter,” commented the spouse of a teacher we spoke with. Indeed, many workers have a difficulty understanding how the nationalism they don’t subscribe to could lead anyone to think killing working-class children from another “nation” is okay. PLP responds that internationalism and communism are the only answers to the scourge of nationalism in our class.

College students and workers speak out
This week, as the death toll climbed in Palestine/Israel, a group called Students for Justice in Palestine at New York University (NYU) organized a teach-in. On October 12th, they had student speakers and a professor discuss media manipulation of the ongoing genocide of Palestinians by the state of Israel.  A student filmmaker played a short film she made depicting her family’s story in Palestine, starting with her grandpa, whose land was taken from him during Nakba, until recently, when her family has been displaced and their homes taken away. The stories and experiences of the Palestinian students were incredibly moving and heartbreaking. There was also a clear message at the end of the teach-in, displaying the shared struggles that the international working class faces today and why it is even more important to unite.

That same day, Columbia University Students for Justice in Palestine hosted a rally on campus. In fear of workers’ anger, security locked the school gates to shut out support from the community and pro-Israeli counter protestors. Students have been demanding an end to Columbia’s investment of endowments in “Israeli companies that…profit off of the construction of illegal settlements on Palestinian land.”

Across the city pro-Israeli forces have been small and marginal in the streets. Of course, with the U.S. and Israeli states on their side, only the most brazen of these fascists show their faces at protests. Still, that didn’t stop one racist from yelling at Palestine supporters, “You are sick people, animals, you don’t deserve to be here.” Meanwhile, Jewish Voices for Peace NYC held a large protest on Friday reminding the working class that many Jewish workers and students are committed to ending genocide in Palestine even as they grieve the loss of their loved ones.

As countless more die in Palestine/Israel and racists pop up in the streets of New York, PLP students, workers, and friends will be out in force. We will wave the red flag of internationalism and communism, and share our ideas, as we struggle with our class siblings to fight back and fight together.

This fall has started off with a bang at our Bronx colleges as we started classes facing closed cafeterias on two of our campuses, canceled classes, crumbling infrastructure, broken elevators, and a myriad of other issues.
Progressive Labor Party (PLP) members are involved in many fightbacks on our campuses, including demanding fair wages for adjunct professors, supporting the struggle against the privatization of healthcare for retirees, and building solidarity with migrant workers and our working-class neighbors. We are involved in organizing fightbacks that bring students and faculty, staff together.

An attack on one is an attack on all!
“A victory for anyone of us is a victory for all of us.” An adjunct professor, who teaches at three different campuses, made this comment at a forum we organized last week, sponsored by Rank and File Action (RAFA) and the Bronx City University New York (CUNY) Action Committee. He made a number of points including that the intensification of capitalism was harming the ability of our working-class neighborhoods to secure decent housing, food, and medical care. Three retired municipal workers who have helped to lead the fightback against the privatization of medical care ( see CHALLENGE, 10/20/22) spoke eloquently about how racist Mayor Adams’ proposed change to retiree healthcare would lead to death of older workers. They explained how union leaders colluded with Adams to save the city almost $1 billion on the backs of these workers.

The purpose of the forum was really to educate ourselves about the struggle retirees have been waging, and to send the message that in fact this is the tip of the iceberg. If the city can do this to retired workers, what will stop them from trying to give healthcare on the cheap to those who are currently working?. The forum was attended by students, professors, union members, and the greater school community. The main takeaway was clear—be ready to be in this struggle for the working class for your whole life!

We must be in it to win it!
PLP members are active in our local union chapter as well as with students. We have a literature table where CHALLENGE is distributed and students stop by to talk. Most importantly, we are winning students to get active with us in various campaigns to meet with us, both in mass organizations and PLP study groups. We have seen how students are key to the struggle and that they are the ones who bear the brunt of CUNY’s racist austerity policies. Not surprisingly, they have played a key role in our struggles to get a working cafeteria open, to protest the lack of heat, and to stop early cancellation of classes.

We have also been involved with other union members in “observing”contract negotiation sessions. Along with RAFA members, we have forced union leadership to open the negotiating process to the members. While the point has been made that union members (and students) should be active participants, not observers,involvement in this process has given us the chance to talk with other union members about why, ultimately, nothing short of a strike could win us better working conditions and why capitalism will never provide us with the education our class needs. While “being at the table” with the CUNY administration is infuriating and eye opening, it gives us the chance to engage with others and make the point that the union’s strategy of trying to shame CUNY into offering us a better contract is a dead-end. CUNY’s racist bosses have no shame!  

Build the Progressive Labor Party
We have a lot of work to do as we continue to face the onslaught of racist austerity at CUNY, the lack of equity for part-time educators, and the reality that CUNY bosses plan to  continue to deny proper funding to students, staff, and faculty. As we face the war in the Middle East, we must step up our organizing with teach-ins and actions on the campus. We are already starting to have discussions about how Dominican and Haitian workers have been divided and the parallels to the Middle East situation.

We have a vibrant PLP Study Group, led by college students which meets regularly and analyzes and discusses both the historical foundations of our movement, along with looking at current events. We analyze the struggles we are involved in, look at how we can sharpen our understanding of the world and determine the best way to bring communist ideas into the reform movement. Our group is growing, to involve both college students and graduate students, and our Party’s ideas are so needed in these very dangerous times. We will continue to be in the reform campaigns, but always keep our eye on the ball that although this is the world we inherited, this capitalist nightmare is not the world we want to leave for generations to come!