On the US Elections

The International League of Peoples’ Struggle (ILPS)  hails the people of the U.S. who courageously stood up to voice their rejection of the fascist Trump regime.  In the face of the systemic disenfranchisement of millions of voters, aggressive and violent intimidation by state security forces and white supremacist groups, an economic crisis that has thrown 11 million workers into unemployment, and a pandemic that is sickening over 100,000 people per day throughout the country, the people of the U.S. organized to get rid of the autocrat in the White House. The defeat of Trump at the polls should not be seen as the victory of the Democratic party. Credit for the electoral defeat of Trump must be given to the people, who are still taking to the streets to demand fundamental changes in the U.S. so that the country serves the working people instead of the ruling class.

The months leading up to the election spectacle exposed cracks in the decaying U.S. empire. While the Republicans and Democrats fought over how many crumbs to dole out to a population losing a million or more jobs per week, they provided billions of dollars in stimulus funds to corporations. While failing to provide a national strategy to contain the pandemic that has so far afflicted 10 million people and claimed the lives of 240,000 nationwide, they left states and cities to individually deal with the health crisis. While squabbling over whether to spend more resources to expand the U.S. nuclear arsenal or invest in high tech weaponry, they remained unified in directing $700 billion to the U.S. military budget and intensifying the destabilization of sovereign states through tactics like sanctions and coups. While tens of thousands engaged in widespread, sustained protest in condemnation of police terror and killings of Black people, neither party agreed with demands for community control of the police.

Upon the electoral defeat of Trump, the Democratic party machinery wasted no time in attacking the slightest whiff of progressive elements within their own party. But the people have no time to waste on supporting a dying system that aims to just benefit one faction of the ruling class or another. No matter who is the individual at the helm of the U.S. imperialist government, the masses are clamoring for long term relief from an economy that prioritizes profits over the people’s needs.  An end to privatized healthcare for profit and the development of a public health infrastructure that plans for and can address a public health emergency. An end to imperialist war, repression, military intervention, occupation and sanctions. An end to the plunder of the land and its people, the root cause of the environmental and climate crisis. The sweeping away of the imperialist state that thrives on white supremacy and its replacement with a state that defends its people from racism, sexism and all bigotry.

The way forward continues to be organizing, mobilizing and building of the movement against imperialism and all reaction in the United States and worldwide.#

Len Cooper

ILPS Chairperson