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The Freedom Road Socialist Organization calls on working and oppressed peoples to celebrate May 1st, International Workers Day.
On this May Day, we will show that the revolutionary spirit of the working class is alive and well in 2024. Unions are waging fierce battles and reviving the strike. Chicanos and Latinos are mobilizing and steeling themselves against escalated militarization at the U.S.-Mexico border. The people of Palestine are shaking off the chains of U.S. imperialism and leading a heroic resistance that will set their people free. Revolution is in the air, and the masses of workers and oppressed peoples are on the move.
A DAY FOR WORKERS
Following the police attack on the rally in Chicago’s Haymarket Square, in May 1886, five revolutionaries were executed by the capitalist class after a major general strike for an eight-hour work day. Today, from auto workers to delivery drivers to flight attendants, rank-and-file workers are taking charge of the labor movement and bringing fighting tactics back to their unions. Last summer, a looming Teamsters strike and a series of practice pickets forced United Parcel Service to make major concessions. Last fall, the United Autoworkers took the auto industry by storm when workers led a national “stand-up” strike against the Big Three – Ford, General Motors, and Stellantis, the monopoly auto manufacturers. The strike lasted 44 days and won many gains, not only in the form of raises but also improved working conditions. This spring has already seen a flurry of strike votes pass among members of the Association of Flight Attendants, with contracts set to expire this year for up to 80,000 workers.
More and more, workers are taking the fight to their bosses and refusing to back down. Class struggle-oriented leaders are emerging among them. This May Day, we must take every opportunity to fan the flames.
“A DAY WITHOUT IMMIGRANTS”
For decades, large May Day protests were a rarity. That changed in 2006, when Wisconsin Senator Sensenbrenner pushed legislation to criminalize millions of undocumented immigrants and was met with a watershed response. Millions of people from the Chicano, Mexicano and Central American communities marched; protesters shut down the city of Los Angeles. The “day without immigrants” megamarches brought new life to May Day and demonstrated the power of Chicanos, Mexicanos, Latinos and all who stood with them.
We expect more anti-immigrant attacks this year. Trump worsened conditions in detention centers and heightened restrictions on immigration, and Biden continues these policies. Now Greg Abbott, the governor of Texas, has lined the Rio Grande with razor buoys and deployed the Texas National Guard to brutalize immigrants and refugees at the U.S.-Mexico border in Eagle Pass. Despite this, Chicanos and Latinos are mobilizing to resist these attacks. We must take up this call to defend immigrant and refugees’ rights, and call for the legalization of all undocumented immigrants.
A SYSTEM BEYOND REFORM
In a time of change, at least two things are for sure: there are many fights ahead of us, and more people by the day are realizing that capitalism cannot be reformed and must be smashed.
We don’t need to look further than the upcoming presidential election to see this. On one hand, Trump’s platform is built on increasing deportations, expanding militarization of the U.S.-Mexico border, and even reversing the 14th Amendment. On the other hand, Biden is bankrolling a genocide in Gaza, as the Israeli occupation starves, bombs and massacres the people of Palestine. The growing numbers of uncommitted voters shows that the masses’ anger at continued U.S. aid to Israel has the power to decide the elections. The capitalist class is in disarray.
Meanwhile, the people’s movements are on the rise. Plans to march in great numbers on both the Republican National Convention and the Democratic National Convention this summer are in full swing. Even as the Supreme Court overturned Roe v. Wade and rolled back the right to an abortion, women’s rights and reproductive rights, protesters pushed back at every turn and formed new organizations.
The people of Palestine are showing the way forward. The brave resistance and sacrifices of workers, farmers, students, doctors and parents weigh more than billions of U.S. dollars’ worth of bombs, fighter jets, and chemical weapons. And in the U.S., hundreds of thousands of people have been marching since October to end U.S. aid to Israel. We must keep on marching until not a penny more is used to fund the Israeli occupation and until Palestine is a free, united state, from the Jordan River to the Mediterranean Sea.
Important organizations in the Black liberation movement, such as the National Alliance Against Racist and Political Repression, continue the fight for justice for the families of victims of police crimes and community control of the police. The flame sparked by the Justice for George Floyd rebellion in 2020 has never gone out. It is critical for the working class to support this cause, and we must actively build this alliance. Fighting the national oppression of Black Americans, Chicanos, Latinos, and other oppressed nationalities is decisive for defeating our shared enemy: the billionaires who sit on Wall Street and are the architects of U.S. imperialism.
LET’S BUILD A PARTY
Our mission is clear: we must unite all who can be united against the monopoly capitalists of the U.S. and turn our movements into a tide that will sweep them away. We need to replace their system with socialism, one where the working class is in power and which serves the people. Every struggle we wage, whether for immigrant rights or for a stronger contract at our workplace, can become a lesson for the people to learn how to unite, fight and win. We can win better conditions, raise political consciousness, and fuse socialist theory with these movements. To do that, on May Day, we must mobilize the labor movement and the immigrant rights movement, identify the fighters of those movements.
This year, we will honor the Haymarket Martyrs and continue our work to build a new communist party, put the working class in power, build a united front against Wall Street, and turn this whole system upside down. The working class is the class of the future. We have nothing to lose but our chains!
We will host marches, demonstrations, and programs in cities across the US.
Click here for a list of local May Day events.
