Orlando, FL – On Saturday February 18, the Orlando chapter of the Freedom Road Socialist Organization (FRSO) hosted a panel on the Puerto Rican independence movement featuring speakers from the Young Lords, a revolutionary organization dedicated to uplifting the Puerto Rican community and fighting for independence since 1968. The panel speakers included David Rivera, a founding member of the Young Lords, and Gabe Marcano, a Florida leader in the New-Era Young Lords, as well as Laura Rodriguez, a Puerto Rican member of FRSO. The event began with the speakers sharing their background in activism, explaining the history of the struggle for Puerto Rican Independence and offering lessons to further the movement. The event was attended by more than 20 people which filled the event space and led to an engaged audience question-and-answer session.

David Rivera spoke of his lifelong history in the struggle and his experience organizing in the Rainbow Coalition, a multicultural movement that linked the Black Panther Party and the Young Patriots with the Young Lords in their fight against police terrorism, poverty and corruption. David, alongside Cha Cha Jiménez and others, created the Young Lords when they were all very young as a response to the oppression and attacks they faced in the U.S. as Puerto Ricans. Once a street gang, David recalled how Cha Cha, after finally being released from a jail sentence, showed him a copy of Quotations From Chairman Mao Zedong, which precipitated their transformation into a revolutionary organization.

Gabe Marcano spoke of the hurricane relief visits to Puerto Rico organized by the New Era Young Lords to assist the people living on the island. Especially in the aftermath of devastating Hurricane Maria and Fiona, where the United States would give little to no support as the power failed and people perished, the Young Lords would go to the island to give aid and help rebuild from the destruction.

On the question of statehood versus independence, they said that admitting Puerto Rico into the U.S. as a state would strip the island of its culture and remove their identity. “Puerto Rico does not need another referendum on statehood, Puerto Rico needs independence!” said Rodriquez, adding, “We must withdraw all U.S. military bases from the island,” noting the bases act as a recruitment tool to enroll Puerto Ricans to fight in wars that will only benefit the defense industry and the wealthy.

Parasites in the U.S. have been buying up industries, resources, land and beaches for their own profit. David led the chant “Jibaro sí, Yankee no,” which exemplifies the spirit of the independence movement, namely giving the land back to the Puerto Rican people and getting the Yankees out. The speakers discussed the immense sorrow and fear felt by the island's people as they witnessed more and more of their homeland being stolen from them.

Even though there is sorrow, there is also a great deal of hope and determination for an independent Puerto Rico. Rodriguez expressed this in their closing remarks: “The future is bright and filled with Boricua resistance! Join the struggle for liberation. Liberation won’t happen overnight, but make no mistake, it will happen. We must walk the freedom road, unite all who can be united, and fight back against all forms of Yankee imperialist oppression.”

As the United States causes the living conditions on the island to become increasingly brutal, the desire among the Puerto Rican people for independence grows larger every day. The necessity of a free Puerto Rico that is independent from the U.S. empire is ever more urgent. The Freedom Road Socialist Organization will continue demanding an independent Puerto Rico in particular and independence for all U.S. colonies in general.

To keep up-to-date on future events of the Young Lords, follow @new_era_young_lords on Instagram.

To keep up-to-date on future events of the Orlando chapter of FRSO, follow @FRSO_Orlando on Twitter.

#OrlandoFL #PuertoRico #YoungLordsParty

Chicago, IL- En un evento trascendental en Chicago, los fundadores de Young Lords (Jóvenes Señores) le pasaron la antorcha a una nueva generación. La ceremonia emotiva del 4 de Junio involucró al Comité Central de los Young Lords dirigido por José “Cha Cha” Jiménez colocando medallones sobre las cabezas de más de 50 miembros de New Era Young Lords (Jóvenes Señores de la Nueva Era). Los activistas jóvenes de siete ciudades y Puerto Rico llevaban con orgullo sus boinas moradas y sus distintivas camisas de los Young Lords. Los medallones dicen: “Tengo Puerto Rico en mi corazón”, con el logotipo original de Young Lords.

La Young Lords Organization fue fundada por José “Cha Cha” Jiménez en 1968 en el vecindario de Lincoln Park en Chicago. Puertorriqueños y otra gente obrera estaban siendo expulsados del nuevamente rico vecindario por financieros pudientes y la máquina política del mayor Demócrata Richard Daley.

En esa época, Jiménez convirtió una pandilla en el movimiento político más exitoso de su tiempo, resistiendo el desplazamiento del pueblo y oponiendo a la guerra estadounidense en Vietnam. Sus tácticas militantes atraían a masas de personas a manifestarse por el mejoramiento de las viviendas, educación, cuidado de salud y niños en Chicago. Entonces los Young Lords se extendieron a Nueva York y otras ciudades grandes donde vivían y trabajaban los boricuas.

Frente a 160 personas en Chicago, los fundadores de Young Lords y varios líderes del movimiento dieron discursos sobre su organización y las lecciones que aprendieron. Los New Era Young Lords entonces honraron a “Cha Cha” Jiménez y a los miembros originales presentes: David Rivera, Tony Baez y Omar López. Había discursos apasionados y altos cantitos de “¡Poder para la gente!” y “¡Viva Puerto Rico libre!”

“Creo que por los últimos 50 años hemos sentido que no teníamos ninguna representación en nuestra comunidad, y podíamos encender la chispa de nuevo el 4 de julio. Ha habido muchos movimientos boricuas, pero resonamos con los Young Lords, y ellos traen representación a nuestra comunidad en este país”, dijo Suby Toro, presidente nacional de los Young Lords.

Los activistas nuevos de Connecticut, Cleveland, Orlando, Tampa, Miami y Nueva York están reviviendo a los Young Lords, demandando independencia para Puerto Rico, y oponiendo asesinatos y represión por parte de la policía. Una media de los líderes nuevos son camaradas mujeres y no-binarios. Sus programas de servicio comunitario están creciendo y desarrollándose tal como crean relaciones y movilizan a la gente.

#ChicagoIL #PuertoRico #YoungLordsParty #NewEraYoungLords

Chicago, IL- At a momentous event in Chicago, the original Young Lords passed the leadership torch to a new generation. The moving June 4 ceremony involved the Young Lords Central Committee led by Jose “Cha Cha” Jimenez placing medallions over the heads of more than 50 New Era Young Lords. The young activists from seven cities and Puerto Rico proudly wore their purple berets and distinctive Young Lords shirts. The medallions read, “Tengo Puerto Rico en mi corazón,” with the original Young Lords logo.

The Young Lords Organization was founded by Jose “Cha Cha” Jimenez in 1968 in the Lincoln Park neighborhood of Chicago. Puerto Ricans and other working people were being forced out of the now wealthy neighborhood by big financiers and Mayor Richard Daley’s Democrat political machine.

At that time, Jimenez turned a street gang into one of the most successful political movements of its day, resisting community displacement and opposing the U.S. war in Vietnam. Their militant tactics attracted masses of people to protest for better housing, education, childcare and health care in Chicago. The Young Lords then spread to New York City and other big cities where Puerto Rican people lived and worked.

In front of 160 people in Chicago, the original Young Lords and an array of movement leaders spoke about their organizing and lessons learned. The New Era Young Lords then honored “Cha Cha” Jimenez and the original Young Lords present: David Rivera, Tony Baez and Omar Lopez. There were passionate speeches, and loud chants of “Power to the people!” and “Viva Puerto Rico libre!”

“I think for the last 50 years we have felt like we had no representation in our community, and we were able to reignite that spark on June 4. There’s been a lot of Puerto Rican movements, but we resonate with the Young Lords, and they bring representation to our community in this country,” said Suby Toro, national chairman of the Young Lords.

The new activists from Connecticut, Cleveland, Orlando, Tampa, Miami and New York City are reviving the Young Lords, demanding independence for Puerto Rico, and opposing police killings and repression. About half of the new leaders are women and non-binary comrades. Their community service programs are growing and developing as they create ties and organize the masses of people.

#ChicagoIL #PuertoRico #YoungLordsParty #NewEraYoungLords

The Young Lords were founded in 1968 in Chicago and spread rapidly to other U.S. cities, especially New York City. In the 1950s, large numbers of Puerto Ricans were displaced by U.S. colonialism from their small island nation where the U.S. military and big corporations still dominate today. People concentrated in big cities where their labor was needed, but issues arose with discrimination and poor housing, education and health care.

In Chicago 1968, Puerto Ricans in the Lincoln Park found themselves being displaced again by real estate investors and bankers. The Young Lords under Cha-Cha Jimenez’s leadership transformed a neighborhood gang into a revolutionary organization that led protests and building takeovers against displacement of the community.

Inspired by the Black Panther Party and Fred Hampton in particular, the Young Lords challenged police murders and crimes. They demanded childcare programs and education, equality and fairness in society, using a local Methodist Church as their headquarters. They also protested the U.S. war in Vietnam, and then formed the Rainbow Coalition with the Black Panthers and others.

The celebration will feature many of the original leaders of the Young Lords who are still active in Chicago, Milwaukee, Tampa and New York. They plan to pass the torch to the New Era Young Lords coming from more than seven cities and Puerto Rico. The New Era Young Lords plan to continue the organizing work of the Young Lords, demanding independence for Puerto Rico, and opposing police killings and repression.

The event flyer reads, “The new era continues the struggle for self-determination of all oppressed people atop the legacy of our elders. Join us as the new era recounts the people's revolutionary history to honor and continue the legacy of the Young Lords and Jose ‘Cha Cha’ Jimenez. Pa'lanté!”

There will music and dance, poetry and speeches, food and beverages, from 12 to 5 p.m. on June 4 at Little Cubs Field, Humboldt Park, Chicago.

#ChicagoIL #ChicanoLatino #YoungLordsParty

Chicago, IL – A standing room only crowd filled the Holy Covenant United Methodist Church on September 29 to commemorate Reverend Bruce Johnson and Eugenia Johnson. The reverend and his wife Eugenia were remembered for supporting the Young Lords and their role in the struggle against poverty, war and oppression. They were savagely murdered in their own home 50 years ago, stabbed to death, during a U.S. government campaign of repression known as COINTELPRO or the Counterintelligence Program.

Ministers of the United Methodist Church, the Bishop of Chicago’s Episcopal Church and leaders from the Presbyterian McCormick Seminary honored the couple’s commitment to equality, justice and peace. Those who knew the martyred couple best spoke with reverence for their commitment to humanity and their dedication and love for their children and each other.

During the church service, it became clear the radical Christian ideas espoused by Reverend Bruce Johnson were both a challenge and an inspiration to many. Those honoring him continue to try to live up to his ideas. It was during the Young Lords occupation of the McCormick Seminary in May of 1969 that Reverend Bruce Johnson stepped forward to offer aid and solidarity to the Young Lords. It was only a few months later he and his wife were killed.

Along with the many women ministers who spoke, DePaul professor Jacqueline Lazu explained the history of the Young Lords. DePaul was one of the three big institutions involved in displacing people. Professor Lazu said, “Every day I think about how I came to teach at DePaul and how I benefit from the struggle of the Young Lords to open up access for Puerto Ricans.”

Young Lords founder Jose “Cha Cha” Jimenez said, “We are here today, to remember and honor the Reverend Bruce Johnson and Eugenia. They are our martyrs. Along with Black Panther Chairman Fred Hampton and Mark Clark who were killed two months later. They gave their lives, as did Young Lords Manuel Ramos and Jose “Pancho” Lind. The Young Lords led our neighborhood struggle against displacement of poor people by the big developers.”

Pat Devine, a religious and community organizer related, “70,000 people were forced out of the Lincoln Park neighborhood in four years, as developers made land grabs and built housing for only the wealthiest in Chicago.”

After the memorial mass, nearly 100 people marched through the Lincoln Park neighborhood to the former site of People’s Church. People’s Church is where Reverend Bruce Johnson hosted the Young Lords. “We ran a day care center, breakfast program for school children and organized protests and occupations to stop the displacement of our community. We also rallied to free Puerto Rico!” Jimenez said.

Tony Baez, Young Lord Minister of Education, said “Their deaths made us more serious as revolutionaries and propelled us forward. Young Lords went on to organize in other parts of society and in many other cities where Puerto Rican people lived.”

The march ended with a rally at People’s Church. “We honor their sacrifice. We will be Young Lords until the day we die! Free Puerto Rico!” proclaimed Jose “Cha Cha” Jimenez.

#ChicagoIL #OppressedNationalities #PeoplesStruggles #AfricanAmerican #ChicanoLatino #PuertoRico #PoliceBrutality #COINTELPRO #Antiracism #PoliticalRepression #YoungLordsParty #ReverendBruceJohnson

There are many 50-year anniversaries being celebrated these days, including the founding of the Young Lords on September 23, 1968, and the Rainbow Coalition in April 1969.

Fight Back! interviewed the founder of the Young Lords, Jose “Cha Cha” Jimenez, about the original Rainbow Coalition. The powers ruling Chicago were struck with fear when the Rainbow Coalition came together. The United States government and the FBI repressed the groups of the Rainbow Coalition with the courts and violence in the form of COINTELPRO, the counter-intelligence program. The Rainbow Coalition inspired many activists in the late 1960s and continues to hold lessons for today.

Fight Back!: How did the Rainbow Coalition come together?

Jose “Cha Cha” Jimenez: In late 1968, Chairman Fred Hampton and I, the Black Panthers and Young Lords, were already working together on building Black and Brown Unity. We were working on a Black Active and Determined (B.A.D.) conference with Danny Underwood and Marion Stamps, at the Cabrini Green housing projects and the Olivet Church. The Young Lords had recently arrived back from Puerto Rico and from a trip to Denver, Colorado where we had established contact with Corky Gonzalez and other Chicano movement leaders. It was September 1968 and we were working out of the offices of the Concerned Citizens of Lincoln Park at 2512 North Lincoln, a church organization of mostly white pastors assisting the poor and opposed to urban renewal. Reverend Bruce and Eugenia Ransier Johnson, Pat Devine and Reverend James Reed were all part of this Northside Cooperative Ministry.

Around the same time, the Young Lords were also connected with the Latin American Defense Organization (LADO). It was primarily a Puerto Rican group led by Mexican national, Obed Lopez. They were forming a Wicker Park/Humboldt Park welfare rights union. It was well supported and became connected to several West Town groups like SAAC, MIO, PACA, PSP, and the West Town Concerned Citizens Coalition. Today’s Ruiz Belvis Cultural Center was also part of that grouping, centered on the Wicker Park Welfare office at North Ave. and Milwaukee.

In February of 1969 LADO asked me to bring the Young Lords to support their picket line. The Young Lords came in large numbers and we also brought along Chairman Fred Hampton and other members of the Black Panther Party.

We arrived at the picket line and were there no longer than 15 minutes when the police rounded up Chairman Fred Hampton, Obed Lopez, and I. The three of us were placed into the paddy wagon and hauled to the 13th District Police Station. We were charged with mob action. Mary Lou Porrata of the West Town Concerned Citizens Coalition and a few other Latina women were also detained and later released. The same situation occurred a couple of weeks later at the same location with Chairman Fred, Obed, and I. All three of us were arrested once again and charged with mob action in the same month of February 1969. This history is well documented in the LADO, Concerned Citizens and Young Lords newspaper collections at De Paul University and at Grand Valley State University special collections: www. gvsu.edu/younglords

Two months later in April, at the street corner of Armitage and Dayton, Chairman Fred Hampton and I were talking about police repression of our groups and the then political climate of fascism. He asked me if I or the Young Lords would object to being part of a coalition of forces for all of our protection. He said that the Black Panther Party was working with a new group on the Northside called the Young Patriots whose leader was William “Preacherman” Fesperman.

I made it clear we had no issues and agreed on the spot. Puerto Ricans had lived next to the hillbilly community at the “La Clark” neighborhood in the 1950s. There was also the Oasis Restaurant hangout at Webster and Bissell, and then a hillbilly gang called “The Rebels,” whose leader was a Puerto Rican, at a diner on Lincoln and Sheffield in Lincoln Park.

Within days all three groups were visiting each other and hanging out. Since the Rainbow Coalition became a response to Mayor Daley and the possible vehicle to stop the rioting, our first task as a coalition was to promote the announcement in a series of press conferences at various media outlets and various parts of the city. That was not a problem, as everybody wanted to be on the TV.

Fight Back!: What were the times like which brought you together?

Jimenez: The year before in 1968 was the Democratic Convention and the Black West Side, South Side and pockets of the North Side of Chicago had erupted into riots over the murder of Martin Luther King Jr. Now, in April of 1969, once again there were strong signs that these same neighborhoods were going to again erupt. The Uptown neighborhood was turning into a decaying area and the new skid row. Puerto Ricans in Chicago had also rioted several times, and they now were the predominant force in the North Side’s Lincoln Park and Lakeview neighborhoods. Reporters had also been bloodied while they covered the hippies being beaten, and now a militant wing of the SDS, the Weather Underground was preparing to wear plastic helmets and use baseball bats to duel it out with the Chicago Police in the Days of Rage.

Still what Mayor Daley feared most was the united front led by Chairman Fred Hampton and the Rainbow Coalition. In fact, Hampton publicly referred to the proposed dueling of the Days of Rage as suicidal and “Custeristic” naming it after General Custer’s last stand. Hampton added that it would lead to unnecessary mass arrests. Our few attorneys would be diverted from the many Young Lords and Black Panther repressive court cases, and this would set the movement back years. Fred Hampton proposed working instead for a disciplined armed revolution and a classless society.

There was democratic discussion taking place among the New Left, which was healthy, but a clear division took place in October 1969 between the downtown Days of Rage event and the already planned Young Lords demonstration to be held within the Puerto Rican Community to honor Don Pedro Albizu Campos and the movement for self-determination of Puerto Rico.

Chairman Fred Hampton asked me if the Young Lords could accommodate the SDS revolutionary marchers from out of town as part of our Puerto Rico demonstration. Of course, I agreed since a contingent of our East Coast Young Lords were also coming and would be among them. This would also expand the march, having greater impact in the neighborhood. It became a counter event to the Days of Rage downtown, but the press focused more on the dueling between the police and the SDS and Weather Underground. During this same period, was when Chairman Fred Hampton took to the airways and expounded on the need to organize the people for a people’s revolution. Eventually we all were reunited but it showed the power of the FBI’s COINTELPRO infiltration and the U.S. government’s re-direction of the movement’s goals, along with “divide and conquer” tactics. It was not just COINTELPRO that helped to destroy the movement, it was members of our movement themselves, those who spread rumors, and put their personal opportunist interests above the people’s interests.

Fight Back!: What were the demands?

Jimenez: One of the questions, which Chairman Fred Hampton repeated and demanded that mother country radicals ask themselves, was, “How can you go all the way to Vietnam without first going through the West Side of Chicago?” Mother country radicals sought to become internationalists without doing the day-to-day work needed to win victory in our local ghettos and barrios. It is impossible to make revolutionary change without the people. Yet the New Left wanted instant gratification instead of canvassing door to door, or a step-by-step process. The New Left wanted to make change for the people, when self-determination meant making change together, with them.

Chairman Fred Hampton also said that our work was not like a theater. White activists must not just be entertained, by Black, Puerto Rican and other oppressed nationalities, but must also organize within their own communities to fight against racism. They must attack white chauvinism and stop promoting patronizing individualism. Black people should organize within the African American communities. Red, Yellow and Brown people should also organize in their own respective communities. It is not just about being inclusive and respecting each other’s diversity, but it is about making revolutionary change. This is also because each struggle is in its own point or process of development. There is no even template. We must take a look first at, “Time, place and conditions within each community” to determine how we can come together. That is why we tolerated the Young Patriots using the symbol of the Confederate flag.

Fight Back!: How did the Rainbow Coalition view Mayor Daley of Chicago? How about the U.S. President, Johnson?

Jimenez: He was the enemy. A revolution has friends and enemies, and Chairman Fred clarified this. How else can you battle and either lose or win if there are not two clear opposing sides: the red and the blue; the people and the enemy. The Rainbow Coalition officially began in April of 1969 and within 30 days, in May of 1969 Mayor Richard J. Daley, alongside his protégé States Attorney Edward Hanrahan, organized the Mayor’s political cabinet into a special committee to declare a “War on Gangs.”

President Johnson, the FBI’s COINTELPRO and Mayor Richard J. Daley were all clear on, “Who were their friends and who were their enemies?” Who were their opposing targets. To make it appear authentic, Mayor Richard J. Daley and Edward Hanrahan immediately attacked the street youth leaders of the Disciples, Black Stone Rangers and Vice Lords; arresting them and racking up multiple charges. Jeff Fort had about 19 pending felony cases. I had 18, Obed Lopez had nine, and Chairman Fred Hampton also had nine. There were others as well. This was an effort to criminalize without legal cause; to bankrupt our finances, harass us and put us away for life.

Today we know that the clear intended targets were not these street organizations but the political groups whom the political machine feared and whom Daley and Hanrahan labeled terrorist gangs: the Rainbow Coalition. It is true that by September the street youth leaders like Vice Lord Gore was behind bars, but it was also true that on September 29, 1969 UMC Pastor Bruce and Eugenia Ransier Johnson were discovered murdered, each stabbed multiple times at their parsonage home. It is true that two months later, on December 4, 1969, State’s Attorney Hanrahan took a personal police task force to assassinate Chairman Fred Hampton and Mark Clark in their home. The patronage machine and Mayor Richard J. Daley was the clear Father of Gentrification in Chicago which displaced thousands of poor from the city. Police brutality became part of the fabric of Chicago and the Rainbow Coalition was organized to build a People’s Army to fight against it.

Mexican revolutionary Emiliano Zapata said that the basis of all revolutions is land. The Young Lords studied the modern-day land question and began to comprehend today’s city hall plan to privatize public housing and to force the poor away from downtown and the lakefront. These were prime real estate areas where all our barrios were built. So, we were not poor by choice. We were robbed.

The Rainbow Coalition was more than just a gang of activists or folks trying to gain one or two small victories. Demands are for battles. What we wanted was revolutionary change. Each of our groups were already small revolutionary armies connected to the people’s struggle and trying to create a People’s Army to win the battle. We were lumpen proletariat, peasants from the countryside, or urban and factory industrial workers. It is why Chairman Fred Hampton’s quote stands out, “I am so proletarian intoxicated that I cannot be astronomically intimidated.” Ours was never a middle class liberal revolution, but a true grassroots people’s revolution.

If you can comprehend this, you can visualize the type of loose yet disciplined alliance that dignified and respected the empowerment of each community and their cultures. Our goals were clear, simple and known to all.

Ho Chi Minh once said that the revolution was just a job like washing dishes. The survival programs were not reformist, but structures created to provide services while constructing the new world. They were not candy to be donated or given away but part of a planned attack to bring awareness and heightened contradictions. We were exposing the city for not providing food, health and other social services. We are never a non-for profit but revolutionaries.

Fight Back!: What are the big lessons from the Rainbow Coalition?

Jimenez: We must start from within and fight racism.

We must be clear on who are our enemies and who are our friends so that we can unite with the many to defeat the few.

Ours is not about individuals but a people’s struggle led by the common folk.

Ours is a protracted struggle that will take years and we must prepare ourselves for the long run via structured community programs specific to the revolution.

We stand for Puerto Rico, all Latin American nations and oppressed nations of the world, against colonialisms and for self-determination and neighborhood empowerment.

#ChicagoIL #AntiwarMovement #InJusticeSystem #Opinion #PeoplesStruggles #Interviews #AfricanAmerican #ChicanoLatino #PuertoRico #Antiracism #PoliticalRepression #YoungLordsParty #JoseChaChaJimenez #RainbowCoalition

Fight Back! interviewed Jose “Cha Cha” Jimenez, the founder of the Young Lords. A Young Lords 50 Year Commemoration is taking place at DePaul University in Chicago, starting at 6 p.m. on Friday, Sept. 21. Jose “Cha Cha” Jimenez and freed political prisoner Oscar Lopez Rivera will be speaking together on the struggle of the Puerto Rican people. Also, there is a Young Lords 50 Year Memorial Tour to honor the church people, Young Lords, and Black Panthers who died in the struggle, starting at noon, Saturday, Sept. 22.

Fight Back!: Who were the Young Lords?

Jose “Cha Cha” Jimenez: The Young Lords were a turnaround street gang, which saw their community being evicted or displaced and decided to stand up and fight city hall. They recruited from the entire community and mobilized them into pickets, occupations of local institutions; protest marches and organized with others into coalitions. These included coalitions with Black Active and Determined; the North Side Cooperative Ministry – pastors of several churches; the Lincoln Park Poor People’s coalition -neighborhood wide group of businesses, churches, organizations and street youth groups; Latino gang clubs; and the Rainbow Coalition – Black Panthers, Young Patriots and Young Lords and later joined nationally with AIM, Red Guard, Brown berets and others.

Fight Back!: How were the Young Lords founded?

Jimenez: You cannot separate the Young Lords from world events at the time. The ‘68 Democratic Convention took place down the street in Lincoln Park and Grant Park and that had a tremendous effect on the adjacent Lincoln Park Neighborhood where the Young Lords were located with several ‘gang’ branches. The Latino community, specifically the Puerto Rican community, had just been displaced from other areas near downtown and pushed into Lincoln Park. Growing up, families faced discrimination from city hall and from local white ethnic communities who feared their neighborhood was being taken over by the new Puerto Rican immigrants. Puerto Rican youth had to form gangs to protect themselves.

There were physical wars in the community with several on both sides killed and beaten. In the meantime, the parents formed organization and created a more stable environment. They began helping their children hoping to steer them away from natural urban problems. Though the neighborhood stabilized, Mayor Richard J. Daley saw a way to build patronage systems and saw profit in the near lakefront and near downtown areas. He decided to kick the Puerto Ricans out to the suburbs and create a “suburb within the city in Lincoln Park.”

All this had an impact on people’s lives. We got into gang fights and drugs. I went to jail for drugs and began reading. Since I was still the president of the Young Lords gang, I was able to educate myself in jail and steer the gang into a different direction. However, it was the times and conditions, along with examples from many groups including the Chicano movement, the Puerto Rican Independence movement, The Black Power movement, the anti-war movement – Lincoln Park was a haven for hippies – which contributed to helping us change together. The Puerto Rican Nationalist Party, Movimiento Pro Independencia and Black Panthers played a major role. See the Schomburg museum article on what happened when I was in jail to lead me to changing the mission of the Young Lords gang.

Fight Back!: What type of community organizing did the Young Lords do?

Jimenez: I began doing street corner to street corner and bar to bar visits and then used my living room as a study group and sleep pad, since I was being evicted for non-payment of rent. We then studied right on the street corner by discussing news events or reading Mao Tse Tung’s Red Book while drinking wine, beer and smoking weed. Groups like LADO and especially Concerned Citizens of Lincoln Park were instrumental in helping to educate the members. It started like the size of a bean and grew like the size of a watermelon. It then spread to other cities via the then tabloids owned and published by all left-wing organizations.

Fight Back!: What successes did you have?

Jimenez: Everything we did was a success because our philosophy was always to turn all negatives into positives. Our people needed self-sustaining leaders to help them stay motivated and not leeches. We were kicked out of Lincoln Park but we built and sustained a Puerto Rican national liberation movement. It is why the U.S. will never be able to steal Puerto Rico from us because the Young Lords trained a new generation. It is why the Young Lords are role models.

Fight Back!: How did Young Lords see the world? Did your ideas develop over time?

Jimenez: We are a part of an international struggle as well as a local struggle. As Chairman Fred Hampton once said, “How can you go all the way to Vietnam without first crossing through the West Side of Chicago?” You cannot fight for Free Puerto Rico without fighting Mayor Richard J. Daley and his gentrification policies. But that is what our local leaders did. They even attacked the Young Lords to get crumbs from the Daley machine but the people will one day see right through their sellout boot-licking policies.

Fight Back!: Did Young Lords work with the African American movement? What about others?

Jimenez: Of course. Of course Puerto Rico is a direct colony of the United States the internationalist capitalist oppressor of the working class all over the world. Both the Black Panthers and Young Lords stand for working people especially the lumpen class that is the most oppressed section of workers. Everything progresses or degrades via a process, which is inter-related to time, conditions and place. You cannot compare the nation of Cuba to the nation of Puerto Rico. Cuba has already made a great revolution. But Puerto Ricans as a whole are only beginning to realize that they are a colony of the United States. They live under a system of capitalism not socialism. I cannot ask them to join the 10th International without first realizing that they are Puerto Ricans and that their names are supposed to be Pedro, Maria and Jose and not Peter, Mary and Joe. Puerto Ricans must go through a struggle for self -determination first; a nationalist struggle. In the process, they will realize the need for a class struggle. This involves practice not theory.

Fight Back!: What happened to the Young Lords?

Jimenez: The question is what happened to the white left, who decided to abandon the Black Panthers and Young Lords when things got hot, as if these groups who risked everything were just, some kind of a fad or that their movement was just some kind of entertainment. Think about this. The Black Panther Party Offices are blown away by police bullets, burned down and replaced by a Walgreens and their leader Chairman Fred Hampton is assassinated by a goon squad from Mayor Daley, the FBI and the Illinois state’s attorney’s office. And so now there is no office and the entire chapter of the Black Panthers is forced to break up and go underground.

Think about the Pastors of the Young Lords People’s Church are stabbed and the police is trying to insinuate that maybe it was the Young Lords. I have 18 felonies on me and the Young Lords entire central committee is forced underground to Tomah, Wisconsin. Can you imagine that environment and conditions?

Yet the Young Lords went only in retreat only to preserve themselves to be able to fight again because we believe like Mao that the object of any battle is to “preserve yourself while you destroy the enemy.”

The Young Lords did not run away like some in the white left did. We came back and fought Daley and COINTELPRO directly by uniting with others and mounting a successful aldermanic campaign that raised the morale of the entire movement. This campaign led to other campaigns in the Latino community and coalesced with other campaigns in the Black community and progressive white communities and this movement led to Harold Washington’s campaign and finally to Barack Obama’s victorious presidential campaigns. The Young Lords are a skeleton group today due to repression not only by the pigs but also by some opportunists from the left. Yet we have never stopped fighting and every year I do an event, and I am still head of the Young Lords no matter what city that I live in. I call the shots.

There are many Black Panthers still left in jail or underground and in exile, in places like Cuba. The cases of Reverend Bruce Johnson and his wife Eugenia Johnson and Reverend Sergio Herrera, who were stabbed multiple times are still unsolved cases. These were United Methodists pastors but the Young Lords entire central committee was forced underground then and unable to show support for them. Young Lords Manuel Ramos, Pancho Lind and Julio Roldan were also killed without justice being carried out. We will not forget them. We will always be reminded of how COINTELPRO and others have worked to split our movement so that we cannot organize together to free our nation of Puerto Rico. We will always work for unity. “Unidos venceremos” or “United will win!” It is not just a saying for us. It is a goal.

Fight Back!: What lessons do you want to convey as 50 years of Young Lords approaches?

Jimenez: That ours is a protracted struggle until victory and beyond!

#UnitedStates #PeoplesStruggles #PuertoRico #YoungLordsParty #Jose