The fight against mass deportation is part of
the fight against dictatorship!
Donald Trump is trying to burnish his reputation as a dictator by holding a flashy, expensive military parade in Washington, D.C., on the occasion of his birthday, June 14. But activists opposed to Trump’s celebration have organized their own demonstrations in defiance, renaming it NO KINGS DAY. It is a day to fight against right-wing authoritarian government and in particular the power grabs by Donald Trump and his reactionary crew.
Trump has shown he doesn’t respect any constitutional limits to his position. He violates laws at will and flouts court injunctions. Hatred for immigrants is a major support for MAGA ideology. He stokes bigotry, vilifies immigrants and minorities, seeks to make their life hell and brings the full force of the executive branch against them. Incensed by the large number of people who stand up in defense of immigrants, he uses a gamut of federal agencies to go after them, even to the point of arresting elected officials he says are “obstructing the law” (Trump’s laws, which multiply every day).
Lately Trump’s thugs in ICE have arrested and charged with obstruction a sitting judge, the mayor of Newark, a Congresswoman, and a Congressional staffer. Trump is now threatening to arrest the mayor of Los Angeles and the governor of California as he orders U.S. Marines into Los Angeles. And when a U.S. Senator from California, Alex Padilla, dared to ask a question of Homeland Security Secretary Kristi Noem, he was grabbed by her security guards, pushed to the ground, dragged out of the meeting room and handcuffed. Trump’s outrages show no limit. But the masses of working people are beginning to rise up against them.
Los Angeles: The masses stand up to Trump’s assault
The weekend of June 7-8 Donald Trump’s ICE thugs launched an attack on working class neighborhoods of Los Angeles. Supposedly looking for “criminals”, ICE goon squads went to businesses where poor immigrants are known to look for work and began rounding them up for deportation. But the word quickly spread among LA neighborhoods, and soon the ICE squads and their police protectors were surrounded by crowds chanting “Get out!” and “Abolish ICE!”
The ICE goons were backed up by other federal police agents – FBI, ATF, Border Patrol, etc. – and by local police departments – LA and neighboring cities and LA county sheriffs. They rode in armored personnel carriers and wore full battle regalia – helmets, shields, batons, armored vests, gas masks.
As usual, the ICE agents covered their shameless faces. When citizens demanded to know their names, badge numbers, or arrest warrants, the agents ignored them or attacked them. Asking for proper police procedure is now considered a crime of “obstructing federal agents.” The police force fired tear gas canisters and flash-bang grenades at the crowd. Then they fired supposedly less-than-lethal ammunition from their guns, pepper balls and rubber bullets, which can actually kill or seriously injure people.
Local political leaders – LA Mayor Bass and Calif. Governor Newsom – denounced the ICE raids as unnecessary provocations. But it was the local and state police firing tear gas and rubber bullets at the protesters. Of course, nothing satisfied Trump, who mobilized National Guard troops and Marines and sent them in to suppress the protests. Trump was clearly thirsting for blood to satisfy his MAGA supporters, and set on turning the military into his personal thugs.
Quotas for bodies
Given Trump’s white supremacist agenda, it was only a matter of time before he launched massive deportation raids. Now Trump has set a new goal of 3,000 arrests a day, aiming at one millions deportations a year. To achieve this, Trump’s officials are imposing quotas on their subordinates, demanding a certain number of bodies sent to foreign countries each week.
And the dragnet has been widened. Where Trump’s agents previously focused on immigrants with criminal records (though often making errors) or political stands, now they are snatching up ordinary workers without any criminal records. This has created a climate of fear in California’s Central Valley, where about half of the quarter-million agricultural workers are undocumented immigrants.
Trump’s anti-immigrant crusade has also disrupted the organizing work of immigrant support organizations and trade unions that concentrate in agriculture, construction, janitorial, etc. This is by plan.. Destroying unions is part of his push to destroy any opposition to his anti-worker policies including mass layoffs and eliminating worker rights at the workplace. Thus, one of the first persons arrested in the protests was David Huerta, a leading organizer for SEIU, who is well known for his work in support of a $15/hour wage for janitorial workers. Huerta’s arrest was protested locally and in some demonstrations in Seattle, Pennsylvania, and elsewhere. But while many union members are active in fighting deportations, the major unions are passive.
Nationwide struggle
The opposition to Trump is gathering steam nationally. Local demonstrations in support of Los Angeles have been held in numerous cities including New York, Chicago, Atlanta, Boston, San Francisco and Philadelphia. In Texas, local protests were held in Dallas and San Antonio even though Texas Gov. Abbot threatened to call out the National Guard against them. In Dallas, hundreds of protesters faced off with the police as they surrounded the federal building, defaced with graffiti denouncing ICE and Trump. The police attacked them with tear gas and pepper spray, but the protesters responded with rocks and bottles. In Seattle, 50 people marched around the federal building there. Hundreds marched in Providence, RI. And in Los Angeles, hundreds of people showed up for nighttime demonstrations, defying Mayor Bass’s curfew declaration
With his provocative raids, Trump was aiming to crush opposition to his crimes against the immigrants. With his use of the National Guard and the marines, he seeks to make the military into his enforcers. But his actions have shocked masses of working people, and protests against his dictatorial actions have grown in size across the country.
No kings -- down with Trump’s dictatorship!
Defend the immigrants and minorities!
Down with MAGA and white supremacy!
Detroit Workers’ Voice - #133 - June 14, 2025 - mail@communistvoice,org
No Kings Day
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Leaflet for No Kings Day - October 2025
To Detroit/Seattle Workers' Voice mailing list
October 18, 2025
Help build the movement against Trumpist tyranny!
(From Detroit Workers’ Voice #134, Oct 18, 2025)
No Kings Day comes again as the fight against Trumpism grows. Millions of demonstrators, scattered all over the US, will be coming out to denounce Trump’s plan to replace people’s rights with a bigoted state where MAGA is king.
All over the U.S., demonstrations will denounce the anti-democratic atrocities that Trump commits day after. He trying to suppress all opposition. He has found a new reason for cutting social programs — “they’re Democratic programs”. He has been sending troops all over the US to suppress opposition to his ICE thugs. And he has been arresting opponents and forcing companies and schools to purge their staff.
His plan is to consolidate power and build a one-party white supremacist state where everyone lives in fear and workers are supposed to live on his absurd claims about how prices are good and the economy is great again.
The government shutdown
This time No Kings Day actions take place during the shutdown of the federal government. The issue in the shutdown is whether Trump and the Republicans will let the subsidies for Obamacare health premiums lapse, forcing millions of people to give up health insurance. For now, the Senate Democrats won’t vote for a budget that doesn’t continue these subsidies. But more generally, the issue is whether Trump’s one-person rule will be allowed to do whatever it wants, moving closer and closer to outright authoritarianism.
This is an important struggle. It affects the welfare of millions of people. But while the Senate Democrats are fighting on this, they backed down earlier in the year in a previous budget fight. They are fighting now because they were lambasted by millions of people who were outraged that the Democrats gave in.
This shows that we can’t rely on the politicians. We must vote against the MAGA Republicans whenever we can. But even when we vote for Democrats we should have no illusion in them. It’s the great wave of anger from the millions of people, hurt by savage cutbacks in social programs or outraged by the savage campaign against immigrants, that has pushed the Democratic Party to fightback.
In fact, angry people haven’t waited for the politicians. They are the ones in the street protesting; they are the ones who are whistleblowers in government agencies; they are the ones who have booed Republican diehards at townhall meetings.
[*] More and more people have defiantly stood up in defiance of ICE’s attack on the immigrant communities and on non-white people. Even Trump’s utilization of the National Guard has not stopped this resistance.
[*] Networks have formed to preserve access to abortion pills.
[*] Workers have persisted in strikes and organizing despite the growing hostility of the federal government
[*] Researchers, scientists, librarians, medical personnel, teachers and others have resisted the book burnings, the destruction of scientific data on climate change and health issues, and the rewriting of history.
[*] The Palestinian solidarity movement has persisted in the face of arrests, deportations, purges of schools, etc.
On this and other fronts, the MAGA movement has met determined resistance.
These are variegated movements, drawn from different sections of the population, and with different viewpoints. To strengthen their staying power, we should strive to meld them into strains of the overall movement against tyranny and authoritarianism.
The labor movement
The Democrats vacillate because they represent one section of the capitalists while the Trumpists represent another. Both parties support market measures, seek the support of rich capitalists, and provide subsidies for corporations while always short of money for the people.
So it’s only working people who can wholeheartedly oppose the Trump offensive. The liberal capitalists have shown how flimsy their democratic words are, with many university presidents, rich lawyers, CEOs who pretended to support diversity, and others of the privileged conceding to Trump’s demands.
But the labor movement has faltered in representing the interests of the workers. Some unions have issued statements against Trumpism, or gone on strike despite difficult conditions. But on the whole the unions in the US are dominated by a class-collaborationist leadership. They have been passive on fighting Trumpist and xenophobic demagogy among their membership, and at best trail the Democratic Party and liberal capitalists. Some, such as Shawn Fain, head of the UAW, have gone out of their way to find something to support in Trump’s tariff war. And the Teamster leadership has covered itself with shame, as its head attended the Republican Convention before the election, while the Ohio Council of Teamsters has endorsed the ultra-Trumpist Vivek Ramaswamy for governor.
This shows that militant workers have to build up rank-and-file groups at the workplace and in unions in order to revitalize the union movement. Only in this way can the unions play a major role in the anti-Trump movement, rather than trailing the Democrats at best.
Prepare for a long struggle
Make no mistake. The fight against Trumpism, bigotry, and authoritariansim is going to be a protracted one. Whatever the result of the coming elections, the MAGA movement is not going away. Even when the Trumpists are defeated in an election, it doesn’t mean that the horrible things they have done will be reversed immediately.
But the Trumpists will never suppress the resistance to their tyranny. Millions of people will see life become harder, but they will also learn to organize better. It will be a long struggle, but millions of people will end up standing up for their rights <>
Slogans which were displayed in a box alongside the text:
No to white supremacy!
No to attacks on immigrants!
No to voter suppression!
No to illegalization of protest!
No to book burnings!
No to grinding poverty and starvation wages!
No to climate and science denialism!
No to fascism!
NO TO TRUMP! <>
Picture: No Kings Day in New York City, Oct. 18, 2025. https://www.reuters.com/resizer/v2/75EQ ... quality=80 .
PDF form of DWV #134 - https://www.communistvoice.org/DWV134.pdf
October 18, 2025
Help build the movement against Trumpist tyranny!
(From Detroit Workers’ Voice #134, Oct 18, 2025)
No Kings Day comes again as the fight against Trumpism grows. Millions of demonstrators, scattered all over the US, will be coming out to denounce Trump’s plan to replace people’s rights with a bigoted state where MAGA is king.
All over the U.S., demonstrations will denounce the anti-democratic atrocities that Trump commits day after. He trying to suppress all opposition. He has found a new reason for cutting social programs — “they’re Democratic programs”. He has been sending troops all over the US to suppress opposition to his ICE thugs. And he has been arresting opponents and forcing companies and schools to purge their staff.
His plan is to consolidate power and build a one-party white supremacist state where everyone lives in fear and workers are supposed to live on his absurd claims about how prices are good and the economy is great again.
The government shutdown
This time No Kings Day actions take place during the shutdown of the federal government. The issue in the shutdown is whether Trump and the Republicans will let the subsidies for Obamacare health premiums lapse, forcing millions of people to give up health insurance. For now, the Senate Democrats won’t vote for a budget that doesn’t continue these subsidies. But more generally, the issue is whether Trump’s one-person rule will be allowed to do whatever it wants, moving closer and closer to outright authoritarianism.
This is an important struggle. It affects the welfare of millions of people. But while the Senate Democrats are fighting on this, they backed down earlier in the year in a previous budget fight. They are fighting now because they were lambasted by millions of people who were outraged that the Democrats gave in.
This shows that we can’t rely on the politicians. We must vote against the MAGA Republicans whenever we can. But even when we vote for Democrats we should have no illusion in them. It’s the great wave of anger from the millions of people, hurt by savage cutbacks in social programs or outraged by the savage campaign against immigrants, that has pushed the Democratic Party to fightback.
In fact, angry people haven’t waited for the politicians. They are the ones in the street protesting; they are the ones who are whistleblowers in government agencies; they are the ones who have booed Republican diehards at townhall meetings.
[*] More and more people have defiantly stood up in defiance of ICE’s attack on the immigrant communities and on non-white people. Even Trump’s utilization of the National Guard has not stopped this resistance.
[*] Networks have formed to preserve access to abortion pills.
[*] Workers have persisted in strikes and organizing despite the growing hostility of the federal government
[*] Researchers, scientists, librarians, medical personnel, teachers and others have resisted the book burnings, the destruction of scientific data on climate change and health issues, and the rewriting of history.
[*] The Palestinian solidarity movement has persisted in the face of arrests, deportations, purges of schools, etc.
On this and other fronts, the MAGA movement has met determined resistance.
These are variegated movements, drawn from different sections of the population, and with different viewpoints. To strengthen their staying power, we should strive to meld them into strains of the overall movement against tyranny and authoritarianism.
The labor movement
The Democrats vacillate because they represent one section of the capitalists while the Trumpists represent another. Both parties support market measures, seek the support of rich capitalists, and provide subsidies for corporations while always short of money for the people.
So it’s only working people who can wholeheartedly oppose the Trump offensive. The liberal capitalists have shown how flimsy their democratic words are, with many university presidents, rich lawyers, CEOs who pretended to support diversity, and others of the privileged conceding to Trump’s demands.
But the labor movement has faltered in representing the interests of the workers. Some unions have issued statements against Trumpism, or gone on strike despite difficult conditions. But on the whole the unions in the US are dominated by a class-collaborationist leadership. They have been passive on fighting Trumpist and xenophobic demagogy among their membership, and at best trail the Democratic Party and liberal capitalists. Some, such as Shawn Fain, head of the UAW, have gone out of their way to find something to support in Trump’s tariff war. And the Teamster leadership has covered itself with shame, as its head attended the Republican Convention before the election, while the Ohio Council of Teamsters has endorsed the ultra-Trumpist Vivek Ramaswamy for governor.
This shows that militant workers have to build up rank-and-file groups at the workplace and in unions in order to revitalize the union movement. Only in this way can the unions play a major role in the anti-Trump movement, rather than trailing the Democrats at best.
Prepare for a long struggle
Make no mistake. The fight against Trumpism, bigotry, and authoritariansim is going to be a protracted one. Whatever the result of the coming elections, the MAGA movement is not going away. Even when the Trumpists are defeated in an election, it doesn’t mean that the horrible things they have done will be reversed immediately.
But the Trumpists will never suppress the resistance to their tyranny. Millions of people will see life become harder, but they will also learn to organize better. It will be a long struggle, but millions of people will end up standing up for their rights <>
Slogans which were displayed in a box alongside the text:
No to white supremacy!
No to attacks on immigrants!
No to voter suppression!
No to illegalization of protest!
No to book burnings!
No to grinding poverty and starvation wages!
No to climate and science denialism!
No to fascism!
NO TO TRUMP! <>
Picture: No Kings Day in New York City, Oct. 18, 2025. https://www.reuters.com/resizer/v2/75EQ ... quality=80 .
PDF form of DWV #134 - https://www.communistvoice.org/DWV134.pdf
Re: No Kings Day
Report on No Kings Day 2 in Detroit: This was a successful event held in Roosevelt Park, a large, flat area in front of the old train station (now being converted into a hi-tech research facility owned by Ford). A superficial guess would be six-to-ten thousand people were present. This would make it considerably larger than No Kings Day 1 last June. There was a festive atmosphere under perfect weather conditions. People engaged in political discussion and displayed a large variety of homemade signs, banners, and costumes. Leftist groups had a line of tables handing out free literature and candy and discussing their different programs. The area was swarming with petitioners gathering signatures for a variety of different proposals. One was for banning political contributions from utilities and corporations that do large amounts of business with the state or are regulated by the state. Another was for ranked-choice voting. Another was for a special high-income tax on the rich to help fund public schools. And there were others.
One notable negative about this event, compared to the first No Kings Day, was the lack of a centralized sound system. The previous No Kings Day was held in Clark Park, which has a concert bowl area where people could sit on the hillsides and listen to speeches and music. Nothing like it exists in Roosevelt Park. There was a sound system, and some voices could be heard speaking, but the sound just went up and away, over the heads of everyone. So I have no idea who spoke or what political ideas were expressed.
Among the literature I collected were these leaflets:
1) Peoples World (CPUSA) had a four-page leaflet about the struggle against a proposed new data center in Ypsilanti to be built by a consortium of the University of Michigan with Los Alamos National Laboratory. This struggle combines the usual NIMBY opposition to data centers (concern about water and utility rate hikes) with opposition to militaristic intelligence projects.
2) Spark leaflet on the economy: "Booming stock market and profits amidst worsening poverty and crisis". As usual, Spark concentrates on basic economic issues. They note that employment in manufacturing and construction have declined under Trump. And they say that in New York City, one in five students is homeless -- ! Can this be true?
3) WSWS leaflet is as usual sharply against the Democrats and labor bureaucrats. Their solution is to build rank-and-file committees of workers that come under international Trotskyist leadership.
I heard reports from other areas about this round of No Kings being larger than the first one. One man said that in Wyandotte the event was about twice the size of the previous one. From Warren, I heard that "many, many" people were lined up along Van Dyke Ave. between 14 Mile and 15 Mile Rds. with signs and banners, causing a traffic jam as drivers on Van Dyke stopped to gawk and blow their horns in support. From video, it appears the gathering in Ferndale was much larger than before.
I wouldn't say the politics were any stronger than before, though. There was little or no organized labor presence. There were lots and lots of signs making fun of Trump, but without much content, and also many signs simply focused on the Epstein files, as if that is the main problem with Trump and the issue that will bring him down (I talked with one man who told me exactly that).
Things may be sharper in other cities. Reportedly, there were 250,000 at a big rally and march in Chicago, where the focus was on Trump's invasion of the city with ICE and his attempted militarization. In New York, there was a separate "labor march" of organized union contingents that marched to the No Kings rally. DSA and JVP also joined this march. It seems odd that Detroit, with its labor history, could not muster any support from organized labor for No Kings. The state teachers union leaders speak against Trump's cutbacks to education but apparently are afraid to try and mobilize any action as long as the UAW leaders are in support of Trump's tariff wars.
One notable negative about this event, compared to the first No Kings Day, was the lack of a centralized sound system. The previous No Kings Day was held in Clark Park, which has a concert bowl area where people could sit on the hillsides and listen to speeches and music. Nothing like it exists in Roosevelt Park. There was a sound system, and some voices could be heard speaking, but the sound just went up and away, over the heads of everyone. So I have no idea who spoke or what political ideas were expressed.
Among the literature I collected were these leaflets:
1) Peoples World (CPUSA) had a four-page leaflet about the struggle against a proposed new data center in Ypsilanti to be built by a consortium of the University of Michigan with Los Alamos National Laboratory. This struggle combines the usual NIMBY opposition to data centers (concern about water and utility rate hikes) with opposition to militaristic intelligence projects.
2) Spark leaflet on the economy: "Booming stock market and profits amidst worsening poverty and crisis". As usual, Spark concentrates on basic economic issues. They note that employment in manufacturing and construction have declined under Trump. And they say that in New York City, one in five students is homeless -- ! Can this be true?
3) WSWS leaflet is as usual sharply against the Democrats and labor bureaucrats. Their solution is to build rank-and-file committees of workers that come under international Trotskyist leadership.
I heard reports from other areas about this round of No Kings being larger than the first one. One man said that in Wyandotte the event was about twice the size of the previous one. From Warren, I heard that "many, many" people were lined up along Van Dyke Ave. between 14 Mile and 15 Mile Rds. with signs and banners, causing a traffic jam as drivers on Van Dyke stopped to gawk and blow their horns in support. From video, it appears the gathering in Ferndale was much larger than before.
I wouldn't say the politics were any stronger than before, though. There was little or no organized labor presence. There were lots and lots of signs making fun of Trump, but without much content, and also many signs simply focused on the Epstein files, as if that is the main problem with Trump and the issue that will bring him down (I talked with one man who told me exactly that).
Things may be sharper in other cities. Reportedly, there were 250,000 at a big rally and march in Chicago, where the focus was on Trump's invasion of the city with ICE and his attempted militarization. In New York, there was a separate "labor march" of organized union contingents that marched to the No Kings rally. DSA and JVP also joined this march. It seems odd that Detroit, with its labor history, could not muster any support from organized labor for No Kings. The state teachers union leaders speak against Trump's cutbacks to education but apparently are afraid to try and mobilize any action as long as the UAW leaders are in support of Trump's tariff wars.
Re: No Kings Day
KING5 [the website for KING-TV, Seattle is in King County] said “The Seattle Police Department estimated the No Kings march stretched more than a mile long Saturday. Organizers with Seattle Indivisible reported preliminary counts of nearly 90,000 people taking part.” And this video, in which you can neither see the beginning nor end of the march, indicates that the 90,000 figure is reasonable.
https://www.facebook.com/frank.arango.2 ... 3BfvSqs3pl
So that's about 20,000 more people than turned out in July.
Large numbers of people wore keffiyhs, and a youthful and militant feeder march arrived from Capital Hill of around 1000 people—a wild guess. They had good chants and would wait in order to get a leaflet. But there were also large numbers wearing costumes and with politically non-serious signs, although they probably considered what they were doing serious.
I couldn't hear the speeches because I was located over a small hill 150 yards away. The left groups were buried in the huge crowd, but I did see one RCPer, a couple people from the group that wears communism on its sleeve, and WWP's Jim. Jim told me their leaflet (which he hadn't unpacked yet) attacked Indivisible, which he said is run by the Democrats, for not supporting the Palestinians.
https://www.facebook.com/frank.arango.2 ... 3BfvSqs3pl
So that's about 20,000 more people than turned out in July.
Large numbers of people wore keffiyhs, and a youthful and militant feeder march arrived from Capital Hill of around 1000 people—a wild guess. They had good chants and would wait in order to get a leaflet. But there were also large numbers wearing costumes and with politically non-serious signs, although they probably considered what they were doing serious.
I couldn't hear the speeches because I was located over a small hill 150 yards away. The left groups were buried in the huge crowd, but I did see one RCPer, a couple people from the group that wears communism on its sleeve, and WWP's Jim. Jim told me their leaflet (which he hadn't unpacked yet) attacked Indivisible, which he said is run by the Democrats, for not supporting the Palestinians.
Re: No Kings Day
Comment on Detroit No Kings Day, October 18, 2025
I attended the No Kings Day rally in Detroit today. I did not march in the march, as I have leg issues.
The crowd was very spirited and biting, and hilarious signs attacking Trumpism were on every shoulder. I helped distribute a leaflet (look for a post from Joseph Green here today, that I just put up).
I wish to comment on several issues of the rally.
First, if we, the anti-fascist movement, want to have any chance of stopping Trump, we'd better mobilize the working class. There were no unions visible to me there today. I and some retired (like me) co-postal workers brought a few people, and I saw one union brother with a t-shirt stating that Trump is a scab. Yes, he is, and worse, but the fact remains : organied labor was absent. We might better call it DIS-organized labor. The union leaderships have for the time being squashed much of the rebellious nature of the workers and are not mobilizing them to fight in the anti-Trump movement. This is disastrous, suicidal, as one of the tasks the Trumpists plan is the destruction of the unions,and the rebellious spirit of the workers. The unions, despite the present passivity, and despite all the cool-it-down actions of the labor leaders, are still places where the workers can get organized and fight, provided they resist the stranglehold of the leaderships. We must bring out the workers.
Another thing: I see some people on Facebook who claim to be on the left, who claim to be fighting for the workers and the oppressed, who say that No Kings Day is just a Democratic Party sham. This is wrong. I spent a long time there today, and last time, and the time before, and I have not yet seen a single sign openly calling for support of the Democratic Party. Yes, in the elections to come these youth and other masses will vote for the Dems, as they will have no other choice. But they are not agitating for the Democrats. That was not seen today at all. In fact, what these active and busy protesting folks are making is a huge and effective storm of criticism of the Trumpist s' fascism. They are denouncing Trump and his minions in nearly every possible way, not mainly on a class basis but for all his outragious violations of democracy. Is this not just? Are these young and old folks not deserving of defeating the Trump onslaught? If you think not, you are on Trump's side. Yes. these folks are influenced by the Democrats and no, that is not good, as the Dems will only sell them out. The Dems are also part of the ruling capitalist class in today's society. This is why everything they do is two-sided; their "fight" for democracy is weak, false, only exists at our prodding. That is how it is.
So what can we, the anti-fascists, do about this? We cannot just say, oh, the demo is a sham, it is just for the Dems. No! We need to participate in his upsurge against violations of democracy, help these folks to fight back and expose the Democrats to them as false fighters, not our real friends. We cannot be passive about this. These are our people; they do not belong to the Democratic party, even if some of them say so. They are not fighting for it; they are fighting for their rights, for our rights. We should support them, not throw them under the bus! If we don't do this and just abandon them to the Dems, the struggle will be either lost or very weakened. Agitate among the people for a real fight with Trump!
Finally, we need to bring the workers into the fight as much as possible. Most of us are actually workers but I did not see much consciousness of that in Detroit today. Our real potential power lies in the working class. It is the vast majority of the population and it can bring the society to a halt. A real, not fake but real, general strike would make our chances of victory over Trump be multiplied a thousandfold. Think about this. Next time we rally. let us bring workers and unions, or factions of unions, with us. Let us roll the union on. There is a union song which goes, we're gonna roll, we're gonna roll, we're gonna roll the union on.... and if the boss gets in the way we're gonna roll right over him, roll right over him, roll roll right over him! (Let's apply this to our fight toda!) We're gonna roll, we're gonna roll, we're gonnal roll the union on....
Just some thoughts for the day.
Solidarity!!!
Tim Hall
I attended the No Kings Day rally in Detroit today. I did not march in the march, as I have leg issues.
The crowd was very spirited and biting, and hilarious signs attacking Trumpism were on every shoulder. I helped distribute a leaflet (look for a post from Joseph Green here today, that I just put up).
I wish to comment on several issues of the rally.
First, if we, the anti-fascist movement, want to have any chance of stopping Trump, we'd better mobilize the working class. There were no unions visible to me there today. I and some retired (like me) co-postal workers brought a few people, and I saw one union brother with a t-shirt stating that Trump is a scab. Yes, he is, and worse, but the fact remains : organied labor was absent. We might better call it DIS-organized labor. The union leaderships have for the time being squashed much of the rebellious nature of the workers and are not mobilizing them to fight in the anti-Trump movement. This is disastrous, suicidal, as one of the tasks the Trumpists plan is the destruction of the unions,and the rebellious spirit of the workers. The unions, despite the present passivity, and despite all the cool-it-down actions of the labor leaders, are still places where the workers can get organized and fight, provided they resist the stranglehold of the leaderships. We must bring out the workers.
Another thing: I see some people on Facebook who claim to be on the left, who claim to be fighting for the workers and the oppressed, who say that No Kings Day is just a Democratic Party sham. This is wrong. I spent a long time there today, and last time, and the time before, and I have not yet seen a single sign openly calling for support of the Democratic Party. Yes, in the elections to come these youth and other masses will vote for the Dems, as they will have no other choice. But they are not agitating for the Democrats. That was not seen today at all. In fact, what these active and busy protesting folks are making is a huge and effective storm of criticism of the Trumpist s' fascism. They are denouncing Trump and his minions in nearly every possible way, not mainly on a class basis but for all his outragious violations of democracy. Is this not just? Are these young and old folks not deserving of defeating the Trump onslaught? If you think not, you are on Trump's side. Yes. these folks are influenced by the Democrats and no, that is not good, as the Dems will only sell them out. The Dems are also part of the ruling capitalist class in today's society. This is why everything they do is two-sided; their "fight" for democracy is weak, false, only exists at our prodding. That is how it is.
So what can we, the anti-fascists, do about this? We cannot just say, oh, the demo is a sham, it is just for the Dems. No! We need to participate in his upsurge against violations of democracy, help these folks to fight back and expose the Democrats to them as false fighters, not our real friends. We cannot be passive about this. These are our people; they do not belong to the Democratic party, even if some of them say so. They are not fighting for it; they are fighting for their rights, for our rights. We should support them, not throw them under the bus! If we don't do this and just abandon them to the Dems, the struggle will be either lost or very weakened. Agitate among the people for a real fight with Trump!
Finally, we need to bring the workers into the fight as much as possible. Most of us are actually workers but I did not see much consciousness of that in Detroit today. Our real potential power lies in the working class. It is the vast majority of the population and it can bring the society to a halt. A real, not fake but real, general strike would make our chances of victory over Trump be multiplied a thousandfold. Think about this. Next time we rally. let us bring workers and unions, or factions of unions, with us. Let us roll the union on. There is a union song which goes, we're gonna roll, we're gonna roll, we're gonna roll the union on.... and if the boss gets in the way we're gonna roll right over him, roll right over him, roll roll right over him! (Let's apply this to our fight toda!) We're gonna roll, we're gonna roll, we're gonnal roll the union on....
Just some thoughts for the day.
Solidarity!!!
Tim Hall
Scabbing on the movement
With friends like these, who needs enemies?
Following the No Kings I and II demonstrations, there has been much discussion of what is the way forward? These mass demonstrations have proven that there is widespread hatred of the Trump administration. Millions of people in the U.S. have seen the importance of loudly proclaiming their opposition to Trump's tyrannical ways. It isn't just a few "antifas", as Trump calls them, and it isn't restricted to Democratic Party diehards or to those in the big cities of the Northeast. The sentiment is widespread in small towns as well, in rural areas of the South, the Sunbelt and the West. But now the question is, how do we strengthen this movement, to make it more united and more capable of change -- that is, more capable of forcing the Trump administration out and reversing the drift to neofascism?
Some commentators have called for DEMANDS as the magic bullet that will unite the movement and strengthen it. But immediately different groups and individuals issue their own set of demands. They run the gamut of economic and political wish-lists, and mainly what they reveal is that the movement is not all that united. All kinds of social trends are present in the anti-Trump movement, and there's no need for them all to be forced into the same Procrustean bed. Even worse, some of these proposed "demands" are unrealistic whistles in the dark that have nothing to do with present-day politics.
Some commentators have tried to address the question of organization first, by calling for trade union leaders to step forward and lead. It is important for working class issues to be brought to the fore, and for workers to participate as a class force. And some union leaders have made statements in support of the movement,Wo and some have even organized contingents for No Kings. But for the most part, they are missing in action. Worse yet, some, like the Teamsters president, have taken to dancing attendance on Trump and the Republicans. Another recent example is the scab statement put out by Everett Kelley, president of the American Federation of Government Employees, urging Democrats to give up their stand against Trump's savage budget cuts to food and health care benefits.
The AFGE is a union of federal government employees with 800,000 members. They have been hit hard by Trump's cutbacks to government programs. And right now their members are suffering due to the government shutdown, many of them working without pay as long as the shutdown lasts. But Kelley, in a statement released on AFGE's website on October 27, ignores all the issues in the shutdown and simply calls for it to end without any kind of positive resolution. But the Republicans' budget, as it stands, eliminates federal subsidies for those receiving health insurance through the Affordable Care Act, which will mean making insurance unaffordable for millions of people. Democrats in Congress have finally made a stand against Trump on this issue, refusing to endorse the Republican budget unless the subsidies are restored.
This is an important issue that affects millions of working and poor people. But Kelley's statement ignores this, dismissing it as "partisan politics." He says this is just fooling around and that the Democrats have now "made their point", so it's time for them to agree to a "clean CR (continuing resolution)" to reopen the government. Kelley never mentions the Trump or the Republicans, their trampling over the normal budget process or their refusal to negotiate anything about the health care subsidies.
Kelley's justification for this kowtowing to Trump is that many AFGE members are now, during the shutdown, being forced to work without pay, and this is an intolerable burden. Yes, it is a burden, but he never considers the burden of going without health insurance for millions of people. The government employees now working without pay will eventually be paid, when the shutdown ends, while people who lose their ACA health care insurance may never get it back. Of course, it never occurs to Kelley that if working without pay is such a burden, why not call a strike? Why put up with such a nonsensical requirement? It's not as if Trump could force them back to work; if TSA employees and air traffic controllers walked out, the nation's airlines would immediately be grounded.
There are other alternatives as well. Trump has been scrounging around and finding the funds to pay members of the military; so why not pay other government employees as well? If it's an emergency for the military, why not an emergency for TSA and CDC employees? The burden Trump is imposing on civilian government employees is another example of his intransigence, his refusal to negotiate and his determination to make the working class pay for his tax cuts for the billionaires. Various compromise measures have been proposed during the shutdown, for example to continue paying SNAP food stamp benefits, but Trump has so far refused any.
Kelley's statement is a perfect example of the traitorous nature of a good section of the trade union bureaucracy. They whine and moan about how oppressed their poor members are and how they deserve a raise of a few cents an hour. But when it comes to facing up to major issues facing the working class, they're absent without leave. Workers in trade unions should make organizing the rank and file a priority and do what they can to change the course of union politics. But organizing the working class does not begin or end with winning over the trade union bureaucrats. The vast, vast majority of workers are outside of unions anyway, and that includes many who are already active in anti-Trump politics.
Following the No Kings I and II demonstrations, there has been much discussion of what is the way forward? These mass demonstrations have proven that there is widespread hatred of the Trump administration. Millions of people in the U.S. have seen the importance of loudly proclaiming their opposition to Trump's tyrannical ways. It isn't just a few "antifas", as Trump calls them, and it isn't restricted to Democratic Party diehards or to those in the big cities of the Northeast. The sentiment is widespread in small towns as well, in rural areas of the South, the Sunbelt and the West. But now the question is, how do we strengthen this movement, to make it more united and more capable of change -- that is, more capable of forcing the Trump administration out and reversing the drift to neofascism?
Some commentators have called for DEMANDS as the magic bullet that will unite the movement and strengthen it. But immediately different groups and individuals issue their own set of demands. They run the gamut of economic and political wish-lists, and mainly what they reveal is that the movement is not all that united. All kinds of social trends are present in the anti-Trump movement, and there's no need for them all to be forced into the same Procrustean bed. Even worse, some of these proposed "demands" are unrealistic whistles in the dark that have nothing to do with present-day politics.
Some commentators have tried to address the question of organization first, by calling for trade union leaders to step forward and lead. It is important for working class issues to be brought to the fore, and for workers to participate as a class force. And some union leaders have made statements in support of the movement,Wo and some have even organized contingents for No Kings. But for the most part, they are missing in action. Worse yet, some, like the Teamsters president, have taken to dancing attendance on Trump and the Republicans. Another recent example is the scab statement put out by Everett Kelley, president of the American Federation of Government Employees, urging Democrats to give up their stand against Trump's savage budget cuts to food and health care benefits.
The AFGE is a union of federal government employees with 800,000 members. They have been hit hard by Trump's cutbacks to government programs. And right now their members are suffering due to the government shutdown, many of them working without pay as long as the shutdown lasts. But Kelley, in a statement released on AFGE's website on October 27, ignores all the issues in the shutdown and simply calls for it to end without any kind of positive resolution. But the Republicans' budget, as it stands, eliminates federal subsidies for those receiving health insurance through the Affordable Care Act, which will mean making insurance unaffordable for millions of people. Democrats in Congress have finally made a stand against Trump on this issue, refusing to endorse the Republican budget unless the subsidies are restored.
This is an important issue that affects millions of working and poor people. But Kelley's statement ignores this, dismissing it as "partisan politics." He says this is just fooling around and that the Democrats have now "made their point", so it's time for them to agree to a "clean CR (continuing resolution)" to reopen the government. Kelley never mentions the Trump or the Republicans, their trampling over the normal budget process or their refusal to negotiate anything about the health care subsidies.
Kelley's justification for this kowtowing to Trump is that many AFGE members are now, during the shutdown, being forced to work without pay, and this is an intolerable burden. Yes, it is a burden, but he never considers the burden of going without health insurance for millions of people. The government employees now working without pay will eventually be paid, when the shutdown ends, while people who lose their ACA health care insurance may never get it back. Of course, it never occurs to Kelley that if working without pay is such a burden, why not call a strike? Why put up with such a nonsensical requirement? It's not as if Trump could force them back to work; if TSA employees and air traffic controllers walked out, the nation's airlines would immediately be grounded.
There are other alternatives as well. Trump has been scrounging around and finding the funds to pay members of the military; so why not pay other government employees as well? If it's an emergency for the military, why not an emergency for TSA and CDC employees? The burden Trump is imposing on civilian government employees is another example of his intransigence, his refusal to negotiate and his determination to make the working class pay for his tax cuts for the billionaires. Various compromise measures have been proposed during the shutdown, for example to continue paying SNAP food stamp benefits, but Trump has so far refused any.
Kelley's statement is a perfect example of the traitorous nature of a good section of the trade union bureaucracy. They whine and moan about how oppressed their poor members are and how they deserve a raise of a few cents an hour. But when it comes to facing up to major issues facing the working class, they're absent without leave. Workers in trade unions should make organizing the rank and file a priority and do what they can to change the course of union politics. But organizing the working class does not begin or end with winning over the trade union bureaucrats. The vast, vast majority of workers are outside of unions anyway, and that includes many who are already active in anti-Trump politics.