Donald Trump, the President of the United States, has called for the “liberation” of states under scientifically based public health quarantines. This call encourages his rabid right-wing base toward further extremism. It can and will lead to thousands of deaths. The far right is already breaking quarantine, blockading hospitals, and calling for the trading of millions of lives for “the economy.” There should be no doubt of their fascist and near fascist politics. Right-wing demonstrators were seen, among other things, holding up antisemitic signs. But even mainstream moderate politicians are moving to prematurely “open” parts of the economy -- as with the recent opening of marinas in the Northeast. Trump’s call is essentially an exterminationist call to a fascist base (despite recent equivocation over Georgia).
This requires mass action by the left.
Fascism depends on three key pillars to be successful. It requires a mass base made of racist, frenzied, desperate and disaffected middle-class persons (hostile both to the working class below them and certain layers of capital above them), and sections of the desperate, marginalized working class and poor (witness the right-wing protester chant of “we want to work” which would be more accurately put as “let me open up my business for work”). Of course not all middle-class persons and small business owners are fascists. Many are liberals and a few are even sympathetic to the left. However, the core base of Trump’s racist support is drawn from a similar layer. Fascism also requires sections of the state apparatus to be won over to give cover to, encourage, and enforce a more or less fascist orientation. We have here the President and his administration, and at least some significant layers in ICE, and large swaths of law enforcement across the country. Lastly, fascism requires the acquiescence and support of a section of capital itself, to use a fascist base as a lever to salvage and stabilize their system. Look at the repeated entreaties from certain corporate sectors to get us “back to work.” While such fascism may be a minority position among capitalists it is nonetheless significant.
All three of these are currently developing in the United States. They are not yet fully organized. However, these elements are developing rapidly. Moreover, these forces do not need to take over in order to kill thousands of people. Merely by disrupting efforts to mitigate the Covid 19 pandemic and blocking universal aid to the public, they can easily kill hundreds of thousands of people, largely working-class, disproportionately poor, disproportionately Black, people of color, the sick, people with disabilities, the elderly.
This extermination does not require formal death camps. In the context of Covid 19, the far right – including the President – can simply direct, or fail to direct, the forces of nature. But, there are also death camps. This is what ICE detention and the prison system have become.
Trump has set up a situation in which smaller businesses and their workers were largely cut out of emergency aid bailouts to large corporations. Now he is inciting his right-wing proto-fascist base as a battering ram against state governments and a “do-nothing” Congress to “reopen the country.” He has further incited his base’s racist middle-class rage and burgeoning terrorism with calls to “LIBERATION.” Attorney General William Barr has threatened to join lawsuits to “reopen” states:
“We have to give businesses more freedom to operate in a way that’s reasonably safe,” Barr said on The Hugh Hewitt Show today. “To the extent that governors don’t and impinge on either civil rights or on the national commerce – our common market that we have here – then we’ll have to address that.”
Barr went on to add, “We’re looking carefully at a number of these rules that are being put into place ... And if we think one goes too far, we initially try to jawbone the governors into rolling them back or adjusting them. And if they’re not and people bring lawsuits, we file statement [sic] of interest and side with the plaintiffs.”
While there is a mass base for this cavalier encouragement of exterminationists, there is a direct link to sections of the administration and capital. Reports indicate that “Operation Gridlock” protests in Lansing, Michigan, were funded by organizations with ties to Secretary of Education, Betsy Devos.
Covid 19 is not simply a cosmic act of natural destruction. Those who are getting sick, and even more those who are dying, are overwhelmingly working-class and persons of color. The US government response to Covid 19 is a genocidal-if-neoliberal act of ethnic and class cleansing. And it is directed.
The scale of the economic crisis triggered and worsened by the pandemic should underline that there is no going “back to normal.” Even after an effective treatment or vaccine is found, capital will have consolidated into even larger blocks. Large swaths of smaller capitalists will be absorbed by larger companies and banks. “Emergency measures” and “unilateral executive powers” – employed by both parties – will be used to shape the post Covid 19 world for their ends. In a country with barely any social safety net we are looking at tens of millions of people without work. The US working class faces a rapid immiseration that it has not seen in generations. In this process, as in the Great Depression, middle-class persons will be thrown into the working-class. With capital and labor increasingly polarized there will be greater competition between the left and far right to explain the crisis, gain a hearing, and act to shape things.
Moreover, this catastrophe should also be seen as a dress rehearsal for the multiple looming climate crises to come. In those coming crises, as in this one, fascists and other exterminationists will get a further hearing.
We will see an exponential uptick in racism and nationalism, in part to redirect popular anger. There will be the likelihood and intensity of inter-imperial competition and conflict, and war.
This is a moment when we cannot cede the streets – or the political narrative – to Trump and his fascist base. Regardless of whether or not you think we need to vote for the Democratic Party as the lesser evil in November, Joe Biden and the Democratic party are ill suited to counter the narrative being constructed by Trump and the far right. Even some of the moderate reform proposals being made by certain elected officials are unlikely to become reality without mass protests to back them up. And, regardless, we cannot wait. Waiting will only result in lost ground and thousands more dead.
The left needs to act now. We need to do so through protest and direct action. The right-wing has created a battering ram for their exterminationist policies. If the right-wing can use their cars to blockade hospitals, we can have mass caravans to show our support for healthcare workers, or Amazon workers in struggle. We can target federal buildings, city-halls, prisons, ICE detention centers, the homes of far-right politicians, or other legitimate sites of protest. We must figure out how to mobilize and engage in protest and mass direct action as safely as possible, through car caravans and intentional physical distancing.
In the immediate – within the next two weeks – possibly on May Day – we need mass mobilizations -- with a wide call for participation -- at federal government facilities to demand, among other things:
Immediate federally funded mass production of PPE gear for all essential workers.
Immediate federally funded mass production of needed medical equipment (including tests).
Immediate seizure of unoccupied housing, dorms, and hotel rooms for use by the houseless, and those released from detention and jails, for the duration of the crisis.
Immediate extension of Medicare for all persons for the duration of the crisis.
Universal basic income of at least $3,000 a month per person (regardless of immigration or other status) for the duration of the crisis.
Immediate closure of jails and prisons.
Immediate freedom for all those in ICE detention.
Immediate end of harassment of working-class communities, Black communities, and communities of color.
A moratorium on all non-essential construction and activities that may cause adverse environmental and health reactions in our communities.
A federal guarantee of collective bargaining rights during the crisis.
The appointment of a committee of scientists, doctors, nurses (including representatives of nurses unions), and other medical workers to determine Covid 19 public health policy.
For example, in Chicago, we could organize caravans from wards and neighborhoods and drive together -- in an orderly manner -- to the Federal Building and City Hall (taking care not to block off hospitals and other essential services). This would mirror the feeder marches we’ve used in past demonstrations.
Of course we must brainstorm and tailor our actions to our specific realities. A car protest may work in one city but might be counterproductive in a densely populated city like New York. Part of our counter-response is that our side believes in science and the importance of taking care. In New York coordinating protest signs -- for rent strikes, in solidarity with striking workers, or in support of the demands of nurses -- in the windows of apartments, combined with other considered actions, may be a better course.
We also need to begin direct actions to make the above happen -- again taking care regarding health and physical distancing. For example, if there is unused dormitory housing in a city, our socialist alderpersons or congressional or state representatives could lead a contingent to seize that housing through direct action. Or, take similar actions.
Thousands upon thousands of our working-class siblings are dying every day. We need to act now.
Jessica Allee, Carbondale, Illinois
Glenn Allen, emergency medicine pharmacist, Chicago, Illinois
Julien Ball, Democratic Socialists of America (DSA), Immigrants’ Rights and International Solidarity Committee, San Francisco, California
Benjamin Balthaser, DSA, Chicago, Illinois
Ken Barrios, DSA, Chicago, Illinois
Courtney P. Biernat, St. Louis, Missouri
Alexander Billet, writer and artist, Locust Review, DSA, Los Angeles, California
Caitlin Brady, organizer, Chicago
Justin Akers Chacón, San Diego, California
Rachel Cohen, Chicago Feminist Action, Chicago, Illinois
Jordy Cummings, Red Wedge, Canadian Union of Public Employees (CUPE) local 3903, Toronto, Ontario
Jon Danforth-Appell, East Side Jews Activist Collective, Los Angeles, California
Drew F., DSA, Los Angeles, California
Nate Goldbaum, Chicago Teachers Union, Chicago, Illinois
Kelsey Goldberg, writer and activist, DSA, Los Angeles, California
Kate Doyle Griffiths, Spectre, Red Bloom, delegate to Marxist Center, New York, New York
Kara Hall, DSA, Las Vegas, Nevada
Sophie Hand, DSA, Chicago, Illinois
Stavroula Harissis, librarian, DSA, Chicgo, Illinois
Adam Michael Levin, DSA, Saint Louis, Missouri
Holly Lewis, Spectre, Texas
Magally Miranda, Los Angeles, California
Tish Markley, Locust Review, DSA, Las Vegas, Nevada
Ian Matchett, Brick and Mortar Collective, Detroit, Michigan
Madeline Maye, musician, writer, DSA, Los Angeles, California
Patricia McCann, hospital admin, Carbondale, Illinois
Scott McLemee, Solidarity
Dave McNally, Spectre, Texas
Mitchel Morden, Rockfold, Illinois
Bill V. Mullan, Purdue University, Indiana
Ellie Navidson MS RN, emergency department nurse, Chicago, Illinois
Nichole Nicholson, Washington
Josh On, San Francisco, California
Jessie Padua, DSA, Las Vegas, Nevada
James Patterson, DSA, Las Vegas, Nevada
Charlie Post, New York City DSA Labor Branch, New York
Bobby Quellos, 33rd Ward Working Families, Chicago, Illinois
Ashton Rome, Socialist Alternative (SA), Bay Area, California
Jesser Sanchez, University of Nevada - Las Vegas Young Democratic Socialists of America (YDSA), DSA, Las Vegas, Nevada
Saman Sepehri, DSA, Chicago, Illinois
Nizan Shaked, DSA, Huntington Beach, California
Snehal Shingavi, associate professor, English, University of Texas-Austin, section44.org, Texas
Jase Short, “Technically” DSA, Tennessee
Ben Smith, Los Angeles, California
Coco Smyth, Central Ohio Revolutionary Socialists, Columbus, Ohio
Omnia Sol, Chicago, Illinois
Matthew Strauss, Central Ohio Revolutionary Socialists, Columbus, Ohio
Tamara Taylor MHA, Nuerodiagnostic Technologist, Las Vegas, Nevada
Adam Turl, Locust Review and Red Wedge, DSA, Las Vegas, Nevada
Richard Vogel, DSA, Las Vegas, Nevada
Lee Wengraf, Science for the People, New York, New York
Kira Woodworth, Seattle, Washington
If you would like to add your name to this statement e-mail red.wedge.magazine@gmail.com. Organizations listed for identification only.
This statement was initiated by rank-and-file members of the Democratic Socialists of America and other comrades.