May Day Manifesto

Workers of the world:

This May Day, it is time to reclaim the essence of the workers’ independent struggle. This day was born out of a mass workers’ mobilization, and that is how it must remain. In 1886, in the United States, hundreds of thousands of workers went on strike and held demonstrations demanding the eight-hour workday. Repression by employers and the police led to arrests, persecution, and executions of labor activists who became international symbols of resistance. In 1889, the Second International proclaimed May 1 as a day of global struggle for the eight-hour workday and for the rights of the working class. Thus, this date is not a celebration of “work” alongside the ruling classes: it is the living memory of the struggle against capital and its governments.

Much is at stake at this moment as U.S. imperialism seeks to impose, through war and repression, the global hegemony it feels threatened. To this end, Trump openly resorts to imperialist colonial methods, as in the war against Iran, linked to Netanyahu’s genocidal Zionism. He invaded Venezuela, kidnapped its president Nicolás Maduro, and seized Venezuelan oil. He threatens to invade Cuba and has already imposed a blockade on its oil supply.

Trump attacks democratic freedoms within the United States, expressing an authoritarian outlook that is followed by far-right governments around the world. ICE’s attacks on immigrants and workers as a whole are part of maneuvers to avoid a possible electoral defeat in the year-end elections.

There is no such thing as “good” imperialism. Russian imperialism invaded Ukraine four years ago and is attempting to impose its rule at the cost of hundreds of thousands of deaths. Furthermore, it has maintained Putin’s dictatorship for 27 years now. Chinese imperialism tries to present itself as an alternative to Trump, but in reality it is only interested in its profits, just like any other imperialism. It relies on brutal repression against Chinese workers to impose low wages.

The European imperialist governments, in full decline, despite their rhetoric (such as that of Sánchez), are not breaking with either NATO or Israel, while imposing arms buildup plans and neoliberal attacks on the workers of their own countries. These governments also criminalize workers’ struggles and harshly repress movements in support of the Palestinians.

We, the workers, in each of our countries, face the misery of our wages and the precariousness of our jobs. Young people have no prospects for education or decent jobs. Barbarism is growing before everyone’s eyes in the outskirts of major cities around the world.

Barbarism is also expressed in the degradation of the environment caused by capitalism’s unbridled accumulation. The last three years have been the hottest in the entire industrial era. Several points of no return in nature are already looming, as an expression of capitalist barbarism in the environment.

Signs of barbarism are also growing in the violence against immigrants, in the repression of Black youth in poor neighborhoods, in the rise of femicide, and in LGBTQphobia. The far right actively seeks to divide workers, and all bourgeois governments are complicit in this oppression.

But it is possible to defeat imperialism. Despite the brutal attacks on Iran, Trump can be defeated by the combination of Iran’s heroic military resistance and the mobilizations in the United States. The mobilization in Minneapolis is joined by the recent No Kings protests (with over eight million in the streets), and this must continue on May 1. The economic and political crisis caused by the war in Iran is accelerating Trump’s decline and deepening divisions within the U.S. ruling classes. The current truce in the war could go either way, but there are growing signs of imperialism’s defeat.

The Sumud flotilla in solidarity with Gaza, which is once again crossing the ocean, highlights the importance of solidarity with Palestine, at a time when Trump’s “Peace Plan” farce relies on the continuation of Zionist-imperialist genocide.

Expectations for Trump are beginning to wane in Venezuela. The Venezuelan masses, driven by their hatred of Maduro’s bourgeois dictatorship, had pinned their hopes on imperialist intervention. But Trump brought neither improvements in the people’s lives nor greater freedoms. The Chavista regime, now under Delcy Rodríguez, has become a puppet government of Trump, ensuring imperialism’s colonial control over oil. But now workers’ mobilizations are beginning to take place, as seen in the one-day national strike at universities.

It is possible to defeat Putin through the combination of heroic military resistance in Ukraine—despite Zelensky’s corrupt bourgeois government—along with political support from the masses of the world.

All over the world, workers face a polarization between different bourgeois camps: between far-right parties aligned with U.S. imperialism (or other imperialisms) and “democratic” and reformist bourgeois alternatives. None of these bourgeois options will solve our problems. Only our own independent struggle can change our lives.

The “progressive international” with Sánchez, Lula, Petro, Scheinbaun, and others is not an alternative to Trump. It is an alliance of bourgeois governments that impose neoliberal plans in their countries against the workers and seek to gain electoral advantage from Trump’s decline. But by keeping bourgeois power intact—the decay of the capitalist system, with attacks on workers—their governments guarantee the conditions that allow the far right to grow. It was Biden’s disasters with the Democratic Party in the U.S. that paved the way for Trump’s election.

We, the workers, must advance our direct struggles with political independence, against all imperialisms and all bourgeois governments. 

It is important to fight in unity of action against imperialist wars, as well as against all attacks on democratic freedoms. But while it is necessary to strike together, it is necessary to march separately, independently of the bourgeoisie. Workers must organize and mobilize independently of the capitalists and so-called governments.

It is also of vital importance to stand with workers in their struggles against all “right-wing” and “left-wing” bourgeois governments. Politically supporting these so-called “progressive” bourgeois governments does not even help in confronting the far right and imperialism.

Let us not be deceived by “alliances with the progressive bourgeoisie,” which tie workers to the interests of the bourgeoisie.

All our support for the Iranian struggle against imperialist-Zionist aggression. For the victory of Iran and the defeat of Trump-Netanyahu!

Free Palestine, from the river to the sea! For a single, free, and secular Palestine! For the military defeat of Zionist genocide!

Trump out of Iran, Palestine, Cuba, and Latin America!

No to government plans for austerity, plunder, and repression!

All our support for the Gaza Solidarity Flotilla!

For the defeat of Putin’s imperialist invasion of Ukraine! Full support for the Ukrainian workers’ and popular resistance! We reject the Zelensky government’s pursuit of alliances with Trump and the hypocrisy of the European imperialist powers!

For the political independence of workers against all imperialisms and all bourgeois governments! All our support for the struggles of Cuban workers against the Díaz-Canel dictatorship! All our support for the struggles of the Iranian people against the dictatorship of the ayatollahs!

Against all forms of oppression against immigrants, women, Black people, and the LGBTQ community!

For the unity of the struggles of workers and oppressed peoples around the world!

For a workers’, socialist, and internationalist May Day!