NEW YORK, NY, December 1—As many as 8,000 working-class families mostly from Honduras are traveling by foot to the southern U.S. border. More than 3,000 are already in Tijuana and many more are passing through Mexico City. They are fleeing poverty, corruption and violence that is largely the result of more than a century of domination by U.S. imperialism. This was most recently displayed in the U.S.-backed coup that overthrew the democratically-elected liberal reformer Zelaya in Honduras in 2009, forcing a mass exodus to escape poverty, crime, drug trafficking and police violence. They join more than 60 million refugees around the world, from Africa to South Asia, from Syria to Somalia, trying to escape the horrors of war and terror. This is the fruit of world-wide imperialism. Workers of the world need communist revolution.
President Donald Trump targeted the refugees with fiercely racist diatribes, calling them everything from criminals to disease carriers to Middle East Muslim terrorists. Trump has deployed more than 5,000 active-duty troops to the border, in addition to an army of ICE (Immigration and Customs Enforcement) and Border Patrol agents and fascist vigilante militias against unarmed poor people, mainly families with children. The U.S. govern building the concentration camps that could house the refugees for some time to come.
Organizing across borders
Progressive Labor Party is organizing solidarity for the refugees on both sides of the U.S.-Mexico border. We are one Party and there is only one international working class. We have reached out to the refugees in Mexico City and in the U.S., we have started raising money in our unions. We are working on many levels within the New Sanctuary Coalition (NSC) to bring thousands of workers and students to witness, aid and accompany our Central American sisters and brothers into the U.S. We are working with hundreds of volunteers, training to go to the border, work in support capacities, and raise this issue in our unions. So far, many unions have shown an interest and the NSC Call to Organized Labor has gone out to tens of thousands of NYC workers and others and we are heling to organize delegations from these unions to go to the border.
These include workers in 1199, IBT (International Brotherhood of Teamsters) Joint Council 16 (who declared themselves a Sanctuary Union after one of their members was deported), a number of UAW (United Auto Workers) locals, PSC (Professional Staff Congress at the City University of New York), NYSNA (New York State Nurses Association) and others. You can sign on at www.sanctuarycaravan.org/labor.
PLP says, “Working People Have No Nation!” This is now true for at least 60 million refugees around the world, and the numbers are growing every day. Imperialism cannot meet the needs of the working class.  And the bosses are using the refugee crisis they have created to build mass fascist movements that scapegoat the migrants as the rulers prepare for wider wars.
This crisis requires everyone’s participation at whatever level you can contribute. We cannot sit this out. If you want to help greet the caravan at the border, or in Mexico City and escort the caravan to the U.S., now is the time to get involved.