The Partisan is publishing brief reports on the work of the revolutionary movement in the United States as part of our column Our Movement In Review. Because it would be impractical and overwhelming to cover every single thing being done nationally by comrades in a month, due to the number of areas and organizations involved, we will be highlighting only a select few illustrative campaigns and reports that help represent the powerful and growing wave of revolutionary mass work and class struggle being carried in cities and towns around the country. As always, if you have any suggestions, questions, or criticisms please reach out to us at classpartisan@proton.me!
NLOC Announces Program of Struggle
The New Labor Organizing Committee (NLOC) announced that their constituent shop organizations and workers circles have united around a new draft program of struggle that will guide their work in the current period. The program, which contains seven sections, can be read on the New Labor Press website and questions, comments, criticisms and suggestions can be directed to the New Labor Organizing Committee national leadership at newlaboroc@proton.me.
The Crusader Re-launches With New Edition
The Crusader, a theoretical organ dedicated to outlining a revolutionary path for the New Afrikan/Black national liberation movement, relaunched this July with a brand new quarterly magazine format. The new edition contained sections on theory, history, and culture, and focused on the Comintern Resolutions of 1928 and 1930 on the Black National Question in the United States, and their continued relevance for our contemporary revolutionary movement. It can be read on the The Crusader website by clicking here.
Workers Mobilize and Organize Around Demand Letters
Class-conscious workers affiliated with NLOC have been organizing their shops and workplaces around demand letters as part of a broader campaign of mobilization, politicization and organization lead by NLOC among the multinational working class. As one example of this trend, in Charlotte, North Carolina, a group of United States Postal Service in-plant workers from one of the highest volume USPS processing plants in the entire Southeast, delivered a demand letter signed by nearly twenty workers to management. The petition demanded an end to last-minute forced overtime and excessively late scheduling. The workers reported that management used the state union system to claim that it is within their right according to the current sell-out contract signed by the National Postal Mail Handlers Union to mandate overtime at anytime to mail handler assistants, but that due to the pressure campaign, they would review the demands presented by the workers.
Neighborhood Organizations Conduct Summer Campaigns
Popular neighborhood and community defense organizations have been ramping up their activity this summer.
People’s Defense D.C. organized an initial mass meeting in July, spending the month on outreach in the community. Given the extreme and ongoing gentrification of D.C.’s remaining working-class neighborhoods, community members from a variety of backgrounds showed up in force to discuss the best way to tackle their issues. Many longtime residents expressed how a sharp increase in rental prices correlated with a sharp drop in conditions and attention from landlords.
People’s Defense Oklahoma City spent the month of July with a SICA program. This SICA work has shown that the neighborhood has a diverse population that exceeds what official data indicates. Gentrification and general price increases have heavily affected Oklahoma City’s communities, with a local overnight home also being singled out as a “problem” within the neighborhood for supposedly being the source for the growing homeless population. People’s Defense Oklahoma City is also working to help a working-class Spanish speaking family that had been scammed into a $45,000 debt by a predatory solar panel company.
PDC organizations have also been organizing events and actions related to the struggle against State/police repression, particularly against the multinational working class in the United States. Borikén Liberation Front – Chicago held two successive protests as part of their ongoing Justice for Nate Fejerang campaign. The release of the police bodycam footage of Nate’s arrest has confirmed what the Puerto Rican community of Chicago has already known—that this was a murder. People’s Defense Rhode Island held a potluck in Pawtucket and spoke about the police attack on Sebastian Yidana. People’s Defense Charlotte held a letter-writing event for political prisoners, as part of their upcoming series of events for Black August. People’s Defense Columbus held a community potluck and mass meeting at which they engaged with the community and talked about how to organize against the issues they face.
NYC Students Raise Anti-Imperialist and Prisoner Support Work
NYC students affiliated with the Revolutionary Student Union spent the month of July applying RSU’s summer directive to organize campaigns around anti-imperialist and class-conscious demands. In particular, the students mobilized around prisoner support work alongside the family of political prisoner Tarek Bazrouk. On May 7, the FBI raided the home of Palestinian student and activist Tarek Bazrouk and arrested him for having taken part in pro-Palestine protests, and he has remained locked up without bail for more than 2 months. To fight back against this act of escalation on the part of U.S. imperialism’s offensive on democratic rights and the pro-Palestinian movement, RSU NYC students have been organizing with local progressive and popular organizations to spearhead a campaign to defend Tarek and raise funds to support him by doing things like buying him books. Donate to the campaign here.
Similarly, members of the Revolutionary Student Union (RSU) from New York and New Jersey marched at the “Armistice Then, Liberation Now” rally commemorating the Korean War armistice, standing shoulder to shoulder with the masses that demand an end to U.S. military occupation and economic warfare on the Korean Peninsula.
At the gates of the Metropolitan Detention Center, AISF-RSU comrades joined the call to fight ICE and free Tarek Bazrouk, a Palestinian student and political prisoner facing a frame-up.
Activists Expand Political Education and Agitation/Propaganda Work
Corresponding to the increase in activity and practical work, revolutionary mass organizations nationally have been expanding and deepening their study and political education campaigns. Organizations like RSU, PDC and NLOC have been studying documents related to class analysis, solid organizing, and basic principles of our class. For example, in Columbus, Ohio, the local New Labor Committee held their first event called “What is the Strike.” Principles of New Labor were introduced along with a series of speeches on the Weapon of the Strike. Meanwhile the Columbus Revolutionary Student Union wrapped up the month with a Teach-in on Self-Reliance. The event explained that the health of a revolutionary movement depends on relying on the strength of the working class, while rejecting the influence of the capitalist class. Finally, People’s Defense Columbus held a joint showing of the documentary Red Ant Dream with Columbus RSU to educate and raise consciousness among the local masses on the Indian Revolution as part of the broader ongoing campaign of solidarity with CPI (Maoist) and the martyrs and heroes of the Indian Revolution.
