Róger Calero meets with workers in SF Bay area

Róger Calero, the presidential candidate of the Socialist Workers Party, met earlier this month with construction workers suing the Apartment Investment Management Company over allegations of racist workplace policies. In the current issue of the SWP newsletter The Militant:

“Your fight is setting an example, inspiring other workers who are hearing about it,” Calero told a group of carpenters gathered for a meeting May 12. “The bosses will continue to use rising unemployment and divide-and-rule tactics as a weapon against workers. Your struggle shows how when we fight collectively, these tactics will backfire on them.”

Calero said fights by workers to overcome divisions on the job and to resist the bosses’ attempts to drive down wages and conditions are part of the struggle to transform the unions into fighting instruments. “Out of such a transformed union movement, workers can forge a labor party that can fight for our broad interests in the political arena,” he said.

Calero also used the visit as an opportunity to meet with truckers at the Port of Oakland. West Coast ports were in the news this past May Day when the International Longshore & Warehouse Union walked off the job in protest of the Iraq War, an action applauded by several Socialist parties.