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Our webinar on: The Ongoing Struggle of the People of Haiti, Les luttes du peuple Haïtien et les autres peuples des caraïbes, was held on Sunday / Dimanche, May 23 / 23 de Mai. It is available, with discussion in English and French, at: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-jSqjdJGlH4
Click here for more background info on the situation in Haiti. Cliquez ici pour plus d'informations sur la situation en Haïti.

Why an Independent Workers’ Party?

The struggle in the United States and around the world erupted onto the streets in 2020 after the murder of George Floyd as well as the deepest economic crisis since the 1930s. We workers, black and brown people, immigrants, women, LGBTQ+ people, indigenous communities, and youth must fight back. The people in the heart of the imperialist center must radically transform this country. The fractures in the US state apparatus have ushered in a new, fruitful moment for organizing our communities. This moment demands new, bold, and wide-sweeping action for all progressive organizers and activists.

In this tumultuous and historic context, the US held an election that disillusioned many progressive forces. On one side, there was a right wing authoritarian who deployed troops against peaceful protesters and separated immigrant families in brutal conditions; on the other a “tough on crime” moderate who repudiated national healthcare, police reform, and environmental action. We can no longer stand for this choice of the “lesser evil”. We demand another option—a third, working class party which will both join with working people in their day-to-day struggles as well as providing a progressive alternative during elections. This is an especially critical task for us as organizers in the US, the chief exporter of imperialist violence and oppression around the world.

We want to distinguish ourselves from other progressive groups by using our paper to reach out to workers and popular forces, not to other leftists. We call on all progressive forces who share our vision outlined in the platform below to organize and begin to fundamentally challenge and change the system of government in the US.

1) End police brutality; defund the police, community control of the police.
After 2001 and the war on terror, police departments became very militaristic and involved in almost every aspect of life in the US. While even the smallest administrative units have unnecessarily armed police forces with special equipment, police occupy schools, hospitals, and communities, especially poor and working class communities. The police budget has to be cut by state governments, and reallocated for educational, healthcare, and social purposes. Also departments should be demilitarized, Pentagon police aid programs have to be removed. To build the mass power necessary to see these aims realized, we must fight for community control of the police, a robust system of democratically elected, civilian councils that control discipline, funding, and the policy making of police departments.

2) Abolish I.C.E; end all discriminatory border policies, Full citizenship to refugees.
The U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement (I.C.E.) is a product of the post-9/11 anti-immigrant atmosphere and policies. However, the U.S. discriminatory policies have a long history. The U.S. interventionist policies cause destruction and dispersion of the countries today where most refugees and immigrants come from. The fights against imperialism and for the rights of immigrants are one. Borders should be open for all who seek refuge from the war and poverty, much of it created by imperialism. An issue that determines millions of workers’ lives like migration shouldn’t be a nebulous electoral propaganda source between Republicans and Democrats.

3) Jobs for everyone at a decent wage and livable income for those who are ineligible for work.
Today’s fragile economic situation, built on austerity after the 2008 crash, intensified the economic turmoil for the people during the COVID-19 pandemic. Today, according to the U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics, 21 million U.S. citizens are unemployed. Millions are either jobless, or have to work more than one job due to insufficient pay. The elderly and the mentally or physically handicapped do not have enough income to cover their expenses on meager disability payments, and are forced to work. We demand jobs or income now. $15 an hour is not enough to live a life with dignity and basic amenities in 2020 and beyond. American workers, working longer hours than they ever have, must receive fair, equitable wages.

4) Right to organize and strike for all workers. Organize the South.
Since the Trump administration came to power, legal attacks have intensified against unions. The National Labor Relations Board has become the sword of the current government against workers’ organizations. Rights to organize and strike are already weak or not in favor of workers after the Reaganite and anti-communist attacks on unionism in the 20th century, leaving workers without protection against austerity policies. On the other hand, the U.S. has seen the biggest rates of worker strikes during the last three years since 1986. However, unions do not do enough to defend workers’ rights, and workers don’t own their unions in many respects, as we saw during the UAW strike. Many unions, though certainly not all, were indifferent to George Floyd Protests until forced to reckon with them (as with the AFL). We must fight to spread and democratize the unionization movement. Repeal Taft-Hartley, unshackle unions, and give workers their unions back!

5) End the oppression of African-Americans, Latinos, Native Americans in the U.S.
Oppressed peoples in the U.S. have always suffered from the worst conditions in this country, including the highest levels of unemployment, lowest-paying jobs, worst health care and education, as well as the increased attacks by the police.. These conditions are the result of historical conditions in the U.S., beginning with the genocide of the Native peoples, enslavement of Africans, the occupation of northern Mexico and the colonization of Puerto Rico.

6) Support for all rights for women and families.
Women’s rights are under attack. These include the right to abortion, but also full funding of SNAP (food stamps), full availability of day care and other programs that predominantly affect women and children. Also, safe shelters for battered and abused women.

7) Free healthcare for all.
The pandemic has been a testament to how weak the healthcare system is, and how it brutalizes working class communities. Healthcare is not a test board for companies and the government that can be changed in every presidency. Healthcare services should be nationalized and free of charge, period. Full treatment and access has to be recognized for all regardless of their background.

8) Free education for all.
All universities, high, elementary and primary schools should be scientific, full access and free of charge. Universities must not be funded by grants from the US military and the military-industrial complex, so that true scientific research can be conducted that benefits and not harms the people. All the student loans must be forgiven, so that graduates can pursue their area of study without the omnipresent shadow of debt.

9) Alternatives to incarceration for non-violent offenders. Prisons should be for rehabilitation, not revenge. Abolish prisons for profit. Free all political prisoners.
The war on drugs explicitly attempted to criminalize entire areas of the country, abandoning even the most basic concept of justice. It has resulted in mass incarceration, which many private companies seek to continue because it is a source of free labor and the intensification of gentrification. Cases where a wrongful conviction was carried out must be reopened. Long non-violent sentences must be revisited, lowered, and in some cases cancelled. Losses caused by imprisonment to those families should be answered both financially and socially. The exception in 13th Amendment, allowing slave labor in prisons, should be removed.

10) Cancel all rents until the end of the crisis. Rents should be reduced to 25% of income.
The pandemic has hit working class communities with more problems. We are either an “essential hero” or jobless and at risk of homelessness. Rents have risen arbitrarily over the last decade while landlords provide decreasing service and upkeep. With our current wages, we cannot afford our rent, particularly during a pandemic when job security has been seriously imperiled for millions of people. All rent must be cancelled until the crisis lessons and jobs are more secure. Rent controls must be instituted, to bring under control the rapid and needless increase of rent.

11) Full housing rights to all!
Homelessness can be resolved simply by filling the millions of vacant homes in the USA. Everyone has to have clean, safe, and usable housing. The balues of people's lives shouldn’t be measured by credit scores, and corporate leeches must stop feeding on the hopes of the working class by issuing usurious housing loans.

12) End any form of imperialist intervention. Stop all wars. Close all military bases abroad and withdraw all troops, cease support to mercenaries.
The U.S. global supremacy caused nothing but pain, terror, and destruction. The trillions spent for war can be used for education, healthcare, and social infrastructure in general. Peace must be established, the U.S., under true working class control, can be a force for peace in the world and not death and destruction as it has been for centuries.

Sixth issue of the Torch

Fifth issue of the Torch

Fourth issue of The Torch

Statement on the Murder of Tyre Nichols

Third issue of The Torch

Second issue of The Torch


First issue of The Torch,


To download the file as a pdf, click on the image above.

Some articles were shortened, or had graphics omitted, in the print version. The full articles can be found here

We are in Great Depression Two

New Sparks in the Workers' Movement

Some letters and articles were omitted because they were either similar to what was in the print edition or where taken from other publications. They can be found here: