Since the lackluster presidential debate between Trump and Biden back in June, the U.S. news cycle has been largely dominated by the upcoming presidential election campaign. President Joe Biden has dropped out of the race to be replaced by his Vice President, Kamala Harris; there have been two assassinations attempts on the Republican nominee Donald Trump; and, despite the fact that neither candidate has anything to offer the working class, the race is shaping up to be one of the tightest in U.S history and could come down to a single electoral vote in Omaha of all places. 

　　But on September 12, the media’s obsession with the horse race of electoral politics was interrupted by 33,000 Boeing factory workers who broke onto the national scene and made headlines with what is, so far, the biggest strike of the year. The rank-and-file members of the International Association of Machinists & Aerospace Workers (IAM) defied their union leadership and rejected the Tentative Agreement (TA) proposed by Boeing on September 12. Over 94% of the workers voted against the TA, and 96% voted in favor of striking. It was an inspiring act of workers taking control of their own future. 

　　However, Boeing workers are not the only ones making waves. At the beginning of September, 10,000 hotel workers across the country went on strike, Marathon Refinery workers in Detroit are on the picket lines, Amazon workers are advancing their unionization efforts, the UAW union is getting ready for possible multiple strikes against Stellantis, Los Angeles County workers may go on strike on October 10th, and as many as 45,000 longshoremen may strike on October 1st, shutting down several major U.S. ports and potentially significantly disrupting the economy. 

　　A week-long port worker’s strike could cost the economy billions of dollars, with each day of clogged cargo taking over a week to clear. This would affect millions of specialized cargo containers and disrupt the flow of goods, halting the movement of factory components, vehicles, household goods, furniture and other consumer products, which would further disrupt supply chains and several manufacturing sectors including automotive production. 

　　While strike activity isn’t at the levels seen in the 1960s and 1970s, the increasing use of strikes as a tool to fight for workers’ demands is a positive sign. The working class is flexing its muscles, demonstrating its strategic power within the economy, and asserting itself as a national force that both political parties must address. 

　　These strikes offer a powerful alternative to the politics of Trump and Harris, both of whom are  leaning further right, with Harris promising she can militarize the border, police cities, and damage the environment better than Trump. The strikes highlight, and are in part a response to, the economic struggles workers are facing, including rising inflation, unaffordable rents, lack of childcare options, and rising benefit costs. 

　　It is in the interest of the ruling class parties to promote the belief that our political engagement is limited to what happens at the ballot box, making us think we can only act once every two or four years. Their attempts to win over the working class have been reduced to featuring union leaders at their conventions. However, it is not through bureaucratic union endorsements that we will achieve our demands, but through rank and file workers, like those at Boeing, who take matters into their own hands. 

　　Boeing not only produces commercial airplanes but they are also one of the largest defense contractors in the world, supporting Israel’s criminal campaigns in Palestine and Lebanon. If the Palestinian movement and the labor movement united their struggles, the potential would be immense, particularly because of the worker’s leverage over capital. In the same way, if the longshoremen and the Palestinian movement joined forces, they could wield significant influence, especially given the strategic importance of U.S. ports to military operations. 

　　As of now, President Joe Biden has said that he won’t use the Taft-Hartley Act to prevent the strike, as happened back in 2002 when the port strike threatened the preparation for the Iraq war. But this seems to be largely because the leadership of the ILU have shamefully sworn to continue to load and unload military cargo, even in the event of a strike. But the rank and file have the power, especially if they have the support of the movement behind them, to defy their leadership and to defy Taft-Hartley, and to bring an end to all weapons shipments through the ports of the East Coast and the South. To achieve this kind of action we will have to overcome the limits of the union bureaucracy, which checks the workers’ struggle at every turn. 

　　Despite the many mistakes of the Trump campaign, the race for president has remained exceptionally close, and the Democrats are using fear of Trump’s racism, xenophobia, and the far-right Project 2025 platform to gather the votes needed to secure a winning margin, while simultaneously conceding to anti-immigrant and pro-fracking propaganda. This was made abundantly clear in the last presidential debate when Harris proposed an imperialist right wing agenda and promised to be tougher than the Republicans on Immigration. Obviously, Kamala Harris is no solution to the rise of the Right. Only by using the firepower of the working class at our workplaces to strike against the racist and xenophobic, can we defeat them. Only by using the power of our labor can we confront poverty, genocide, and imperialism, while fighting to defend abortion rights, democratic rights and the rights of marginalized groups, including immigrants and Black communities. 

　　We need more than what these candidates are offering. The real solution lies in taking the fight into our own hands — organizing ourselves and rallying our unions and social movement organizations to form a united front against Trump, Harris, the Right, and the increasingly xenophobic and imperialist politics of both major parties. 

　　Editor: Zhong Yao  Deng Panyi 

　　From:https://www.leftvoice.org/labors-october-surprise-in-the-midst-of-presidential-elections-workers-are-rising-up//(2024-9-29)