https://themilitant.com/2019/04/20/swp-campaign-builds-may-1-actions-demands-amnesty-for-all-immigrants/
SWP campaign builds May 1 actions, demands amnesty for all immigrants
By Terry Evans
Vol. 83/No. 17
April 29, 2019
John Hall, who works as a cook in Combs, Kentucky, told Maggie Trowe,
left, and other SWP campaigners that 2016 election was “the first time
in my life I didn’t vote. I hated them both.”
Militant/Rachele Fruit
John Hall, who works as a cook in Combs, Kentucky, told Maggie Trowe,
left, and other SWP campaigners that 2016 election was “the first time
in my life I didn’t vote. I hated them both.”
“They deported a friend of mine two days ago. ICE has been stepping up
its activities here,” laborer Ryan Null told Socialist Workers Party
member Deborah Liatos when she knocked on his door in Valley Acres, a
small town in southern California April 6. Many of Null’s co-workers are
immigrants.
“We should fight for an amnesty for all undocumented immigrants in the
country,” Liatos said. “This demand is central to the fight to unify and
strengthen the entire working class and labor movement.”
Null picked up a copy of the Militant and asked Liatos to keep in touch
about the party’s campaigns.
Immigrants without what the U.S. government considers “proper papers”
are treated like criminals, with most states denying them access to
driver’s licenses. As they campaign around the country to expand the
reach of the party, SWP members are encouraging workers and young people
to join protests May 1 to demand driver’s licenses for all and for
amnesty. It’s an issue for the entire working class.
Supporters of SWP candidates Amy Husk and Samir Hazboun, running for
Kentucky governor and lieutenant governor, fanned out across the state
and southern Indiana April 12-15 to discuss a working-class road
forward. They joined in advancing the international drive to expand the
readership of revolutionary books and the Militant, to increase the
number of people working with the party, and to raise $115,000 for the
Militant Fighting Fund.
“I’m surprised you came to Combs,” Shelly Hall, 60, a disabled retail
worker told SWP campaigners Rachele Fruit and Maggie Trowe when they
knocked on her door in eastern Kentucky. “This is known as a bad area.
There are only two people on our street who have jobs. But we look out
for each other. Sometimes there’s not enough food. If someone has a sack
of potatoes, we share them.”
The two SWP members explained that the fight for working-class
solidarity is advanced by building a movement to take power out of the
hands of the capitalist rulers, as working people did in Cuba. Hall got
a subscription to the Militant.
Campaign to expand reach of ‘Militant,’ books, fund (week one).
“Jobs are high on my priority list,” Paul Couch, a retired construction
contractor and church pastor in Typo, Kentucky, told them. “People just
can’t find work around here. I’m working with other churches and talking
to anyone who will listen to try to get some companies to invest in our
community and put people to work.”
“The SWP candidates urge a fight for a massive government-sponsored
public works program to put millions to work at union-scale wages to
repair the roads and bridges, build schools and hospitals and other
things workers need,” Trowe replied.
Health care, not health insurance
“Have a seat,” Brandon Morris, a disabled factory worker and former coal
miner from Austin, Indiana, told Jacquie Henderson and Jim Horne after
they introduced the SWP’s Kentucky campaign. “I like what you say about
working people needing to stand together. We work all our lives and end
up with nothing.” Morris has black lung disease and lung cancer.
“I’m a lucky one,” he said. “They found it and removed part of my lung.
My wife couldn’t get doctors to even take her condition seriously until
it was too late. There’s no such thing as health care in this country.”
All the plans to reform health insurance presented by Democrats and
Republicans, including “Medicare for all” touted by liberal Democratic
candidates for the presidential nomination, would in fact boost the
profits of the pharmaceutical companies and hospital bosses. In
contrast, the SWP demands universal government-guaranteed health care
for working people and explains why a fight is necessary to expropriate
the for-profit drug, hospital and medical equipment companies and place
them under the control of the workers who work there.
The socialist campaigners from Louisville, Kentucky; Atlanta; and
Chicago sold 15 books, 10 subscriptions and received three contributions
to the Militant Fighting Fund in Kentucky and Indiana.
When SWP campaigners Alex Huinil, Jacob Perasso and Beverly Hoggs
visited the picket line of striking workers at Stop & Shop in
Pittsfield, Massachusetts, they met striker Melissa Taylor. She told
them she had tried to organize a union at the Price Chopper store she
used to work at. “They called me ‘rebel girl’ and cut me off the
schedule. I came here three months ago for more hours and a union,” she
said. She subscribed to the Militant and bought five books the SWP
campaigners showed her that are on special offer.
SWP members are offering all of Pathfinder’s books at 20% off. The books
contain writings of SWP leaders on working-class politics today, of
revolutionaries like Fidel Castro, Thomas Sankara and Malcolm X, and on
the lessons of past working-class struggles.
Fund off to strong start
Over the first week of the seven-week drive, readers across the country
and the world have sent in $12,553 to the Militant Fighting Fund.
Another $1,780 is in the mail, getting the second week off to a good
start. Keep the contributions coming! Readers efforts like this can
ensure the fund drive will bring home the $115,000 goal by May 28.
Contributions from working people who value the Militant ’s coverage of
working-class struggles and its presentation of a way forward
independent of the bosses and their parties are the backbone of the fund.
Teacher’s assistant and student Erica Smith kicked in $5 to the fund and
got a copy of In Defense of the US Working Class by SWP leader
Mary-Alice Waters, when Rebecca Wilson and Jeanne Fitzmaurice talked
with her April 6 at her doorstep in Tenino, Washington.
Readers who want to join the effort can contact party branches or
contribute online at the paper’s website, www.themilitant.com.
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In This Issue
Front Page Articles •New England Stop & Shop workers strike against cuts
•Legislators in Texas push to make every abortion illegal
•Protesters in Sudan say: ‘The regime must fall!’
•SWP campaign builds May 1 actions, demands amnesty for all immigrants
•Fight against ban on Washington prisoners getting used books wins
•Cuban Revolution ‘put workers in the best position to take on racism’
Feature Articles •Today’s fighters can learn from Algeria’s 1962-65
revolution
Also In This Issue •Quebec protests hit gov’t ban on wearing religious
symbols on job
•‘Why do workers face so many problems today?’
•Quebec taxi, Uber drivers need union to fight boss, gov’t attacks
•66-year South Korean ban on abortion ruled unconstitutional
•Defend a woman’s right to abortion!
On the Picket Line •Toronto teachers, students protest education cuts
•Autoworkers in Russia start ‘work to rule’ against layoffs
Books of the Month •New battalions of working-class fighters in
formation in China
25, 50 and 75 years ago
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