Britton was responding to the question, “What should we do about protecting our borders?” asked by a teacher at the Sherman Oaks Center for Enriched Studies at a September 30 assembly. Don LaFraniere, who teaches social studies at the high school, had invited Britton and several other gubernatorial candidates in the October 7 recall election to speak to the assembly, which drew nearly 300 high school students over two class periods.

The socialist candidate called for an end to all factory raids, deportations, “no-match” Social Security letters, and secret detentions of immigrant workers, which have stepped up under both Democratic and Republican administrations in California and nationally.

“I am for international working-class solidarity, and am completely against what the wealthy rulers of this country do with the borders, trying to divide us. I solidarize with those who say, ‘We didn’t cross the border—the border crossed us,’” Britton concluded, drawing applause from many of the students.

This slogan of immigrant rights protests expresses the reality of the United States today, in which the working class has been transformed by a massive wave of immigration—where millions of working people go back and forth across the U.S.-Mexican border for everyday job and family reasons.

At the end of the assembly, students crowded around the socialist literature table set up at the front of the room by the Young Socialists for Britton.

“That’s my mother!” said Andrea Contreras, a 17-year-old senior, pointing to a front-page picture of the Militant of the September 20 rally in Los Angeles to send off the Immigrant Workers Freedom Ride bus caravan. “I agree with what Joel Britton said,” Contreras told the Militant. “There shouldn’t be any borders. People shouldn’t be penalized for coming here trying to find a better life for their families.”

Many at the assembly took copies of the “Vote Socialist Workers” appeal to working men and women in uniform, and several students signed up to find out more about the campaign. One of the campaigners was Christal Ramjattan, a student who had arrived from Miami the previous day to join the activities of the Young Socialists for Britton for a week.

The debate on immigration continued later that morning when Britton spoke at a candidates’ forum sponsored by the Humanist Association at California State University in Los Angeles. He expressed a sharply different point of view from the eight other candidates who participated.

One of those, Douglas Anderson, a mortgage broker and right-wing politician, says in his campaign literature that “the state…is in shambles. If you take a look at our educational system, our budget, and everything else…it all comes back to illegal immigration.” At the forum, he called for closing the border with Mexico and enforcing it with the National Guard. He decried the new state law allowing people to get driver’s licenses without having a Social Security number. Other candidates expressed a range of views on these questions, with several echoing Anderson’s positions.  
 
Immigrants strengthen working class
“The Socialist Workers Party’s position is in favor of driver’s licenses for everyone who needs one—to drive to work or for recreation or any other purpose,” Britton said, referring to Gov. Gray Davis’s earlier stance that he would only sign a law that restricted immigrants’ licenses to those who had jobs and needed to drive to work, an untenable position he later dropped. “We also believe that immigrant workers should have full rights to an education, to medical care, and in every other sphere of life.”

The socialist candidate explained, “The immigration of workers from Mexico and elsewhere is strengthening the capacity of working people here to fight. They bring their experiences of struggle with them. We see this today in the meatpacking, garment, coal mining, and other industries. We can all learn what the word huelga [strike] means.”

“I think it is outrageous to consider any human being ‘illegal.’ A century ago when there was a huge wave of immigration from Europe, there was no big paperwork that people had to go through, no green cards they had to get. People just came, to work in the factories and to farm.” At the Cal State-Los Angeles forum, Britton was wearing a “No concessions” button from the United Food and Commercial Workers union (UFCW), given to him by a campaign supporter. The contract covering some 71,000 Southern California supermarket workers at Vons, Ralphs, and Albertson’s stores was due to expire at midnight on October 5, and union members were expected to vote on a contract proposal a few days later. The supermarket owners are demanding major concessions in wages and medical benefits.

“The UFCW’s ‘no concessions’ position is an example of working people digging in their heels to defend what we’ve won from past struggles,” Britton told the audience. “I join with these union members today and will join them on the picket line if they go on strike.”

In the Los Angeles area, Young Socialists for Britton teams also campaigned at a protest against tuition hikes held September 24 at Cal State-Northridge, at the September 27-28 Latino Book Fair held at Exposition Park, and at a September 28 demonstration against the U.S. occupation of Iraq. On the evening of September 28, Britton attended a dinner hosted by a worker from the UFCW-organized Farmer John meatpacking plant here that drew two dozen workers from his neighborhood.

Traveling to the Napa Valley in northern California, Britton spoke to 18 students from the Hispanic Club at Napa High School on October 2. The meeting was arranged by Vicente Ramírez, one of the Young Socialists for Britton campaigners. Ramírez, 18, graduated from the high school last year and now attends Napa Valley College as a freshman. After the meeting, Britton, Ramírez, and other Young Socialists for Britton from San Francisco headed over to the college to campaign for several hours. Among those they met were three members of the Latina Club on campus, who invited Britton to return to Napa to speak to their group. Nearly 20 students also signed up for the Government Club, which Ramírez helps to organize. They plan to bring Britton back to campus to speak as soon as possible.  
 
 
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