Chicago, IL – Reminiscent of four years ago, the streets of Chicago may again turn red as tens of thousands of Chicago teachers prepare to strike over a concessionary contract when negotiations end on Oct. 11.

Red, the color of the 28,000-strong Chicago Teachers Union (CTU), has to be Mayor Rahm Emanuel’s and Chicago Public Schools (CPS) CEO Forrest Claypool’s least favorite color. Emanuel and Claypool have an agenda of austerity and privatization, against a strong and unified teachers union that demands quality, well-staffed neighborhood schools.

90% of CTU teachers, dissatisfied with Claypool’s proposals, authorized the strike because teachers are demanding modest pay raises, no cuts to health care, strong pensions and adequately-staffed classrooms with full resources for the children, among other demands.

The city has always portrayed the cutbacks in the schools as economically necessary. Again, as in 2012, the strike will be both about defending teachers and students. CTU executive board member Sarah Chambers, a special education teacher at Saucedo School in Chicago’s Little Village neighborhood, said, “When Rahm slashes special education and hurts our disabled students, that’s a choice, not a necessity. Laying off librarians until only one out of four schools have librarians is a choice, not a necessity. And Rahm choosing to pay his banker buddies over funding special education is a choice, not a necessity.”

Claypool and Emanuel, who have been making drastic budget cuts and closing dozens of schools, are pushing for a four-year contract that will reduce teacher wages and harm school conditions for the children.

When CTU struck in 2012, Chicagoans embraced them, and tens of thousands of supporters came out to support them, forcing Mayor Emmanuel and CPS to back down. The most recent polling by the Chicago Tribune has shown that 79% of African Americans, 77% of Latinos, and 76% of union households disapprove of Mayor Rahm Emanuel’s handling of education.

Governor Bruce Rauner, a billionaire out to destroy unions, has called for a takeover of CPS and wants CPS to declare bankruptcy. He’s made a special target of the teachers union. According to Chambers, “Rahm and Rauner are no longer the good friends they were when first elected, but the one thing they agree on is their desire to break the strength of the CTU.”

The Chicago Teachers Union has alerted workers everywhere that unions can fight and win, even against a mayor with White House connections and billionaire backing. CTU appears ready for this battle for both their members and their students.

To support CTU, sign up here to receive emails about actions you can take:

http://www.ctunet.com/action

#ChicagoIL #PeoplesStruggles #LaborParty #teachers #strike #TeachersUnions

Washington D.C. – Fed up with the domination of the U.S. government by big corporations, workers came to Washington D.C. for the second convention of the Labor Party, July 25-28. Over 500 delegates, representing many thousands of workers from unions, worker organizations and Labor Party chapters, as well as at-large delegates, came to challenge corporate power and set a course for workers to have a voice in the halls of government.

The Democrat and Republican politicians have been doing the work of the big corporations. Speaking to the convention about the two major parties Leo Gerard, International President of the United Steelworkers of America (USWA) said, “We don't know how bad we have been sold out by either group, but we know we have been sold out.”

The Labor Party seeks to elect candidates that will speak to and work for the working class, the class that represents the overwhelming majority of the people of this country. One after the other, farm workers, janitors, schoolteachers, nurses, truck drivers and factory workers went to the microphone. Workers talking to workers. They hammered out a plan to build a party that will contend successfully against the two corporate parties, the Democrats and the Republicans.

The plan includes building a movement around the economic demands of working people. In the coming years, the Labor Party will focus on three campaigns: Just Health Care, Workers Rights and Free Higher Education. With the support of labor unions and activist workers, they hope to build a party that is strong enough to contend for office.

Just Healthcare is a movement for national health insurance for all people. Canada has such a system in place. So, it had an extra impact when Canadian Leo Gerard of USWA told the convention, “I can not imagine a bigger double-cross exists than this private, for profit rip-off at every stop health care system.”

The Labor Party also calls for free higher education. Poor and working people should have the same access to this country's colleges and universities as the rich. The Labor Party has effectively drawn parallels to the G.I. Bill of Rights passed after World War II, which gave free higher education and a stipend to all returning veterans.

Also, the Labor Party has launched a campaign for workers' rights. If workers are to have any voice in the government, collectively or individually, the laws of this land need to be changed. Workers need the right to join and to build strong unions.

The Labor Party convention was a success by any measure. Yet the challenges ahead are daunting. The Labor Party looks to base itself in a labor movement that is under vicious attack by George Bush, the Republicans and sections of the Democratic Party. Liberal democrats will take huge contributions from unions, but when workers face a real fight, they do nothing, or go over to the other side.

Finally, the challenge to the working class is to transform our labor movement. The Labor Party will succeed if workers succeed in transforming labor unions – if the unions become the vehicles of class struggle instead of class collaboration. It is then that the trade union movement will see the need for an independent, workers' voice in government, a Labor Party.

#WashingtonDC #LaborParty #JustHealthcare #FastTrack #Elections

Washington, D.C. – “On every major headline issue of the day, the Labor Party, at its very inception in 1996, had charted a pathway to protect workers' interests. Now, more than ever before, workers of America should rededicate themselves to building their own movement.” states Labor Party National Organizer, Tony Mazzocchi.

Mazzocchi made this statement as the Labor Party prepares for the Build the Future: Labor Party Convention and Conference, to be held July 25-28 in Washington D.C. The Labor Party seeks to build a strong political party that can eventually challenge the Democrats and Republicans. Using the strategy of waiting to field candidates until enough strength has been accumulated to win elections, they're building a worker's party around worker's issues.

The massive resources of giant U.S. corporations have bought and paid for the Republican and Democratic parties. The Labor Party was founded on June 6, 1996, in Cleveland, Ohio as a step towards developing a real alternative for most everyone left out by this scheme.

Raising the slogan “The bosses have two parties, now we have one of our own,” the Labor Party has been striving to set itself up to be a party that fights for the interests of workers. Founded and financed by some of the most progressive, forward-thinking unions in the United States, the Labor Party wants to be a voice for all workers, not just those in unions.

The Labor Party supports a single-payer national health plan, called Just Healthcare. They have also spoken out against the so-called “welfare reform” of the two major parties, and favor an end corporate welfare. The Party has additional campaigns in progress around fair trade, and workplace rights. There are plans to launch a campaign for free higher education at the upcoming convention.

For more information about the Labor Party or the Labor Party convention and conference go to www.thelaborparty.org

#WashingtonDC #Washington #LaborParty #TonyMazzocchi #Elections