Revolutions Per Minute - Radio from the New York City Democratic Socialists of America

On tonight’s episode of RPM, we’ll talk about how the “border crisis” is manufactured under capitalism and break down some of the dangerous presidential election year framing we see from both Republicans and Democrats.   You’ll hear from Yvette Borja, abolitionist and Laura E. Gomez Teaching Fellow at UCLA Law. Yvette lived and organized in Tucson for 6 years and will tell us what it’s really like on the ground in Southern Arizona along the border and why there are no single issue voters. We’ll also hear from Luisa and Tristan, members of the DSA IC International Migration Working Group, about that working group’s new webinar series, revitalizing migration organizing efforts during a presidential election year and so much more.  To listen to Radio Chachimbona: https://www.radiocachimbona.com/And you can follow Yvette on Instagram @RadioChachimbona You can read DSA statement on Migration and International Solidarity Between Working People here: https://www.dsausa.org/statements/statement-on-migration-and-international-solidarity-between-working-people/And visit dsaic.org/MigrantRights to register for upcoming webinars. 

Tonight on Revolutions Per Minute, we travel to the United Kingdom, where far-right riots have swept the country. We ask Alex Roberts, a UK-based organizer and host of the anti-fascist podcast 12 Rules for WHAT, how communities can fight back. We also speak to Paolo Gerbaudo, a senior research fellow at Complutense University in Madrid, on the role of social media in contemporary politics. 

Last Tuesday was election night across New York State. The night highlighted both the enduring challenges and promise of the rising Socialist movement. In the most widely covered race of the night, Reactionary forces across the Right and Center, including AIPAC, funneled tens of millions of dollars into the 16th Congressional District to secure the defeat of DSA-endorsed incumbent, Congressman Jamaal Bowman by George Latimer. While at the state-level, all eight DSA incumbents in the State Senate and Assembly won their reelection bids, and they will be joined by DSA-endorsed candidate, Claire Valdez, who won her insurgent campaign to represent the 37th Assembly District in Queens. Tonight, we will hear from David Vibert, a steering committee member of DSA’s National Electoral Commission, to give his perspective on last week’s elections and their ramifications for the socialist movement in New York state and beyond. We will also hear from RPM’s own Jack Devine and Alex Randazzo on their breakdown of Bowman’s defeat, and what his loss tells us about the evolution of the 16th district since he first won the seat in 2020 and what we can learn in his loss 4 years later.

For over five and half years and 220+ episodes, we here at Revolutions Per Minute have brought the voices of activists and organizers fighting for a better world to the listeners of WBAI. Tonight, we dig into the show’s archives to hear some of those interviews through the years. Each of the interviews you will hear tonight, in their own ways, exemplify the different dimensions of our show, the members of our collective, and showcase the perspectives that you won’t hear anywhere else. Ultimately, this is a show about the RPM difference.   Segments Used from Past Episodes:  1- PSC and New Deal for CUNY2- Build Public Renewables Act3- Kansas DSA and Protecting Abortion Rights4- The Bronx Fires5- Palestinian Solidarity in the UAW 

1864. That’s the year Arizona’s abortion ban was passed. The archaic law has remained dormant since 1976, when Roe v. Wade made abortion legal nationwide, but a little over a month ago, on April 6, the Arizona Supreme Court resurrected the law, banning abortion in almost all cases.  The Arizona State Legislature has since passed another law to repeal the 1864 ban, which would default the state to a still strict, 15-week ban on abortion because of a law that was passed and signed by former Republican Governor, Doug Ducey, in 2022.  Meanwhile a coalition called, Arizona for Abortion Access has been gathering hundreds of thousands of signatures to get a constitutional amendment on the November ballot that would create a “fundamental right” to receive abortion care up until fetal viability.Tonight, we’ll bring you a dispatch from the frontlines of the fight for abortion rights here in Arizona and talk to socialist organizers about how they’re trying to change the dynamic so reproductive rights can no longer be tossed around like a football during election years. For more info on Arizona abortion ballot measure visit: https://www.arizonaforabortionaccess.org/

Students here in New York and across the country are staging protests and encampments on university campuses in solidarity with Palestinians under siege in Gaza for over 200 days. The student movements are united by a common call for their institutions to divest and boycott the state of Israel, companies, and institutions complicit in Israel’s occupation and ongoing genocide in Gaza. In response to this vast mobilization of students, the university administrations at Columbia, NYU, CUNY and elsewhere have handed out mass suspensions & even threats of expulsion to students involved in the encampments, in addition to unleashing NYPD to arrest students protesting peacefully on their campuses. Tonight, we will hear from the students themselves. We will hear from Britt, a student organizer at the Gaza Solidarity Encampment at CUNY City College, about the ‘Five Demands’ of the students to the CUNY administration. We will also be joined in-studio by Erin, a student at NYU and a member of the National Coordinating Committee of YDSA, to hear the latest from the NYU encampment and what YDSA is doing to meet the national moment.  *This episode was recorded at 7pm Tuesday night before the NYPD sweep and mass arrests of students at Columbia and CUNY. Go out and provide jail support for the arrested students & comrades opposing genocide at One Police Plaza   Link to CUNY Gaza Solidarity Statement: https://twitter.com/cunygse/status/1785677626431934751/photo/1

In this episode we meet Jonathan Soto, the DSA endorsed candidate running for New York State Assembly in the North East Bronx. Jonathan is a public school parent, an inter-faith organizer and a democratic socialist, campaigning to unseat longtime incumbent Michael Benedetto in Assembly District 82. 

If you’re interested in democratizing the economy then you’re going to need to build a social base capable of such a dramatic transformation of our way of life. The only way to shift the balance of power toward the working class is to build the labor movement. Organized labor remains weak in the United States with about 10 percent of all workers organized into unions. This number has dropped nearly 25 percent since the peak of the AFL-CIO during the 1950s following the incredible surge in organization in the mass production industries during the New Deal and World War II. What is to be done to demonstrate our strength in organized numbers? Today we continue our series with labor organizers here in New York City fighting to build unions in the service sector. We’ve already spoken with workers at Starbucks, Trader Joes, Barboncino’s, and Nitehawk. Now we’re joined by organizers from Partners Coffee Union who are attempting to form a collective organization that can improve their material interests.

Tonight, we continue our series of interviews with NYC- DSA’s 2024 slate of endorsed candidates and will be talking with Eon Tyrell Huntley, a retail worker, father and tenant running for Assembly District 56 in Bed Stuy and Crown Heights. We’ll talk to Eon about the beauty of Bed Stuy, fighting for affordable rent, standing in solidarity with Palestine despite facing AIPAC money and so much more.To learn more about Eon: www.eonforassembly.com 

Today in Albany, New York tenants numbering in the thousands descended onto our State’s Capitol Building in a Day of Mobilization, urging the New York Legislature to pass key legislation, such as Good Cause protections for tenants and greater rent support for low-income families facing eviction. Amidst the calls made by tenants and housing justice organizers for greater protections against the worst injustices of the current housing system, there also exists a new transformative vision of what housing could look like in our state. A new bill co-written by DSA-endorsed State Assembly member Emilly Gallagher representing North Brooklyn, would establish the New York Social Housing Development Authority and empower the state to build & maintain substantial new housing developments across the State that will be publicly funded, environmentally sustainable, permanently affordable by law, and democratically-controlled by tenants. If passed, the social housing authority would work to shift the balance of power over our whole housing system towards tenants and the state government and away from wealthy private developers that have no interest in building affordable housing, and the landlords that get rich from its scarcity. Tonight, we will hear from Renette, a DSA member and tenant organizer with HOPE Tenant Union, and Genevieve, a housing justice organizer with Ithaca DSA, on the importance of this new bill and the campaign to build beautiful, abundant, & affordable social housing for the whole working class of New York. 

Today is day 158 of Israel’s genocidal assault on the Palestinian people in Gaza and also primary day for voters in Georgia, Mississippi and Washington.  Over the last several weeks, hundreds of thousands of people across the country have voted "uncommitted" in the presidential primaries, to send a message to President Biden calling for an immediate and permanent ceasefire in Gaza.  Tonight we’re joined by Ali and Tzara to talk about DSA’s role in the Vote Uncommitted campaign and what comes next to achieve a lasting ceasefire and the liberation of Palestine.  To become a member of the Democratic Socialist America: https://www.dsausa.org/joinTo follow Ali & Detroit DSA: @alihallalmi and @detroitdsa

In the early twentieth century the vast majority of mass production industries were unorganized in the United States. Efforts to replicate the success of the United Mine Workers, brewery workers, and the garment trades were largely unsuccessful until the 1930s when the Congress of Industrial Organizations changed everything. Fragile Juggernaut tells this story with a narrative that spans from the mid-nineteenth century to the 1950s. Andrew Elrod joins us to discuss why this history is important and what organizers can learn from it today.

Tonight, we’re talking to Claire Valdez, a NYC-DSA endorsed candidate for Assembly District 37 in Queens about what being endorsed by NYC-DSA and UAW Region 9A means to her, how she plans to bring her union organizing experience of becoming ‘more powerful than the boss’ to the halls of power in Albany and much more. There are currently 8 socialists endorsed by NYC-DSA serving in Albany in the Senate and Assembly. If electoral organizers get their way- that number could be 11 next year - the largest socialist block ever elected in New York.NYC-DSA has voted to endorse three new-insurgent candidates this year- Claire in Queens, Eon Huntley in Brooklyn and Jonathan Soto in the Bronx. As we do every year, we will talk to all of the new-dsa endorsed candidates here on Revolutions Per Minute and tonight is the first in that series of interviews with the NYC-DSA’s 2024 slate. So stick around to hear from Claire, a union organizer running for Assembly District 37 in Queens - stretching from Long Island City, Sunnyside and Maspeth to Ridgewood. To learn more visit  https://claireforqueens.com/ and to sign up for a canvassing shift https://claireforqueens.com/events/

The unionization rate in the United States remains at around 10% after decades of deindustrialization in the Northeast and Midwest as well as anti-worker policies from corporations and the state, but labor organizers are fighting back. Across the country the UAW is attempting to organize non-union auto plants while here in New York service workers are building collective power. Last year we spoke with organizers from Barboncino’s who successfully organized a union at the pizza restaurant where they work. Today we’re joined by members of Nitehawk Workers Union Organizing Committee as they prepare for an National Labor Relations Board Election.

This past weekend, DSA held their inaugural kickoff for their new nationwide campaign for Trans Rights & Bodily Autonomy. Spearheaded by the Trans Rights and Bodily Autonomy Campaign Commission, DSA will mobilize the organization’s tens of thousands of members across 150+ chapters across the country, not only to combat the advances of the far-right and their systematic attempt at every level of government to remove trans people from public life & restrict access to abortion, but also to advance a positive vision of queer liberation that protects queer spaces, our rights as workers, students & educators, and as human beings. Tonight, we will hear from Genevieve, joining us from Ithaca, NY and one of the leaders of this organization-wide project, to break down all the pieces of this ambitious campaign, how DSA will rise to fight the far-right, and why the struggle for trans rights & bodily autonomy is a struggle for the whole working class.  Join DSA's Trans Rights & Bodily Autonomy Campaign Commission: https://airtable.com/appxkhakxWCUXVVqO/pag9jCfy3jpsn74do/form Support Tech Guild Workers organizing for trans rights at The New York Times:https://actionnetwork.org/petitions/nyt-respect-trans-workers

This episode of Revolutions Per Minute explores the life and legacy of Pablo Yoruba Guzman, who co-founded the New York chapter of the Young Lords, and later became a prominent television reporter on local news channels in the city. We are joined by Mickey Melendez, a fellow Young Lord, to discuss the group's occupations of the First People’s Church in Harlem and Lincoln Hospital in the South Bronx. We will also hear from New York City Council Member Charles Baron, the organizer Denise Oliver-Velez and CUNY scholar Johanna Fernandez on the legacy of the group. 

With the battle over abortion rights raging in the United States at local, state, and national levels, we here in New York state cannot become complacent that access to abortion will always be guaranteed here. Economic, social, and logistical barriers prevent many people from accessing the care they need, and without decisive action to change that, working-class New York residents as well as people living in the surrounding area will continue to be at risk. Tonight we're joined live by Chelsea Williams-Diggs of New York Abortion Access Fund and Allie Bohm of New York Civil Liberties Union to discuss the state of abortion access in New York state and their advocacy for the statewide Reproductive Freedom and Equity Fund. Tell your legislators that you support increasing access to abortion in New York state: https://action.aclu.org/send-message/protect-abortion-access-new-york Follow and support the New York Abortion Access Fund at nyaaf.org.

2023 was the hottest year on record and for many people across the country being able to afford  their utility bills to cool or heat their homes during the more extreme temperatures caused by climate change is becoming a possibly deadly challenge. Last year, Maine DSA was part of a statewide coalition called Pine Tree Power that attempted to take over the two largest corporate utilities in the state through a ballot measure in November. They didn’t win. But here on Revolutions Per Minute we are just as interested in talking about losses as we are victories. Tonight, we’ll go to Maine and talk with Aarron and Dwight about the struggles of organizing in a rural state and the lessons they learned from their Public Power campaign. We’ll also check in with Chen from the New York City EcoSocialist Working Group for an update on the state of renewable energy development in New York (spoiler alert: the private market is in shambles) and what comes next for implementing the Build Public Renewables Act. Follow Maine DSA and our guests at @DSA_Maine, @bioleera, and @dwobbsy.Follow New York City EcoSocialist Working Group at @NYCDSA_Ecosoc

The holiday season is in full swing, and as some people head toward time off and relaxation, workers in many industries are facing their busiest time of year. We are joined live by Connor Spence, a worker-organizer at Amazon’s first union distribution facility, JFK8 on Staten Island. Connor discusses his work as a co-founder of both the Amazon Labor Union and the ALU Democratic Reform Caucus, and how Amazon workers organized and won new leadership elections in their union.  Now they'll be upping the pressure on this mega corporation to bargain a first contract with workers at JFK8. We also talk about Amazon Labor Union’s recent organizing around Palestine solidarity and the movement to stop the US-Israeli war machine from the bottom up. Connor was recently illegally terminated by Amazon for his organizing activity. Read more and donate to the solidarity fund: https://www.gofundme.com/f/connor-spenceillegally-fired-alucaucus-organizer Learn more about Amazon Labor Union: https://sol.alu.network/ Follow the ALU Democratic Reform Caucus at @ReformALU. 

On the 1st of December, the United Auto Workers International Executive Board, alongside other labor unions & allies, announced the UAW’s support for a permanent ceasefire in Israel & Palestine. The announcement also called for the formation of a Divestment and Just Transition Working Group to study the UAW’s ties to the ongoing violence & terror of the Israeli occupation, and to explore future scenarios for a Just Transition of US workers from the war economy. The endorsement represents an important step forward for international solidarity between US labor unions and Palestine, and is the product of a long, often neglected, history of Palestinian solidarity by rank & file workers organizing within the UAW to pressure its leaders into action and divest its ties to the Israeli state. Tonight, we hear from Mary, a labor historian, filmmaker, and a graduate worker in UAW Local 2865, on the history of Palestinian solidarity by UAW rank & file workers, and how those lessons from our collective past can inspire working people today. We will also hear from Gordon, a labor organizer in UAW Local 7902, on organizing for Palestine in his local and at New York University, and the struggle that lies ahead for the UAW in the new year.