BRIDGEWATER, NJ, June 25 — The Progressive Labor Party organized 70 militant protesters to shut down the recruitment meeting of the United Patriots of America (UPA), a racist, fascist organization that — under the guise of "Homeland Security" — blames immigrants for U.S. economic woes and equates undocumented immigrants with "terrorists."
While anti-racists chanted and marched with banners outside, ten people including PLP’ers, infiltrated inside and completely disrupted the meeting, stunning the fascists.
The UPA — affiliated with the infamous "Minutemen Project" that places armed vigilantes at the Arizona border — advocates closing all U.S. borders to "illegal aliens," enforcing English as the only language spoken, supporting fascist educational policies of "traditionally American curriculum" and monitoring the activities of "liberal" or "left" teachers.
Outside the arena, the police, working as tools of the ruling class to protect the racist UPA, descended on the group of approximately 60 chanting protestors to force them from the Sports Arena property. Defying police commands, two PLP members were arrested while the rest of the group was aggressively pushed and prodded to the road below. But the cops’ intimidation only motivated us more to continue demonstrating.
Meanwhile, inside the 10 anti-racists, including PLP members, raised hell. Initially posing as "supportive and interested" persons, they responded to a leadership signal during Minutemen Ed Whitbred’s speech to about 35 listeners, standing up and unfurling two huge banners while chanting, "SMASH RACIST DEPORTATIONS! WORKING PEOPLE HAVE NO NATION!" As they militantly marched to the front, the cops and attendees were frozen in shock while Whitbred dashed from the podium. Action proceeded quickly: the microphone cord was ripped from its socket, a comrade moved to the front to belt out a speech, and local police and the County SWAT team quickly filled the room. The PL speaker was arrested as the rest of the group was pushed out the door and down the stairs. A brutal attack on the staircase by the Somerset County SWAT team — armed to the teeth in full riot gear — left one member with a broken shoulder. He was subsequently arrested on false allegations of simple "assault."
The remaining eight infiltrators emerged from the building chanting just as the 60 protestors were marching back up the grassy hill. They joined forces in the Sports Arena lot.
The youth led the day, both outside and inside, showing great determination, courage, discipline and commitment. This leadership bodes well for the future of our Party.
The effective disruption of the UPA meeting was only made possible by the unending leadership and organizing efforts of every PLP member present — just as it will take the unending leadership and organization of the entire working class to successfully fight for the end of racism, of artificial borders, of fascist police control and of capitalism itself. This event marks one more step forward for PLP and the international working class.
We will fight these charges and the fascist police attacks on our comrades, in the courts, in our mass organizations and on the streets. We will raise money from our friends and will recruit more members to PLP, to bring closer the day when the bosses, their homeland security police state and their gutter racist supporters will be a forgotten chapter in history.
Borders are a bosses’ creation to mark their nation-states. They use nationalism and patriotism to portray workers who live outside these borders as "foreigners" or "aliens." However, when it suits them, the rulers ignore these borders, always searching for the cheapest labor, no matter its origin. Imperialism requires that capital be exported outside the "home country." And bosses’ wars send one side’s armed forces to invade the "territory" of the other side.
The working class is one class, worldwide, with one class interest — to seize the world away from the profiteers who run it now and to make communist revolution all over.
UPA publicly calls for "border control" and mass deportations. They want to spread the "Minuteman Project," enlisting vigilante "volunteers." They falsely portray themselves as the voice of "middle America" and "the forgotten little guy." But behind the UPA is an openly fascist anti-immigrant ideology, decrying "the loss of American culture and values" resulting from a "foreign invasion." Their platform dovetails with the rulers’ current push to win a mass base for a Homeland Security police state. UPA and others like them are potential foot soldiers for U.S. fascism.
Borders are a bosses’ creation to mark their nation-states. They use nationalism and patriotism to portray workers who live outside these borders as "foreigners" or "aliens." However, when it suits them, the rulers ignore these borders, always searching for the cheapest labor, no matter its origin. Imperialism requires that capital be exported outside the "home country." And bosses’ wars send one side’s armed forces to invade the "territory" of the other side.
The working class is one class, worldwide, with one class interest — to seize the world away from the profiteers who run it now and to make communist revolution all over.
UPA publicly calls for "border control" and mass deportations. They want to spread the "Minuteman Project," enlisting vigilante "volunteers." They falsely portray themselves as the voice of "middle America" and "the forgotten little guy." But behind the UPA is an openly fascist anti-immigrant ideology, decrying "the loss of American culture and values" resulting from a "foreign invasion." Their platform dovetails with the rulers’ current push to win a mass base for a Homeland Security police state. UPA and others like them are potential foot soldiers for U.S. fascism.
YORKTOWN, VA., June 25 — With militant chants, powerful signs and the only speeches with political content, a group of PLP’ers gave communist leadership today to protesters demonstrating against a rally of a new Nazi-KKK coalition. The racists chose the historic battlefield where the U.S. War for Independance ended to promote their goal of ridding the U.S. of Jews. "Just as Washington kicked out the British, so shall we kick out the Jews" was their Hitlerian motto. The Nazis and their supporters, numbering less than 90, were protected by police barricades keeping protesters — Progressive Labor Party militants, anti-racist anarchists and supporters of U.S.-Israeli nationalism — more than a football-field-distance away.
PLP comrades, young and old, truly challenged these fascists with our political speeches, offering our bullhorn to fellow anti-racists who were dissatisfied with the religious pacifists and partisan nationalists. We chanted "I don’t know but I’ve been told, These Nazis getting way too bold, Time to put them in their place, Kick a Nazi in the face!" and "Death, death, death to the Nazis, Power, power, power to the workers!" We held signs like, "The Progressive Labor Party, kicking Nazi ass since 1962" and "Which pig is which?" with a pig dressed in a combination Klan/police uniform.
Amnesty International members from Norfolk attended the rally, and discussed our chants and speeches with us. All bought CHALLENGE. PL also had a contingent at the rally exit, distributing the paper to all who passed, while chatting about revolutionary politics.
The cops searched everyone with metal-detectors, filming and photographing only the protesters, for future attacks on anti-racist radicals. One cop being told, "You got your gun and your nightstick, but where’s your noose?" responded, "In my car." One young comrade explained how cops never break down big corporations’ doors to fight for workers’ interests, but are always there to protect the bosses and break strikes. We also linked police brutality to the courts’ compliance with racist cops.
Almost 30 media people sat in the front row for 90 minutes listening to the racist group’s fascist ranting, before recording five minutes of token footage of the anti-racists’ action. Thus, the police and the media provided direct auxiliary support for these racist terrorists. Our chant, "The cops, the courts, the nazis and the Klan, all a part of the bosses’ plan," pointed out these ruling-class connections.
PL youth and supporters had a sign-making party preparing for the rally, discussing how PLP militantly disrupted past rallies. The most disturbing moment was dissecting the Nazis’ National Socialist Movement ideology, explaining how advocating the mythical superiority of some workers over others can be twisted into a barbaric capitalist war machine.
Communists show that all workers deserve sustenance and should use their abilities in the interests of the working class as a whole. In response to the pacifists and other-worldly mystics, communist revolutionary love of human-kind will prevail over the fear of oppression and over the capitalist oppressors themselves.
CHICAGO, July 2 — Today more than 10,000 workers, students and youth marched for immigrant rights on the Southwest Side. PLP distributed 1,100 CHALLENGE-DESAFIOS and 1,000 leaflets in under an hour. Many responded enthusiastically to our anti-racist line, helping us distribute literature and listening eagerly to what we had to say. Many joined our chanting, "Este puño si se ve, los obreros al poder" ("This fist you see means the workers are coming to power"). Workers selflessly donated hundreds of dollars for PLP comrades arrested in New Jersey (see front page) while protesting the racist Minutemen.
Several Spanish radio hosts organized the march, responding to a local Latin woman who invited the Minutemen to speak here. The March leadership was incredibly nationalist and opportunist. Many workers and youth waved Mexican and U.S. flags, chanting, "Viva Mexico!" We struggled against these classless ideas, pointing out that the bosses manufacture national borders to divide us. We chanted, "Stop Racist Deportations, Working People Have No Nation!" and "La Lucha Obrera, No Tienen Frontera!" ("The Workers’ Fight Has No Borders!"). Workers enthusiastically joined us, taking up our internationalist line. A young woman comrade made a speech in Spanish explaining the role of groups like the Minutemen, how nationalism divides the working class and how all workers are exploited under capitalism.
A close friend of the Party said, "I couldn’t believe the response of the workers to the Party. People just came up to me and took CHALLENGES right out of my hands." She saw how welcoming the working class could be to the Party in action. She got out 50 CHALLENGES "accidentally." When asked, she said that all the people who got the paper came up and asked her for it
Newer comrades took most of the leadership throughout the march, leading chants, making speeches and other decisions. Self-critically, we collectively felt that we could have given more effective political leadership with more people, especially Spanish speakers, with more literature, and with better political preparation. This event brought more of our friends closer to the Party and inspired one young woman to want to become more of a leader as a communist and a Party member.
The politicians and clergy, who attacked us for spreading communist ideas, cannot and will not lead workers to smash racism. All these tricksters will lead us down the dead-end road of reformism. Our experience today shows that we should have confidence the workers will see through their lies. Communist leadership will lead the struggles against racism towards communist revolution and a world without borders.
BALDWIN PARK, CA., June 25 — About 800 workers and students protested a rally by anti-immigrant racists called "Save Our State" and the Minutemen. These racists were demonstrating at a monument that says, "These were Indian lands, then they were Mexican…and they will be again." The racists alleged this would bring an "invasion of immigrants."
Hundreds of the anti-racist protesters and Baldwin Park residents enthusiastically received PLP leaflets and CHALLENGES, contrasting with the liberal and nationalist politics of other groups there. We exposed the Minutemen as being part of a long history of attacks on immigrants to divide the working class. We also showed how the liberal Dream Act and the McCain-Kennedy Bill are ploys to induce immigrant youth to fight and die in the bosses’ war in Iraq.
The PLP helped organize a neighborhood march of over 100 people, trying to get to the racists, who were protected by over 200 cops armed to the teeth. At one corner the police formed a line to stop the marchers. As they called in reinforcements, several youth gave speeches attacking racism, the war in Iraq, and bosses’ borders and calling for communism.
After demonstrating in front of the cops, they joined the main group of protesters at a cultural event to try to get to the racists via another route. On the busy street, their chants rang out: "La clase obrera no tine frontera" ("The working class has no borders"); "The workers, united, will never be defeated"; "The cops, the courts, the Minuteman, all are part of the bosses’ plan." Many drivers honked in support while others joined the march.
Many protesters re-grouped with others closer to the racists, but hundreds of cops protected them. Still, the crowd took up chants like, "SOS, Policia — la misma porqueria" ("SOS, Police — the same crap"), contrasting with those only saying "SOS — go home." When the cops tried to clear demonstrators from the street to let the racists through, the anti-racists refused to leave.
While this was very positive, the main gain was the political struggle waged in schools and factories to bring friends to this action. The anti-racist fight is part of the long-range struggle for working-class unity and the building of a revolutionary movement for communism, which will bury all the racists and the system that created them