BY CHRIS REMPLE
WEIRTON, West Virginia-Officials of the Independent
Steelworkers Union (ISU) announced at a press conference here
July 26 their endorsement of ultrarightist politician Patrick
Buchanan's campaign for president of the United States. After
ISU president Mark Glyptis made the announcement outside the
union hall, Buchanan issued a short statement and took
questions from the press. The ISU is the union at Weirton
Steel, a local steelmaker and major employer in the area,
which has been hit by the economic crisis. In addition to
media and a half dozen cops, about 40 ISU officials,
steelworkers, and their family members attended the event.
Several people carried signs saying "Pat for President" and "Welcome, Pat." Many wore "Buchanan" hats, which were also given to the Weirton chief of police and several cops present. A number of people wore T-shirts proclaiming "Stand Up for Steel, Stand Up for America," the slogan promoted by the steel bosses and union tops.
Buchanan, who is waging his third campaign in the Republican presidential primaries, pushes America First chauvinism, as well as anticapitalist demagogy, to appeal to middle-class layers and some workers as a defender of "the little man" against corrupt politicians and big business. He represents the most prominent center for organizing an incipient fascist movement in the United States today. While keeping one foot in traditional bourgeois politics, he seeks to recruit cadres who can build a movement in the streets that will eventually attempt to violently roll back the gains of the working class, fighters for Black rights, and women's equality in the name of defending the "America" he defines.
Glyptis opened the news conference by thanking Weirton Steel's plant security, the chief of police, and the county sheriff for helping to organize the event. He stated, "Pat Buchanan has a long history of standing up for American workers and today we stand united for Pat Buchanan. Pat Buchanan has used his national platform to discuss the domestic steel crisis and the influx of foreign steel imports." Addressing Buchanan, Glyptis said, "Over 1,000 were laid off when you visited here in March. We appreciate you supporting steelworkers."
"The globalists in Washington who believe that all Americans are riding a wave of Wall Street prosperity don't like to talk about the Weirtons of America," said Buchanan, in comments typical of his increasingly anticapitalist and national socialist rhetoric. "But I have seen factories closed and towns destroyed by illegal steel dumping, and I believe this betrayal of American workers must come to an end." He claimed to represent workers "whose jobs are being shipped abroad." In addition to blaming "unpatriotic" companies and workers in other countries for the economic crisis, Buchanan targeted the banks. Steel imports are high because "the illegal dumping of foreign steel from Brazil, Russia, and Japan is only to get the money to pay back the New York banks," he argued. Thinly veiled anti-Semitic references to "New York bankers" have long been a trademark of Buchanan.
"American workers," he stated, "are being sacrificed on the altar of the global economy." Buchanan told a story of talking with a John Deere worker in Gastonia, North Carolina, who was laid off. He said, "They laid off 700 out of 800. That worker told me, `Do you know where my neighbor is right now? He's in Chihuahua, Mexico, training my replacement for a dollar an hour.' "
A reporter at the news conference asked Buchanan if he would accept support from the rightist Reform Party of Ross Perot and Minnesota governor Jesse Ventura and run outside the Republican party. Buchanan sidestepped the issue, saying, "I appreciate support from the Reform Party, but right now I am running as a Republican looking to the caucuses and primaries." He added that Republican front-runner "George W. Bush is wrong on global free trade. There's not a dime's worth of difference between them. Mr. Bush will give you four more years of the past eight years."
Buchanan went from the news conference to a $25-a-plate chicken roast at a park in Weirton to raise funds for his campaign.