The Socialist Workers Party campaign of Rachele Fruit for U.S. president is at the heart of an eight-week international drive by the party and Communist Leagues in Australia, Canada and the U.K. to get out the word about the campaign and the party’s program, win 1,350 Militant readers, sell 1,350 books by SWP leaders and other revolutionaries and raise $165,000 for the Militant Fighting Fund.
The Militant is the voice of the Fruit campaign.
Fruit joined hundreds of hotel workers fighting for a better contract and their supporters at a UNITE HERE Local 11 picket line in front of the Hotel Figueroa in downtown Los Angeles April 5. Fruit is a hotel worker in Miami and UNITE HERE member.
Politically, the fight against Jew-hatred has been a central focus of the SWP campaign, in continuity with the SWP’s political program and activity since its founding and the Bolshevik Revolution led by V.I. Lenin.
“We are becoming known as the socialists who act against Jew-hatred and in defense of Israel’s right to exist as a refuge for Jews fleeing persecution,” Fruit explains. “The worldwide rise of Jew-hatred since Hamas’ Oct. 7 deadly pogrom against Jews in Israel shows the need for a refuge today is not an abstract question. Israel must have the right to defend itself from destruction, the aim of the Iranian regime and all its proxies — Hamas, Hezbollah and the Houthis.
“Our starting point is the class interests and solidarity of workers of all nationalities and religious beliefs, whether in the Middle East — Palestinians, Jews, Arabs, Kurds or otherwise — or working people elsewhere around the world.”
There were protests worldwide over the April 6-7 weekend, marking six months since the pogrom and Hamas’ kidnapping of over 250 hostages. The actions demanded their immediate release. SWP and Communist League candidates took part in many cities, including New York, Pittsburgh, Dallas, Montreal, Toronto and elsewhere.
Since Oct. 7 weekly vigils have been organized in Pittsburgh calling for release of the hostages and condemning antisemitic attacks there.
“Vandalism, thuggery, ‘shut them down’ actions targeting Jews and Israel’s right to exist are not about social justice,” Candace Wagner, Socialist Workers Party candidate for U.S. Congress, told a March 31 rally attended by 100 people. “They remind us of Hitler’s jackbooted fascists, who began by smashing Jewish shop windows, and then proceeded to physically crush the German trade unions and working-class political parties.”
Toby Tabachnick, editor of the Pittsburgh Jewish Chronicle, wrote an article March 28 about Wagner’s campaign. It pointed out that Wagner “spoke before the Allegheny County Council in March, urging its members to vote against a resolution calling for Israel to cease its military operation in Gaza.”
For a working-class road forward
Katy LeRougetel, Communist League candidate in the upcoming Montreal federal by-election, and campaigner Félix Vincent Ardea met retired auto parts factory worker Ed Baker on his doorstep in Dartmouth, Nova Scotia, April 6. They showed him the Militant and described how the League had been involved in supporting the Unifor union workers, who just won their 37-day strike against Canadian National Railway-owned Autoport bosses. LeRougetel said working-class solidarity is crucial in today’s labor battles.
“I really agree with what you’re saying. Keep the change,” Baker said, getting a subscription, a copy of The Low Point of Labor Resistance Is Behind Us: The Socialist Workers Party Looks Forward by party leaders Jack Barnes, Mary-Alice Waters and Steve Clark, and contributing $6.
“The rulers try to take away our confidence in our own capacities,” said LeRougetel, “it’s one of their biggest weapons against us. They say, ‘who are you, what do you know, anyway?’”
“I just worked for you all my life,” Baker said with irony. “I thought maybe it would get better. But now it’s going more the way of that guy Hitler.”
“Yes, the rich use Jew-hatred just like the Nazis did, to try to get us to blame the Jews for the problems of capitalism,” LeRougetel said. “We have to build unity against Jew-hatred.”
They also discussed the fight to defend leaders of the 2022 truckers’ Freedom Convoy who are facing draconian charges for opposing government job-killing COVID policies.
“Exactly, they’re taking away freedom of speech,” said Baker. “Finally someone sensible, thanks for stopping by. You made my day.”
In Florida, Laura Anderson, SWP candidate for U.S. Senate from that state, campaigned with supporters March 30 in North Miami. A Haitian worker, Louis Wilbert, talked with Anderson about the dire conditions and political crisis in Haiti today and asked her what people here can do about it.
“A revolutionary leadership must be forged to organize workers in our millions to take political power from the capitalist class and into our own hands — and use that power to defend workers and farmers around the world,” said Anderson. Wilbert bought Are They Rich Because They’re Smart? by Barnes along with a subscription.
Then Anderson met a young couple from Honduras — Naftali, a cleaner and home care worker, and her husband, a construction worker. “It seems like nothing works in this country, sometimes,” said Naftali.
“The system here is not broken,” Anderson responded. “Capitalism is based on the exploitation of the working class and there is no letup in the bosses’ offensive.
“The only check on their offensive against the working class is our determination to fight back,” she said. The couple subscribed to the paper and bought Malcolm X, Black Liberation, and the Road to Workers Power by Barnes and The Low Point of Labor Resistance Is Behind Us.
To campaign for Rachele Fruit and other SWP and Communist League candidates, contact the office near you. Donations to the fund can be made out to the Militant and sent to 306 W. 37th Street, 13th floor, New York, NY 10018 or online at themilitant.com.