PITTSBURGH - Talking to 500 demonstrators against police brutality was the highlight of Socialist Workers presidential candidate James Harris' stay in the Pittsburgh area.
"The issue is not good police or bad police. Police brutality is endemic to the capitalist system and what the rulers use to protect their interests," Harris said at the June 29 action. "It is a national and international problem. We need to link up with those who protested the beatings of immigrant workers in California and those in New York and New Jersey who were outraged at the recent shootings and beatings by cops there."
During his stay, Harris was interviewed by the daily Pittsburgh Post-Gazette, KQV all-news radio, and In Pittsburgh, a widely distributed weekly. He also campaigned at a shift change at the USX plant in Clairton, Pennsylvania.
- Edwin Fruit
SALT LAKE CITY - "Defend abortion rights? Why do you
campaign for that?" a worker at Magnesium Corp. of America asked
Laura Garza outside the plant, about 50 miles from here, June
26. "Women have a right to control their own bodies," the
Socialist Workers Party vice presidential candidate replied.
"That sounds right to me," the worker responded. Dozens of
workers took literature from socialist campaign supporters
during the shift change at the plant where John Langford, the
SWP candidate for U.S. Congress in Utah's 3rd District, works.
Before coming to Salt Lake City, Garza spoke to a meeting of 14 people at a community center in Denver. Three young people asked about joining the Young Socialists after the talk.
- Dan Fein
EDEN, North Carolina - Jim Rogers, Socialist Workers
candidate for governor of North Carolina, was at the Union of
Needletrades, Industrial and Textile Employees (UNITE) Bi-county
district picnic here June 22. He works at the Karastan rug mill.
I work at the rug mill too, and I came because I admire him for
standing up for workers. Running for governor is the right thing
to do.
When I saw others speaking on the platform, including Harvey Gantt, the Democratic Party candidate for U.S. Senate, I pushed through the crowd and urged the union officials to have Jim Rogers announce his candidacy and let people there hear what he had to say. Rogers was the only speaker that day to talk about the arson attacks on the Black churches. In his speech he invited union members there to join with him later that day in Charlotte, North Carolina, at a church rally to protest the burnings.
- Jeffrey Totten
BIRMINGHAM, Alabama - Kari Sachs, Socialist Workers
candidate for the 4th Congressional District in Alabama,
received prominent news coverage recently for her views on the
burnings of Black churches in the South. WBMG, the local NBC
affiliate, conducted an extensive interview with her just prior
to the weekly Militant Labor Forum, which the news program also
featured. The topic of the forum was "A New Rise in Racism?
What's Behind the Recent Church Burnings." The interview with
Sachs and the socialist's call for protests was the lead story
on the 10 p.m. news here June 21.
- Tim Mailhot
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