NYC: neighbors vs. ICE raids

ICE Activity surged in New York City the week following July 27th. Key targets included Inwood, Washington Heights, and Crotona. In uptown Manhattan, ICE agents targeted neighborhoods with key access to the Major Deegan and West Highway, major  arteries that connect to the George Washington bridge that lead back to New Jersey and Delaney Hall, where immigrant workers are being illegally detained. Workers and other residents of Inwood and the Bronx, including members of Progressive Labor Party, have been extremely impactful in protecting their neighborhood since I.C.E. presence in New York increased three months ago.

ICE agents spotted between Van Cortlandt Park and Washington Heights were monitored and tailed down by Bronx and Upper Manhattan neighbors. On Tuesday, July 28th, several watchful eyes uncovered an ICE hangout spot usually designated as a police hangout in the Van Cortlandt Park Golf Course Parking lots on both the Jerome Avenue and Bailey Avenue sides. Inwood neighbors helped to protect the Bronx, chasing down ICE vehicles in their cars and away from the Bronx. They were soon chased into Queens where ICE continued activity in Crotona. 

A known ICE vehicle was spotted at Inwood Hill Park on Seaman Avenue and Isham Street and continued to remain parked with little activity until the next day, when it had moved from its spot. The following Thursday, the vehicle returned and parked before it was joined by several other vehicles waiting for a police officer to hand a victim over to them. After the officer handed over the detained worker to the agents, Inwood residents confronted them as they documented the scene. One woman was sprayed with bear mace, demonstrating the cowardice of these federal thugs. 

Several more neighbors appeared on the scene after their departure with a few reactionary hecklers hurling vitriol in support of the bosses. A neighborhood-wide demonstration wrapped up the week of activity as protestors demanded an end to ICE presence in Inwood and to abolish ICE. The work of Inwood residents shows the potential of working class power. A handful of concerned neighbors are able to chase away federal agents and stand up for the working class when the going gets tough. They are the tough that gets going that is the spirit necessary for true working class power, not to demand a negative peace, but for taking control of our lives and our affairs. 

The demand of the bosses to be rid of our neighbors to continue to sow fear amongst the working masses, drive up housing and living costs, and bleed every penny of the working class until we wrestle over the remaining scraps will not be won. But their loss must come with the victory of the working masses over their capitalist overlords, and more work must be done to secure that victory. 

ICE activity has surged in recent weeks in the most vulnerable neighborhoods of New York City, namely Crotona, Belmont, Washington Heights, Jackson Heights, and Bed-Stuy among others. The rampant surge in activity is one we cannot ignore, something that requires much greater precision and greater force to deal with than whistles and sighting reports. It’s going to take an effort of millions to end this capitalist aggression. \

It’s going to take a communist revolution.
*****

Worker-rider unity need to smash transit bosses 

Shortly after the transit workers in Washington DC rallied for safety with the slogan “Don’t Quote the Fare” (CHALLENGE 7/15), a passenger assaulted a bus operator, striking him several times with a heavy object after the driver mentioned the fare and asked the rider to step behind the line. The partial plastic shield was not enough to keep the operator from being punched and doused in some liquid and being punched some more. Another rider stepped up to tell the rider to get off the bus, and he ran away. What did the bosses do about this video they had on tape? They sent the driver for a drug test and hid the video for several days. Management also had a separate event where they talked about how safe the Metro system is, but never mentioned this event or the risk to operators. Ten years ago, the bosses decided to have drivers refrain from asking riders for the fare because of such assaults, but recently, desperate for funding, they changed the policy, making it more dangerous. 

Today, the leadership and staff of the ATU 689 transit union held a press conference to protest this dangerous policy. They did not, however, mobilize workers to join the event that was covered by several news stations. The union also did not call for free fares, which would benefit riders and operators, but called for more transit police on the buses. One rider pointed out that connecting bus lines are free, so some riders get upset when they are suddenly asked to pay. He agreed that this should be a free public service. Some of the workers also mentioned that a complete plastic cage should be on each bus so that such assaults can’t happen – but that project hasn’t moved forward through the Metro system. Safety projects are simply not prioritized. Progressive Labor Party members shared the issue of CHALLENGE that reported on the earlier rally with the riders and drivers listening to the press conference. We explained that more police are not the answer to this safety problem, but spending money to make the buses safer and eliminating the fare are the next steps in the fight to build unity between riders and operators. DC area capitalists make big profits from the transit system that brings customers to their doors and workers to their jobs, and then expect us to pay for their profits in fares and income taxes. PLP members will continue to reach out to workers and riders to demand no layoffs, no fares, and safety first, while explaining about the need for mass working class organizing and militant action. The capitalists are not bothered by press conferences when union leaders are not willing to intensify the struggle with labor action. The bosses’ press, like the bosses’ politicians, are not going to help in the struggle. We need to shed the illusion that the press or supposedly progressive politicians will work for us, and take direct action into our own hands.
*****

Baltimore Project an opportunity to lead 

I’m writing  about my experience during the Baltimore Summer Project. When I heard from my lead comrade that each area was doing their own summer project, I was curious about what ours would entail. We discussed this in our club and decided that me and a comrade of ours (whom I regularly do mass work with at Baltimore City Community College) would be the main organizers of the event. Personally, I felt nervous about being in a leadership role, since this would be the first time being in one since I joined last year. Our local club would meet with the surrounding clubs in the DMV online to discuss the logistics and agendas for each area’s summer project. Our agenda included meeting up at Mondawmin Mall to sell CHALLENGE, give speeches and chants, and distribute fruits, granola bars, and water at the metro station.

During the first day of the summer project, ten people showed up. We also had 47 CHALLENGE newspapers in our inventory. We set up at the entrance to the metro station to start shouting chants. While we were chanting, a worker interrupted us. He said that our bullhorn was interfering with his radio and told us to move away from the subway entrance. We moved our materials a few feet away from the entrance. In the midst of our comrade’s speech, an officer came up to them and said that we have to move our bullhorn across the street. To keep this brief, every time we started to speak or chant with our bullhorn, the police would interfere with our rally minutes later. Those moments were annoying. At the very least, I read a speech about police terror around the world. And we distributed all 47 copies of CHALLENGE!

Since the police clearly didn’t want us to make some noise there, we marched our way to the local stores at the mall. As we were chanting in front of the Dunkin Donuts, a disruptor with a black fez started to yell at us —even calling one of our comrades a “cracker.” As he tried getting closer to the speaker, me and a few other comrades shielded our speaker. It was our club leader comrade who gave two speeches at that point, leading the disruptor away from the crowd. I happened to overhear the man say that [Zorhan] “Mamdani is a communist.” He sounded a bit confused, if you ask me. Eventually, the director of security at the mall said we couldn’t chant here because it’s “private property.” When asked by my co-organizer for the project who owns the property, the director couldn’t give us a straight answer. As we marched to the far end of the station, the heckler went inside the mall. In the midst of our marching, the director followed us into the parking lot; where we were chanting in front of him.

After our rally at Mondawmin Mall, we took the subway to The Peale Museum. The museum showcased Tyrone West’s artwork alongside other pieces of artwork from victims of police brutality. There were many beautiful and inspiring works on display. The exhibit carried a heavy atmosphere, with one comrade saying that they could cry. After the heaviness from The Peale, we took the subway back to Mondawmin Mall to travel down to Hyattsville for some dinner. 

Overall, I enjoyed the summer project more than I thought. Even though I felt a little nervous about co-leading it, I felt energized and ready, despite the less than stellar conditions from the air quality. Maybe there should be an anti-communist heckler on May Day as well!
*****

NYC: straight to communism?

One highlight of the New Jersey and New York summer project in July was selling CHALLENGE outside of a group of apartment buildings in New Jersey. What distinguished the sale from other ones I’ve done was the high level of interest from middle and older elementary school students. Lots of students paused while we were selling the paper to read the headline and ask for a copy. One middle schooler stopped for several minutes to listen to our comrade giving a speech on the bullhorn. She said “This is IT!” and “My mom needs to hear this!” One of her friends tried to hurry her away, “Let’s go!” and she replied, “Wait, I want to hear this!” I went over to speak to her and her friends. The student shared that she wanted to speak out about issues she notices. The group of us had a conversation about segregated schools and racism at school. 

When I was closing out my speech on the bullhorn, a high school student came over to me and asked, “socialism or communism?” I said, “communism.” He replied, “straight to communism?” Those of us on the corner had a discussion with him for a while. He told us that he had seen  CHALLENGE newspaper before— eight years prior on his door step! After our discussion, he met some of our comrades that live in the neighborhood and even gave a speech at end-of-day closing share-out. It was a reminder that everything we do counts, and that even a small impression at a young age can stick in someone’s mind. Workers and students alike are looking for a solution to the bleak future capitalism has to offer. We must be there to raise communist ideas wherever we go. 
*****

Capitalists seek oil opportunities in Venezuela

The Guardian, 8/14–BP [British Petroleum] has…new plans to develop a large offshore gasfield. BP will partner with two oil firms with close links to the Trump administration to develop the second phase of the Loran gasfield in one of the first large-scale foreign investments in Venezuela since the US ousted its leader Nicolás Maduro in January. The London-listed oil company holds a licence to develop the field alongside a Qatari company owned by the Al-Khayyat brothers… BP will also work alongside the overseas investment arm of UAE’s national oil company…The deal makes BP one of the first large-scale international oil firms to return to Venezuela after rival Shell secured a licence to develop the first phase of the Loran field earlier this summer. 

Apologists for capitalism discuss anger and resentment at the system

Wall Street Journal, 8/10–Inequality is a feature of capitalism and a sign of its health. It isn’t only functionally efficient but morally proper…it is that very inequality and the incentives it produces that make capitalism so uniquely good at generating the resources and opportunity…But it’s also empirically obvious that the wider the inequality, the more social solidarity diminishes. At some point disintegrating cohesion produces costs—social, economic and political—that undermine the benefits of inequality and erode support for the system itself…

Vietnam enters the race to build capitalist war machine

Reuters, 8/10–Vietnam has begun construction on what it describes as the country’s largest and most advanced domestically made anti-submarine frigate, a military-owned newspaper reported. The vessel…will also have most of its weapons and military equipment developed or assembled in the country…Vietnam…has been seeking to expand its domestic defence manufacturing capabilities while reducing reliance on imported military hardware sourced largely from Russia. The project underscores Vietnam’s policy of developing a defence industry that is “autonomous, self-reliant, self-strengthening, dual-use and modern”, according to a government statement…

Mamdani needs bosses’ Tisch run the racist NYPD show

HellgateNYC, 8/21–Since Zohran Mamdani announced in November that he planned to keep NYPD Commissioner Jessica Tisch on as his police commissioner, she has resisted his agenda. She declined to make good on the mayor’s campaign promises to dismantle the Strategic Response Group or defang the NYPD’s controversial gang database. Mamdani’s campaign vision for a total overhaul to public safety, moving many social services responsibilities away from police…has not materialized. Low level arrests for things like fare evasion have continued apace, if not increased. Despite these betrayals of his progressive base, the mayor has very little incentive to change the leadership of the NYPD, because he’s getting exactly what he needs from Tisch, and he has repeatedly said as much…the mayor, who once called the NYPD “racist, anti-queer & a major threat to public safety,” did not hesitate. “Yes,” he said. “I would not have someone serving our City if I was not confident in what they were doing.”

As U.S. economy sinks, military recruitment expands

Military.com, 8/11–After several years of the Army and Navy publicly missing their recruiting targets by thousands of people, the Defense Department’s five military branches had hit or exceeded their fiscal year 2026 recruiting goal…part of what’s driving record enlistment numbers is…a civilian job market that isn’t offering young Americans as many good options as it used to…An official for Army Recruiting Command described the dynamic…using what economists call the Beveridge Curve, which compares the unemployment rate against the number of available job openings. Historically, low unemployment paired with a high number of job openings signals a healthy, growing labor market that competes hard with military recruiters for young talent. 

Kidnapped workers sent to Haiti 

APNews, 8/20–The U.S. deported more than 160 people to Haiti on Thursday for the first time since the Trump administration won a legal battle to end Temporary Protected Status for some 350,000 Haitians. The plane landed in the northern Haitian city of Cap-Haitien because the main international airport in Port-au-Prince is considered too dangerous. The U.S. government currently has a ban on U.S. commercial flights to Haiti’s capital through early September because of ongoing gang violence.

Over the last several months, Iran has successfully closed the Strait of Hormuz, with oil tanker passage down by as much as 95 percent. The resulting price spikes and drops in exports for both oil and fertilizer have devastated the international working class. The United Nations predicts that 45 million people will be pushed into extreme hunger, mostly in Africa and Asia (4/20). 

The war in Iran is, fundamentally, a dogfight among imperialists for control over oil. The U.S. bosses are desperate to cling to their control over the world’s oil supply, the lifeblood of the U.S. empire. Meanwhile, Chinese and Iranian bosses have jumped in to exploit U.S. weakness. Chinese capitalists are forcing more countries into their orbit by manipulating oil prices and renewable tech in their bid to become the top-dog imperialist.

Iran’s capitalist rulers have seized the opportunity to further entrench their anti-worker regime and potentially expand their military and business enterprises across the Middle East. None of these bosses care a lick about their own workers, whom they are willing to sacrifice by the millions to protect their profits. The international working class has no choice but to turn these imperialist conflicts into class war and to end the profit system for all time.

War with Iran hastens U.S. decline

The evident defeat of the U.S. ruling class in Iran is accelerating the fall of the world’s once-dominant superpower. U.S. control over the region’s oil has been a core part of its imperialist strategy since the end of World War II. It established the dollar as the world’s unchallenged reserve currency and allowed the U.S. to punish any smaller capitalists who step out of line (see box on oil history in our next issue).

Of late, however, the U.S. bosses can’t seem to get out of their own way. The big multinational oil companies went all in on Donald Trump in 2024, with 88 percent of their campaign donations backing Republicans and their pro-oil policies. Their bet is paying off. Even as U.S. intelligence agencies have concluded that more bombing will have no effect on negotiations with Iran (Washington Post, 7/20), “Chevron reported net income of $12.2bn for the second quarter, a more than fivefold increase on the same period last year. ExxonMobil reported a profit of $14.5bn, double what it made in the same period a year ago” (Guardian, 8/4). The problem for the U.S. ruling class is that this naked profit-seeking undermines the broader interests of U.S. imperialism. With its Patriot missile interceptors severely depleted (Al Jazeera, 8/9), the U.S. is less able to honor its security guarantees to Saudi Arabia and the other petro-states. And as the U.S. bosses find their interests threatened, they will become even more reckless and dangerous—regardless of which party wins the next midterm or presidential election.

In the bigger picture, the U.S. capitalists’ reliance on fossil fuels, an outlook based on short-term maximum profits, is a growing threat to capitalism writ large.  With greenhouse gas pollution still rising, 3 degrees of global warming now looks increasingly likely—a prescription for famine, drought, and mass migration that could devastate economies and threaten the lives of billions (Current Affairs, 8/6).

China’s renewables empire

The Chinese imperialists are at the center of an alliance to break the U.S. monopoly over global finance. U.S. economic sanctions are having less and less impact. When the Biden administration imposed severe sanctions against Russia after the invasion of Ukraine, a number of traditional U.S. allies—including Turkey, Israel and India—refused to comply and continued doing business with Vladimir Putin.

As the world’s largest importer of oil, China essentially controls the market. With vast stores of oil in reserve, huge strides in electrification and renewables, and the ability to control domestic industrial demand, China can raise or lower the short-term oil price by up to 30 percent (The Economist, 8/9). At the same time, China’s global dominance in the clean energy technologies of the future—notably solar, wind, and batteries—represents “the biggest energy security threat in history,” according to the head of the International Energy Agency. Earlier this year, 50 countries set records for imports of Chinese solar panels (CNN, 4/26). China is using renewable energy to steadily expand its sphere of influence in preparation for the next world war.

Iran’s bosses cashing in

At least 4,000 Iranian workers have died in the war so far, with tens of thousands more wounded, including over 1,600 children (Al Jazeera, 7/20). Two-thirds of all U.S. attacks have hit residential, commercial, or other civilian buildings (Bloomberg, 4/21). More than three million people have been displaced, mostly people fleeing urban centers for fear of being killed by U.S. or Israeli bombs (NRC, 3/27). 

Despite this devastating toll to workers, the Iranian bosses, led by the leadership of the Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps, are seeking to escalate the conflict (see box) and expand their own profit base in the region. They see the war as a potential opportunity to expel the U.S. from bases in the region. 

Fight back! 

Wars over natural resources are inevitable under capitalism, regardless of which set of bosses are in charge. In their rush to profit from oil extraction, none of these bosses will stop from creating misery on a scale never before seen. Our class must intervene by building a mass revolutionary movement to seize state power and build a new world, where workers will balance their need for energy with their need for a livable planet. Progressive Labor Party seeks to lead the way into this communist future—join us!

Iranian bosses are strait ca$hing in

The Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps (IRGC) is tasked with enforcing theocratic capitalist rule in Iran, including sexist dress codes and other harsh rules for behavior. The IRGC took a lead role in the January crackdown that slaughtered at least 5,000 protesters and possibly thousands more (Amnesty, 1/26). The IRGC is also a sprawling capitalist enterprise that extracts profits from oil exports, airports, dams, railways, pipelines, and engineering and construction companies, within Iran and around the world. They stand to make billions more from the tolls they’re demanding for safe passage through the Strait of Hormuz—a protection racket, no more and no less. On top of these so-called legal enterprises, the Guard Corps runs a massive smuggling operation for alcohol, tobacco, firearms, and narcotics, to the tune of $12 billion per year (Fortune,  3/2)

Iran’s new supreme leader, Mojtaba Khamenei, is closely tied to the IRGC. He is estimated to control $3 billion in luxury assets around the world. His father, the assassinated Ali Khamenei, may have controlled as much at $200 billion (Forbes, 7/29).

NEW JERSEY & NEW YORK, JULY 12-18—Amidst sharpening inter-imperialist rivalry, fascist terror and the ever-clearer bankruptcy of liberal and fake left misleadership, the revolutionary communist Progressive Labor Party (PLP) of the New Jersey-New York City metropolitan area raised the red flag high with comrades from Virginia to Boston at our weeklong 2026 Summer Project! Each day was hosted by different collectives that showcased past and current antiracist, antisexist struggles with study groups discussing aspects of the Party’s line, and our revolutionary working class philosophy and guide to action, dialectical materialism.

New Jersey: Communist politics in our pockets

We kicked off the project by meeting in a neighborhood park in Newark where the Party has been organizing for over 40 years. The collectively made lunch was soon followed by two young comrades welcoming over 30 friends and comrades to the summer project, summarizing one of the most important goals of the week: building and training new leaders.   

After the speeches, two veteran comrades led a workshop called “Speech in a Pocket.” As communists we understand the importance of giving political leadership in moments of struggle on campus or on the job, and the workshop was designed to train comrades and friends to give communist speeches on the spot. Participants were given an actual scenario and had to think about the audience they were talking to and asked to think of three points that they wanted to make. The leaders helped organize these points into a communist speech by first “finding the trick” the bosses use in each scenario to divide the working class. Most often, it’s racism or its liberal counterpart, identity politics; nationalism, and sexism.

Our job is then to introduce internationalism and why communism is the only solution. 

One highlight was a young woman from Jamaica struck by the following realization: workers in Jamaica face mass displacement and environmental destruction by mining companies extracting bauxite, a key mineral in electronics and AI. This creates a material international connection between them and workers across the U.S. fighting displacement and environmental destruction from AI data centers built with this bauxite. Therefore, our fightback and our Party must be international, from Jamaica to the U.S. to the DRC and beyond!

This echoes Russian communist leader V.I. Lenin’s point that communist ideas must “come from the outside.” This doesn’t mean that “communists are outsiders,” which anticommunists love to say. It means communist ideas don’t arrive to people spontaneously, and must be introduced amidst struggle.

Illustrating this point, we then took our newspaper CHALLENGE to the residents of a large multiracial immigrant apartment complex where PL’ers are active in organizing a tenant union. One of the tenants we met remembered seeing CHALLENGE years before from previous organizing, and another excited resident shared an opportunity to meet their fellow Muslim immigrant residents who have been angry at conditions in the building and want to organize.

On our second day we made our way to north New Jersey where some comrades are organizing in “Trump loyalist territory” against a proposed AI data center that has given the Party an opportunity to spread our politics amongst workers in the region. Young comrades then led a powerful dialectical materialism workshop on contradiction, quantity into quality, and negation of the negation, vividly using the recent New York Knicks championship to illustrate the three laws in action. After the workshop, comrades went to a local lake to relax.

The third day, PLP once again made their presence felt through Newark as we led a motorcade from the West Ward of Newark all the way to Delaney Hall. With banners such as Smash Racist Deportations, Smash Sexism, and Fight For Communism! Our goal was to connect the housing struggles in Newark to the ICE concentration camp at Delaney Hall. In Newark, Black workers continue to face worsening conditions by slumlords and rising rental prices. The ICE attacks are not just an attack on migrant workers, but they are setting the stage to attack all workers who are fighting against these conditions. 

As we wound our way into the Ironbound of Newark, where multiple ICE raids had taken place, our bullhorn rang out throughout the streets while students and workers came up to the cars to get CHALLENGE and raised their fists in support of our motorcade. Eventually we got to Delaney Hall, had a spirited rally in the heat where comrades gave their “speeches in a pocket,” and moved the project to NYC.

NYC: Building the fightback across five boroughs

With dangerous  air quality  from the Canadian wildfires and a desire to keep each other safe, our collective leadership decided to cancel our planned Thursday activities for the Bronx and upper Manhattan and instead meet locally for study groups around the houses where people were staying. 

On Friday, we gathered for a report on work from the Flatbush neighborhood, where a longtime friend’s sister, Shantel Davis, was the victim of racist police murder, and shared the history of the struggle for justice and naming a street in Shantel’s name. Over the years of fighting for justice, she saw the same patterns of capitalist politicians coopting or attempting to coopt and control every other family fighting for their own justice – and she realized the contradiction was between relying on these capitalist politicians and sellout misleaders, or the potential power of the working class. 

Our discussion elaborated that communist organizing among the working class is deeply personal to our life experiences, and ultimately, we face a choice: we can either look up to these sellout politicians defending this capitalist pyramid of abuse, or look to our class siblings, share our communist politics and fight to overthrow it. But these ideas are in contradiction. We cannot build for revolution while compromising through voting for politicians like Mamdani, because through state power the bosses ultimately pick politicians that represent their class interests. If we agree that communism is the only solution, especially for smashing racist police terror, then we must pick – and intensify – that side of the contradiction. Otherwise we follow the sellout path and, at best, repeat the failures of the old communist movement. 

On the closing day of the project, more than 50 comrades and friends gathered at a community space donated by base members for a presentation on neighborhood anti-ICE organizing. The presentation was hosted by a multiracial group of women antiracist fighters from a South Brooklyn anti-ICE group that PL’ers have organized in over the past year. While poor weather prevented our breakout teams from patrolling and canvassing the neighborhoods, our backup indoor activities and youth-led study group on reform versus revolution were lifted by delicious Mexican food donated by workers in our political base. When PL’ers passed the hat to offer tips to the workers, the workers refused and told us the money will be used to prepare food for our next event!

As the fascists prepare sharper attacks on the international working class, PLP’s NJ-NY Summer Project welcomed new young comrades into our Party and displayed the organization and potential of our area collectives in building a mass, fighting Party that, in the coming period, will take this escalating class war all the way to communist revolution. The future is bright  – JOIN US!