Joe Biden and other Democrats have spent the last four years repeating the mantra “no one is above the law.” Yet Biden has advocated policies that would, as the San Francisco Chronicle recently noted, effectively make the United States a sanctuary country.
BIDEN'S DEFACTO AMNESTY
President Joe Biden’s administration, on a broad scale, has been utilizing a work-around to funnel border crossers and illegal aliens into American jobs. The policy has allowed at least hundreds of thousands to enter the U.S. labor market in the last two years with work permits approved by the U.S. Citizenship and Immigration Services (USCIS) agency.
JOHN BINDER
The Rasmussen Reports/NumbersUSA poll surveyed midterm election voters, finding that 69 percent support the federal government requiring U.S. employers to screen potential hires through the electronic E-Verify system to ensure illegal aliens are not hired for jobs over American citizens and legal immigrants.
Across all racial demographics, a majority said they support nationwide mandatory E-Verify — including 73 percent of Hispanic Americans, 70 percent of black Americans, and 68 percent of white Americans.
Sen. Chuck Grassley (R-IA) and Rep. Mo Brooks (R-AL) introduced bills this year to mandate E-Verify across the U.S. but the legislation stalled in the House and Senate Judiciary Committees with a lack of support from Democrats and Republicans.
JOHN BINDER
‘He Claims To Be Pro-Labor But He’s Not’: Buttigieg’s Focus On Midterms During Stalled Rail Negotiations Strains Relationship With Unions
Transportation Secretary Pete Buttigieg was a no-show in negotiations with the rail works union at a key inflection point, opting instead to hit the campaign trail for Democrats ahead of the midterms and leave the heavy lifting to other officials, a move that has angered the secretary's onetime union allies.
The outrage came after the White House designated Buttigieg as a point man for a new labor agreement with the country's rail worker unions when negotiations began breaking down in September, according to Politico. Although other officials made public efforts to reach a deal—Labor Secretary Marty Walsh in September said his team spent "20 consecutive hours" at the negotiating table in a press release—neither Buttigieg nor the Department of Transportation, which did not respond to an interview request, made public statements on Buttigieg's role in negotiations.
But Buttigieg was a regular on the campaign trail, attending more candidate rallies than any other Biden administration official. Union leaders—who sought paid sick leave—told the Washington Free Beacon they no longer see Buttigieg as a friend to their cause.
"He claims to be pro-labor but he’s not," said retired rail worker Marilee Taylor, who now works at the Railroad Workers United, in a nod to Buttigieg's ambitious campaign pledges. "He has no idea the conditions working people face. He sits in an office and climate controlled rooms wearing a suit all day. He doesn’t have any idea of what we do."
The stakes of the contract negotiations between rail workers and their bosses couldn’t have been higher, with workers threatening a strike that could cripple the U.S. economy. As Walsh sat for marathon negotiation sessions in Washington, D.C., in September to avoid a strike, Buttigieg was in Michigan, a midterm battleground state, at the Detroit Auto Show and an awards dinner. At the dinner, Buttigieg expressed his "appreciation to all the parties that stayed at the table," and celebrated the "good news" that a tentative agreement was reached. The Department of Labor's announcement of the agreement made no mention of Buttigieg or the Department of Transportation as participants in the negotiations.
Rail workers said they thought they would have an ally in Buttigieg, who enjoyed months of paid paternity leave last year, when it came to worker benefits. Helping a major Democratic voting bloc achieve their goal of getting paid sick days—the main sticking point in the negotiations—could have been an easy way to bolster pro-labor bona fides.
The two sides never reached a final deal. Biden, with the public backing of Buttigieg, turned to Congress. Following a days-long pressure campaign on congressional Democrats from Buttigieg and other White House officials, Biden signed into law a new contract for the nation's rail workers on Dec. 2. The workers never received their paid sick days.
Rail worker Matt Weaver said he was initially "excited" about Buttigieg’s appointment to run the Department of Transportation. When Buttigieg was nominated, transportation unions heralded the pick and cited his meetings with organized labor during his failed presidential run in 2020 as a sign that he would stand with them.
"I think he is qualified, I just never heard a whole lot pertaining to freight rail labor unions though," Weaver told the Free Beacon. "Pete’s not exactly been a cheerleader for our unions."
After the tentative deal in September, Buttigieg jetted off to New Hampshire so that he could headline the Eleanor Roosevelt Dinner hosted by the state's Democratic Party. One of the largest Democratic fundraisers in the state, the event featured a number of the party’s candidates up for election.
Buttigieg’s remarks at the dinner made no reference to the potentially disastrous rail strike. Instead, he spoke of the United States’ "never ending journey to become greater and our refusal to settle for things as they are." He later traveled to Nevada to headline a fundraiser for Sen. Catherine Cortez Masto and then knocked doors for her. In an interview with a local outlet, Buttigieg spoke about "a woman’s right to make decisions about her own body" and gay marriage.
Few other members of the electorate are more important for any Democrat seeking office than organized labor. Their endorsements—or ire—can doom a candidate's bid. A study from the Center for American Progress concluded that union members "cemented President Biden's electoral victory" in 2020.
According to the unions, rail workers need paid sick days to operate their positions safely and effectively. The new contract signed into law by Biden earlier this month includes more personal days, although workers say they must give up to 30 days notice to use them.
Some Republicans, such as Sens. Josh Hawley (Mo.) and Marco Rubio (Fla.), saw Buttigieg and the Biden administration’s inability to negotiate a contract as a political opportunity to show solidarity with blue-collar voters. The pair, along with three other Senate Republicans, voted against forcing the contract on rail workers without sick pay.
"This was the White House and management and union bosses teaming up to use federal law to force workers to accept contracts they rejected in negotiations," Hawley said in a Dec. 1 statement. "And then people in D.C. wonder why working Americans think the system is rigged."
Even unions that weren't impacted by the contract said they won't forget the Biden administration's conduct. The American Postal Workers United said the negotiations proved to be "a fundamental test of ‘Which Side Are You On?'"
"This administration and the majority of the Democratic-controlled House of Representatives and Senate failed," the union said.
Democratic Socialists of America scrambles to defend its role in imposing rail contract
The Railroad Workers Rank-and-File Committee has announced an online rally this Tuesday at 7:00 p.m. Eastern/ 4:00 p.m. Pacific time to oppose Washington’s imposition of a contract that workers rejected to block a national strike. Register for the event here. All supporters of the railroaders are urged to attend.
The Democratic Socialists of America has been thrown into crisis after three of its four members in the House of Representatives voted to impose a contract on the railroad workers, blocking a national rail strike. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez, Jamaal Bowman and Cori Bush all voted in favor of the bill, with only Rashida Tlaib voting against.
Together with Bernie Sanders in the Senate, the DSA-backed caucus introduced a separate resolution to give railroaders seven days paid sick leave. This was purely political theater to provide the Democrats with political cover. It had no chance of passing the Senate over opposition from Republicans and even right-wing Democrats such as Joe Manchin. And it was crafted in such a way that its passage in the House but rejection in the Senate would not even delay the signing of the anti-strike law.
In the Senate, Sanders cast a meaningless “no” vote against imposing the contract, but his support was critical for the expedited procedure through which it was passed, because under Senate rules it requires the support of all 100 senators.
The role of the DSA shocked and angered many of its own members, which include sincere but politically inexperienced youth who joined in the belief that the DSA was a genuinely socialist organization.
The DSA leadership, meanwhile, is in full damage control mode. The DSA Political Committee issued a statement Monday titled “Stand with Railworkers, Build Workers Power,” which was in reality wholly devoted to whitewashing the role of the DSA in illegalizing a strike by railroaders.
“We condemn the move by President Biden and Congress to force over 100,000 rail workers to accept the TA by denying them the legal right to strike,” the statement claimed. It added, “When every major power in the country—the center, the right, and our laws—aligned against workers, DSA members in Congress introduced a legislative push for sick days, and forced a vote on the measure, which did not succeed.”
After praising Rashida Tlaib’s vote against imposing the contract, the statement then adds in passing, several sentences down, “We disagree and are disappointed with the decision of DSA members Rep. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez and Rep. Cori Bush to needlessly vote to enforce the TA.”
The DSA is trying to cancel out public perception of its support for the anti-strike law by citing its support for adding seven sick days to the contract that Congress voted to impose. But even if this fig leaf had passed, it still would not have changed the fact that DSA members voted to strip workers of their democratic right to strike, which is a far more fundamental issue than sick days.
The DSA Political Committee statement tries to falsely separate the actions of Biden and the Democratic Party, of which it is a part, from the DSA. In reality, the DSA is a critical element of the Democrats’ attempts to keep workers and leftward moving youth trapped within the confines of this right-wing capitalist party. It is assisted in this role by a whole constellation of pseudo-left groups in and around the DSA, such as the Labor Notes publication, Jacobin magazine and others.
It has repeatedly come to the defense of the Biden administration and the Democratic Party against opposition from the left. In March of 2021, Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez denounced left-wing criticism of Biden as a “privileged critique” by “bad faith actors.”
During this summer’s Labor Notes conference, leading DSA member and flight attendants union president Sara Nelson strenuously opposed suggestions by audience members that workers should break with the Democrats. “If we start seeing ourselves as a working class, then we don’t need a party,” she claimed. “The party [Democrats as well as Republicans] will come to us.” The vote by the DSA itself to impose the rail contract exposes this perspective as a self-serving falsehood.
Other DSA statements were more strident in their defense of the vote to illegalize strike action, declaring all criticism as out of bounds and illegitimate. The DSA faction Socialist Majority instructed readers to “Stay Focused on the Class Enemies” in a statement. The group’s leadership includes PC Chairwoman Kristian Hernandez.
“Several voices in DSA have recently called for DSA to censure or expel members of the ‘Squad’ who voted for the Congressional measure to impose the rail contract,” the statement acknowledges. “While we do not endorse their strategy of trading support for the TA that revokes rail workers’ right to strike for a vote on the sick days, we believe that directing DSA’s organizing energy in this moment only toward attacking closely-allied electeds [sic] is both a distraction from and counterproductive to the urgent tasks at hand.
“While we, as socialists, may have—and should express—criticisms of unions’ choice of strategy, we should make that criticism in the spirit of moving the struggle forward, not second-guessing past actions,” the statement concludes.
In other words, workers should not learn anything from the betrayals of “the past”—in this case, last week—but only “move forward”... to the next betrayal.
For the DSA, the “class enemy” does not include their own congresspeople who vote to strip workers of their right to strike. It does, however, include rank-and-file workers fighting against this dictatorial measure.
A statement by the Railroad Workers Rank-and-File Committee declaring Congress’s actions as “completely illegitimate” was widely shared on Twitter this weekend, where its declaration that “railroad workers reserve the right to organize and prepare collective action” received a particularly enthusiastic response.
The wide readership of the statement prompted a deluge of angry tweets from DSA members, including top DSA leadership, urging people to stop sharing it and slandering the RWRFC for its association with the World Socialist Web Site, where the statement was published. The RWRFC’s activity among railroad workers, which includes public meetings involving hundreds of railroaders and a series of nationwide informational pickets, has been amply documented.
David Duhalde, former DSA deputy director, wrote: “Isn’t it some WSWS front[?]” Another wrote: “Is this a formal statement from the union? No. Is it at least from actual rail workers? Not sure.” A third said: “When reading a Trotskyist mag like this, be alert to nuance. It isn’t as you wrote, the union that did something, it’s a ‘rank and file’ committee that even involves workers in other industries.” In other words, workers are not allowed to speak for themselves. Only union bureaucrats who played a central role in engineering the sellout contract are allowed to speak for them.
As a general rule, whenever the DSA enters into a serious political crisis, its leadership responds with furious attacks on the World Socialist Web Site. Last year, dozens of leading DSA members responded to WSWS reporting of Ocasio-Cortez’s denunciation of criticisms of Biden by posting memes referencing the assassination of Leon Trotsky by a Stalinist agent. This was an implicit threat of violence that the DSA itself refused to condemn. The DSA is furious that the WSWS is being read by thousands of railroaders, who respect it as the only news outlet writing consistently from the side of railroaders and exposing the machinations of the government and the hated union bureaucracy.
Instead of the Railroad Workers Rank-and-File Committee, the DSA is promoting Railroad Workers United (RWU), with which both it and Labor Notes have close connections. Its leadership consists primarily of lower-level union officials, and rather than campaigning to mobilize workers to fight against the bureaucracy, it is a union reform caucus claiming that the bureaucracy can be reformed from within by running opposition candidates.
Jacobin magazine, which functions as the house organ of the DSA, published an interview last Friday conducted by Labor Notes writer Jonah Furman with leading RWU member Ross Grooters, in which Grooters defended the role of the DSA in Congress. “Your average railroader is not paying attention to that… the [proposed] seven paid sick days [bill] is probably what’s being paid attention to the most,” he said. Grooters cynically claimed, “That’s a win. That took a lot of work from the same progressives who are coming under fire—people like Jamaal Bowman, who really stood up and were advocates for including the paid sick time. I think they need to be commended for that action.”
There are definite class interests motivating the DSA’s hostility to rank-and-file opposition. The DSA itself is a major constituency, not only of the Democratic Party, but within the union bureaucracy itself. It either controls or has lent crucial support to the leadership of many major unions. It supports the union apparatus not despite its role in policing the working class, but because of it.
This experience is an object lesson in the politics of the DSA and the rest of the pseudo-left. Their politics express the outlook of a privileged section of the middle class consumed with a struggle over privilege and positions. They are not socialist, but a branch of the Democratic Party that uses left-sounding phrase-mongering to provide the party with political cover even as it lurches further to the right.
As reported by Breitbart Texas, the arrest of migrants with existing criminal records has risen more than 350 percent since 2020. According to CBP, the number of migrants who have criminal convictions for Homicide and Manslaughter rose from 3 encounters in 2020 to more than 60 in 2022. More than 120 migrants with homicide or manslaughter convictions have been encountered since January 2021 — compared to 11 during the Trump era. The increase reflects those convicted of prior offenses committed in the United States.
Joe Biden and other Democrats have spent the last four years repeating the mantra “no one is above the law.” Yet Biden has advocated policies that would, as the San Francisco Chronicle recently noted, effectively make the United States a sanctuary country.
No comments:
Post a Comment