Vol. 72/No. 50      December 22, 2008

Their action is a sign of the resistance that will grow as working people search for a way to fight back against the attacks by the bosses on our standard of living. It should be supported by all working people.

Strengthened by the support and solidarity of many workers, unionists, youth, and others across the city, those in the plant have pledged to continue the fight until they get what’s due to them.

The workers have conducted the sit-in with discipline and safety as a top priority—crucial to making the action a success.

The workforce at the plant is in its big majority immigrant workers. Bosses often treat these workers as a superexploited source of labor, using reactionary anti-immigration laws and pitting “legal” against “illegal” in an attempt to divide our class.

Since May 2006, when 2 million workers poured into the streets demanding legalization for all immigrants, a fighting vanguard of the working class has emerged, largely made up of immigrants who refuse to be intimidated in the face of these attacks.

Chicago has had some of the largest immigrant rights actions. These demonstrations, in addition to many actions protesting the raids and deportations, have strengthened the labor movement. The workers who lead them bring an added confidence to this fight along with the experience of Black and white coworkers in the plant.

In Chicago, the fight for immigrant rights has been particularly sharp and the sit-in action there represents this confidence and strength.

The economic crisis, rooted in the inability of the capitalists to reverse declining rates of profit from industrial production and sales of goods, is causing the bosses to launch more and more attacks on our wages, hours, medical care, retirement benefits, and other aspects of our social wage.

Nearly 2 million workers have lost their jobs this year alone and this is just the beginning.

These attacks will accelerate as the crisis deepens, and actions like this will spring up more and more. We urge working people to support this example of working-class resistance and extend solidarity to their fight.
 
 
Related articles:
Chicago workers sit in at plant over layoffs
Win 60 days’ pay, medical benefits
On the Picket Line  
 
 
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