An earlier version of this article appeared at glorialariva4president.com on December 8.

Thank you to everyone who supported the Gloria La Riva for President 2016 Campaign! The 2016 Presidential and VP candidates of the Peace and Freedom Party, Gloria La Riva and Dennis Banks waged a dynamic campaign for the socialist movement. They received 66,101 votes in California, the second most of any presidential ticket in the PFP’s nearly 50 year history.

The campaign, under the banner “For the Earth and people to live, capitalism must end,” reached millions of people across the country with the message that we need a new, socialist system.

Speaking about the campaign, La Riva said: “We met thousands of people who responded positively to our platform and campaign. It’s so inspiring to see the growing popularity of socialism and its principles, which include the right to housing, education, healthcare and full rights for immigrants and for all people, and rejection of war, racism, misogyny, mass incarceration or police brutality.”

La Riva was also the only candidate nominated by three independent ballot qualified socialist parties. In Vermont, La Riva was the candidate of the Liberty Union Party. In other states across the country she was the candidate of the Party for Socialism and Liberation (PSL), a young organization formed in 2004 which is steadily spreading across the country.

Nationally, La Riva received more than 74,000 votes, the most for any socialist presidential candidate since 1976.

While the corporate-funded campaigns were shutting down their offices the day the day after the election, Gloria and her campaign organizers were leading mass marches protesting the elevation of racist, misogynist, xenophobe Donald Trump to the office of president. We will continue this struggle and will join the Inauguration Day protest in Washington, D.C., on January 20, and parallel marches in San Francisco, Los Angeles and other cities.

If you live in California, the La Riva/Banks campaign strongly urges you register Peace and Freedom Party and help keep PFP on the ballot. If you are already a PFP registrant, get involved in organizing and building the only ballot-qualified socialist party in California!

When: Sunday, November 20 from 5:00pm to 7:00pm
Where: San Jose Peace and Justice Center, 48 S 7th St, San Jose ( MAP )
What: post-election public forum
Sponsor: Santa Clara County Peace and Freedom Party
Contact: call 408-829-9506
Cost: $3-5 donation requested ($7-10 food included), no one turned away for lack of funds

Trump Is President-Elect—What Now?
Building the Movement for Social Change

Featured Speaker: Gloria La Riva, 2016 Peace and Freedom Party candidate for U.S. president

We have just lived through a corrupt, anti-human and disgusting election. Both Democratic and Republican politicians have voted to spend trillions on war and bank bailouts while doing little for the tens of millions of people who have lost their jobs and homes.

Join us for an introduction to the Peace and Freedom Party and an analysis and discussion of the election, the La Riva/Banks socialist campaign, and what is needed now to build the movement for socialism and the struggle for justice.

Click on the image below to download the Adobe Acrobat (pdf) document for printing and distribution. There are two copies per letter-sized sheet.

On November 4, join the La Riva for President campaign for a community speak-out on our “Vote Socialist” campaign. La Riva and supporters will speak about her campaign platform and the need to continue building the movement for socialism beyond November 8.

When: Friday, November 4 at 6:00pm
Where: 24th and Mission, San Francisco ( MAP )
What: campaign rally
Sponsor: Party for Socialism and Liberation
Contact: call 415-821-6171 or visit Facebook event page

When: Tuesday, November 8 at 6:00pm
Where: 2969 Mission St, San Francisco ( MAP )
What: Election night party
Sponsors: Party for Socialism and Liberation and Peace and Freedom Party
Contact: call 415-821-6171 or Facebook event page
Cost: free, campaign donations encouraged

The lesser of two evils is still evil!

The Peace and Freedom Party and the Party for Socialism and Liberation are running Gloria La Riva for U.S. President and Dennis Banks, famed co-founder of the American Indian Movement, for Vice President.

Come watch the results of the elections as they come out in real time! We will have some snacks and drinks. The election count will go long into the night join us for as long as your able to.

Click on the image below to download the Adobe Acrobat (pdf) document for printing and distribution. There are four copies of the 5.5 inch by 4.25 inch flyer per sheet.

When: Tuesday, November 8 at 6:00pm
Where: 2860 Florin Rd, Unit D, Sacramento ( MAP )
What: Election night party
Sponsors: Party for Socialism and Liberation and Peace and Freedom Party
Contact: call 916-572-9680 or Facebook event page
Cost: free, campaign donations encouraged

The lesser of two evils is still evil!

The Peace and Freedom Party and the Party for Socialism and Liberation are running Gloria La Riva for U.S. President and Dennis Banks, famed co-founder of the American Indian Movement, for Vice President.

Come watch the results of the elections as they come out in real time! We will have some snacks and drinks. The election count will go long into the night join us for as long as your able to.

Click on the image below to download the Adobe Acrobat (pdf) document for printing and distribution. There are two copies of the 5.5 inch by 8.5 inch flyer per sheet.

In 1996, California voters passed the country’s first medicinal marijuana initiative, Proposition 215. In 2010, we had the opportunity to be the first state to end cannabis prohibition for all with Proposition 19, but narrowly failed with 46% in favor. The Peace and Freedom Party, in keeping with its platform calling for legalization of marijuana from its founding in 1967, supported both these measures.

In 2010, our support of Prop. 19 focused on the role played by the forces behind prohibition: the prison-industrial complex (the prison-building industry, private prison operators, prison guards’ and police officers’ associations, prosecutors, etc.), and the “competition” (mainly alcohol companies; pharmaceutical companies have also contributed). We also mentioned those who profit from the current black- and grey-market conditions.

The standard prohibitionist forces are still quite active opposing Prop. 64, but no more needs to be said about them here; their arguments are all well-known and thoroughly refuted. There’s another line of argument that was raised against Prop. 19 and is being raised against Prop. 64: that the proposition would actually do more harm than good, and that we should reject it in favor of something better later. The misinformation generated in the course of supporting this position could contribute to the defeat of Prop. 64 as it probably did to that of Prop. 19.

The remainder of this article will attempt to briefly answer the arguments of those who oppose Prop. 64 while being for “real” legalization. A more complete refutation can be found in the following articles:

Top 10 Myths About California’s Prop 64 (With Footnotes!)

Part Two of Russ Belville’s Top 10 Myths About California’s Prop 64

The main objections can be summed up under the following themes.

“It’s not ‘real’ legalization.”

These arguments basically come down to claiming that it’s already legal enough under the status quo, and that the things that will still be illegal under Prop. 64 are somehow new. But in fact, cannabis is still illegal; all that Prop. 215 does is provide an affirmative defense. People are still in jail; people are still being stopped, searched, arrested, harassed and brutalized because a cop smelled weed; people are still being denied employment and housing behind a criminal record for pot. Once Prop. 64 passes, all that stops: People in jail for something that Prop. 64 makes legal will be able to petition for release, and people with criminal records for things that are no longer crimes will be able to have those records expunged – and the burden of proof is on the state to prove why they shouldn’t. As for the things that are still illegal, penalties are sharply reduced on almost all of them (from felonies to misdemeanors or “wobblers”, or from misdemeanors to infractions), it eliminates jail for minors entirely, and perhaps most significantly, the mere odor of cannabis will no longer serve as probable cause for a stop and search. Even without its other benefits, and even if every other objection were true, this would be enough to merit our support.

“It ‘destroys’ Prop. 215.”

The part of this that isn’t an outright lie is based on a gross misunderstanding both of what Prop. 215 is and what Prop. 64 does. The lie is easy enough to debunk: Prop. 64 explicitly protects Prop. 215 and adds new protections on top; medical patients are exempt from the limits and restrictions imposed under Prop. 64 for non-medical adult use; and medical patients are further protected from having their children taken away, for one example. What is misunderstood is, first, what Prop. 215 does – which is only to provide an affirmative defense for medical need. Prop. 215 did not provide for anyone being able to purchase or otherwise acquire cannabis other than to grow their own, or any of the other activities currently engaged in by medical card holders; those are the result of legislation and regulations enacted long after Prop. 215 passed, chiefly SB 420 and recently superseded by the Medical Cannabis Regulation and Safety Act (MCRSA, formerly known as MMRSA). Opponents of Prop. 64 raise objections that are more properly directed at the MCRSA, claiming that they’re fixing to defeat the MCRSA in court but that Prop. 64 will prevent that by “enshrining” it within the language of an initiative. But that doesn’t work, as the above referenced article explains.

“It hands cannabis over to big corporations like Monsanto. That’s why billionaires like Sean Parker and George Soros support it!”

Prop. 64 actually gives priority to those currently in the business for two years, and to current (from 2015) California residents until 2020, and also does not provide for licensing large grows until 2023, providing small local farmers and businesses plenty of time to get set up under the new system before ever having to face competition from large out-of-state operations. And it has strong anti-monopoly provisions; for instance, among the reasons to deny a license to a business, the first on the list is if it would “allow unreasonable restrains on competition by creation or maintenance of unlawful monopoly power.” But it doesn’t stop there; the article, and the text of the measure itself, go into much more detail. The only real objection small farmers have is that it allows for large operations at all, starting in 2023. But even then, there’s nothing that says the state has to license larger operations, and if the small growers’ concerns about the impact of such operations are valid, there would be grounds under the terms of Prop. 64 to deny such licenses. The growers’ association opposed Prop. 19; on Prop. 64, they split just about 50:50, and as an organization they are neutral. Let’s hope that the Emerald Triangle doesn’t defeat legalization this time.

Errata: Originally posted that large-grow licenses come on line in 2020. Those licenses will not become available for five years after the other licenses come on line in 2018.

“It imposes onerous taxes that go into a politician’s ‘slush fund’.”

The argument that the taxes imposed by Prop. 64 are too high is not entirely without merit. And even though it does exempt medical patients from the 7.5% state sales tax, they are still subject to the same 15% excise tax and $9.25/oz. cultivation tax as everyone else, and that’s a shame. However, it’s still a better deal than the legalization law passed by the State of Washington, for example – and even with their much-higher taxes and other negative provisions that we won’t have to suffer, the price of cannabis has gone down there as in every other state that has passed legalization. Prohibition is a much higher tax, just considering the market price of the commodity and not even considering all of the other consequences. As for where the money goes, it’s the opposite of a “slush fund,” it’s a separately maintained fund which has very clear and explicit earmarks for how much is to be spent on what in which order. This actually is one of the things we don’t like about it – we prefer all tax money go to the General Fund where it can be spent on whatever we need – but most voters prefer earmarks, and the places and amounts are what have found favor among likely voters.

Finally, and most dangerously:

“We can do better.” Momentum is on our side, there’s no reason to rush to pass this initiative, there are better options available and if we defeat Prop. 64 we’ll be in a better position to pass one of the other, superior initiatives that have been circulated.

This is delusional. The other initiatives that Prop. 64 opponents tout have never come close to getting on the ballot, and there are no prospects that they ever will. (And those initiatives are actually worse than Prop. 64 in several of the ways opponents object to.) When California failed to pass Prop. 19 six years ago, it was a defeat for legalization efforts, but that defeat was mitigated by the facts that (1) it was the first non-medical legalization measure post-Prop. 215, (2) the uniquely unrestricted nature of Prop. 215 (which has provided a negative model for every other state’s medical initiatives ever since) and the greater influence of the Emerald Triangle growers skewed the results here, and (3) it was a non-Presidential election, with lower voter turnout and therefore skewed toward the conservative end. Failure to pass Prop. 64 in this election will not be seen as a signal that Californians want better legalization – it would be a major defeat for the entire concept of adult-use legalization and a major momentum-killer for the entire movement, while passing Prop. 64 would give that momentum a turbocharged boost not only across the U.S. but internationally as well.

Proposition 64 is not perfect, by any means. No proposition that could make it onto the California ballot, or stand a chance of passing in a state that is not as universally liberal and pot-friendly as one might imagine – Bay Area, Los Angeles and Emerald Triangle notwithstanding – could possibly satisfy the wishes and desires of cannabis consumers, producers and merchants. There are several legitimate objections, as noted here:

California NORML Guide to AUMA

But as noted, most of the real problems that exist can be fixed by further legislative work, as noted here:

Cal NORML’s Post-64 Reform Agenda

Advocates for the rights of cannabis consumers and opponents of the War on Drugs are advised to vote for Prop. 64 and to join in this work.

When: begins Saturday, October 29 at 10:00am (see itinerary below)
Where: Crenshaw Fzrmer’s Market, 3650 MLK Blvd, Los Angeles ( MAP )

When: begins Sunday, October 30 at 10:00am (see itinerary below)
Where: MacArthur Park, Los Angeles ( MAP )

What: Campaign appearances and outreach
Sponsor: Party for Socialism and Liberation
Contact: Facebook event page

Gloria La Riva has led a fighting Presidential campaign across California, New Mexico, Colorado, and beyond! Her campaign has fought the rising tide of white supremacy from the front line fight against Trump in Burlingame to chasing Sheriff Joe Arpaio out of the South Bay community of Los Angeles. She was jailed while shoulder to shoulder with the community of Baton Rouge, LA after the heinous murder of Alton Sterling and joined the encampments at Standing Rock with her running mate Dennis Banks to demand an end to the violation of Native rights and destruction of the planet. She has been featured in news outlets, including Univision, Telesur, and many others. She has built events to free our political prisoners and fight mass incarceration, including building with Albert Woodfox of the Angola 3 and rallying outside of San Quentin. Her dynamic campaign has reached thousands of working and poor people who are seeking an alternative to the candidates presented by the rich.

And now she is coming to Los Angeles for a full weekend tour of the city! Join Gloria La Riva and her supporters in a neighborhood near you and hear straight from the California Peace and Freedom Party candidate in street meetings around the city!

Itenerary

Saturday

– 10am: Crenshaw Farmer’s Market, 3650 MLK Blvd
– 1pm: Lunch with La Riva, Caesar Chavez/Soto
– 3pm: El Mercadito in Boyle Heights, 3425 East 1st St
– 7pm: Noche de Ofrenda in DTLA Grand Park

Sunday

– 10am: MacArthur Park + Venice Boardwalk (Gloria will be at MacArthur Park)
– 1pm: Echo Park + Silverlake on Sunset, 1625 Sunset Blvd
– 4pm: Dia de los Muertos in San Pedro, 398 West 6th St

Proposition 227, passed in 1998, required that all California public school students, especially children whose native language is other than English, be taught in English-only programs. A greatly reduced number of schools continue to offer bilingual education, but the imposition of a complicated waiver process makes this option a rarity.

Proposition 58, placed on the ballot by the California State Legislature, will restore the option of bilingual education and remove the waiver requirement. Parents of English learners would be given a choice of instructional methods, including intensive English only instruction.

Research shows that a good bilingual program, which begins with instruction in a child’s native language and transitions gradually to instruction in English, is the best way for students to learn basic skills and concepts and the English language. How this works is not clear from a surface view.

It seems to most people that young children learn new languages quickly and would learn best by total immersion in the new language. This is caused by mistaking fluency for proficiency. Young children pick up everyday language more quickly and with better pronunciation than do adults, but that is not the same as the ability to think, read, and write in a language.

Learning to read requires multiple skills: letter-sound recognition, familiarity with syntax (the rules a language follows), and knowledge of the content or meaning of words and sentences. For a child to put these skills together, it is important to be familiar with the sounds, syntax, and vocabulary of the language. He or she will be most successful initially learning to read and write in the native language. As the child learns more English, he or she will more easily learn to read in English because the complex of reading skills will already be in place.

Proposition 58 is being touted by its proponents as a tool for all students to be prepared for the global economic system. They are downplaying the fact that immigrant populations were most negatively affected by the almost complete elimination of bilingual education since the passage of Proposition 227 in 1998. Their selling point is that Proposition 58 will promote dual-immersion programs in which native English speakers can learn a second language while students with a different native language learn English.

While second language instruction is good for everyone, what is most important is that we provide the best instruction possible for all of our students, especially those whose needs have been ignored or discounted. This can only be done if we restore bilingual education for English language learners. Vote yes on Proposition 58.

By Peter B. Gemma

Peter B. Gemma: I appreciate your time for this interview. You have stated that, “By the end of my first year at Brandeis University, I decided I needed to become a socialist.” What happened?

Gloria La Riva: I went to Brandeis in 1972 as a beneficiary of the affirmative action struggle waged by Brandeis students of color. The United States was involved in its imperialist war against Vietnam and there had been university protests in 1968 all around the country. Students were coming together to fight for equality, ethnic studies, against racism and for affirmative action. I learned from the students that they had fought to win the right for us, students of color and White students who were of lower-income, to enter Brandeis with scholarships. Through my political science classes and the radical student movement, I realized that the challenges that my family faced, poverty, evictions, racism, were endemic to capitalism and I quickly became radicalized in my first year.

Gemma: I have some basic questions about socialism and this election. I’ve interviewed one candidate who adheres to the socialist label who says he is a Trotskyite, and the PSL has been described as neo-Stalinist. Can you give me an overview of the American socialist movement?

La Riva: We do not define ourselves as either Trotskyist or Stalinist, but rather as revolutionary Marxists. We believe that working-class people, employed, unemployed, and students – I think the great majority – need to take political power, to reorganize society on the basis of meeting the fundamental needs of the people in a long-term, sustainable fashion. Today, the capitalist economy is organized to reward the capitalists, the owners of the giant banks, oil companies, military-industrial and other corporations.

Gemma: I’m sure when you are campaigning or talking with the media, it takes something to break the ice after using the unfamiliar term socialism – is there an issue or two which address specific policy issues that can start a political discussion rather than an exploring philosophical terms?

La Riva: I start out by pointing that one out of every two people in this country are either poor or near poverty, while we are seeing obscene, unimaginable wealth at the top. For example, just on the issue of the corporations and banks that use tax shelters abroad, if their holdings were taxed — even at the current minimal tax rate for the rich — that income to the society would amount to $717 billion dollars. But instead of just the basic idea of increasing taxes on the rich under this current system, the opposite is taking place. This is the capitalist system. People who understand this reality know that we need a new system.

We have been campaigning across the country and we’re getting a lot of support from people who agree that this system cannot go on. We also recognize the positive aspect of Bernie Sanders’ campaign mentioning socialism, which greatly facilitated our identity as socialists. People are willing to listen and they ask what socialism is. This year we have seen the fog of anti-communism being lifted from the minds of many, after more than 70 years of exclusion.

Gemma: You support the nationalization of “all the economic resources in this country,” and you’ve said, “Nixon used the emergency action in the 1970s to create a wage freeze, but we want to use it to create a price freeze.” Nationalization is pretty much a foreign term to most Americans – how would that work on a practical basis?

La Riva: If the people had political power we could for example set limits and control prices or inflation. Because of the skyrocketing of rents by landlords – really price gouging – we believe the rents should be rolled back to the 1990s. Of course, that would take a movement, but one greatly encouraged by a president who called on the people to organize collectively.

The billionaire class owns all the fossil fuels under the ground. The pharmaceuticals that are effectively killing people by jacking up essential medicines to inaccessible prices, or pushing opioids on the population, are causing mass addiction and crisis, and more. Under socialism, the people would own these vital resources which working people have indeed created. That’s what we mean by nationalization, taking back all the wealth we produce which has been gobbled up by the “One Percent.” The capital of the banks was created by interest rates worse than loan sharks ever charged – the banks were bailed out and we are stilling paying for that bailout! By taking control of the banks, the wealth could be used to finance a vast overhaul of the infrastructure, whether water, sewage, electricity, fuel lines, communications, roads and bridges, homes, and so much more.

Gemma: The PSL advocates a working week of 30 hours via the introduction of an income guarantee. The PSL website states, “A job should be a constitutional right. The minimum wage should be raised to $20 per hour and a living income must be guaranteed for those who cannot work.” What steps would you have to take to accomplish this?

La Riva: The Pentagon receives almost one trillion dollars each year, whether through direct military weapon financing or by other federal departments such as Energy. When we say to people we meet that the people should have the say in what is produced, where our wealth should be employed, we get an overwhelmingly positive response. When people fight back and organize, they can win.

Five years ago, the idea of having a $15 minimum wage was inconceivable to the majority. Thanks to the movement and workers coming together in the “Fight for $15,” cities across the country have been forced to raise their minimum wage, some over time. Hillary Clinton is still against the $15 minimum wage, and Trump’s answer is “they need to work harder.” When this is explained, people say, “Yes, that’s right.” They immediately recognize that it was a popular movement by the low-wage workers themselves along with the unions. The only thing that has ever changed this country for the better has been the movement – the masses of people organizing, educating and demanding. That’s how we plan to accomplish our goals. We plan to continue building the movement.

Today, there is no rational reason that every person who is able to work couldn’t have a job and every person unable to work couldn’t have a living income. What stands between that and the present reality is the capitalist system itself, which, as Karl Marx pointed out 150 years ago, needs unemployment. There is a vast need to rebuild the country’s infrastructure, build and staff tens of thousands of new schools, clinics, childcare centers, to construct millions of new housing units and refurbish many others, to carry out a crash program to switch over to renewable energy, and more. These urgently needed programs would provide tens of millions of jobs. And the money to fund them is there, presently in the form of the Pentagon budget that must be liquidated.

Gemma: You are campaigning on a platform that promises to “shut down all U.S. military bases abroad and bring all the troops, planes, and ships home,” and you propose to, “immediately end all covert operations around the world, as well as those agencies responsible: the CIA, NSA, FBI, etc.” What is the Party for Socialism and Liberation’s alternative to our current defense and national security structure?

La Riva: Today the U.S. has some 800 bases in more than 100 countries, with Central Commands for every continent. It is the military of an empire, serving to protect the interests of corporate America around the world. The wars waged by the U.S. in Korea, Vietnam, Central America, and the Middle East have all been wars of aggression.

Just to mention a few examples – the Guantánamo prison and military base must be immediately shut down and the whole territory returned to Cuba. Puerto Rico is an outright colony and can never be free as long as it is riddled with U.S. bases. Korea remains divided, long after the end of World War II, because of U.S. occupation and its threat to all of Asia. Africa is the new target of a massive expansion of U.S. military presence. We the working people pay for and die in these wars, while the rich get ever richer.

The danger of a new nuclear war remains very real, especially with the extremely hostile stance of the U.S. – which, by all indications, would only be intensified under a Hillary Clinton presidency – toward Russia, which is the second-ranking nuclear weapons power. The Obama administration has approved a new, one trillion dollar nuclear weapons program, even more dangerous than all the current existing nukes.

Obama signed a $38 billion military package to Israel, giving them a complete green light to continue the occupation, settlements, bulldozing of Palestinian homes, and th bombings.

A socialist government would take the initiative to dismantle all nuclear weapons. Its foreign policy would be based on friendship, self-determination, and solidarity with other countries rather than the current one of threats and aggression against many countries. I call for the dismantling of the military-industrial complex, stop the sales of weapons around the world, end U.S. aid to Israel and support the right of the Palestinian people to self-determination, including the right of return.

Gemma: If you are successful in dismantling the nation’s national security apparatus and erasing America’s international military footprint, would we be vulnerable to cyber attacks, spying, and terrorism? If our security and defense positions are changed radically, will the world automatically follow?

La Riva: For so many years during the existence of the Soviet Union and the larger socialist camp, the people were always told that those who live under socialism had no freedom, that they were under surveillance by their government, but all along the repressive state machinery of the United States was conducting a war against the popular movements. Now we are living under a regime of total surveillance and spying against all U.S. people and worldwide. Just recently, President Obama claimed – without any facts whatsoever – that Russia was hacking the Democratic Party’s e-mails and trying to effect the elections. That is the typical demonization of other countries that is intended to divert our attention from the greatest threat in the world, U.S. imperialism itself.

We believe that we should be promoting peace and solidarity around the world. If we stopped intervening in other countries’ affairs and paid reparations to all the victims of our imperialist wars, then why would we have to worry about our security? The people of the world want to co-exist, but capitalism and imperialism stifles that possibility. I have traveled to many countries that were being actively bombed like Yugoslavia, some targeted by crippling sanctions like Iraq and Iran, or suffering blockade like Cuba. It always amazes me that in each of those countries, the people emphasize that they distinguish between the U.S. people and the government, and desperately want peace and good relations. Our people need to understand this essential point.

Gemma: You have pledged to “abolish the police force as we know it and create a whole new one to serve the people, not the rich and corporations.” What would that law enforcement system look like?

La Riva: We call for a police force that doesn’t shoot and kill innocent Black, Latino, Native, and other people of color and working class Whites, one that doesn’t protect the corporations and banks over the well being of the people. For this we need a completely new system. Under socialism, community police would be unarmed – it is an outrage that we see in the United States, armies of Robo-cops with AR-15s deployed against protesters, and police who immediately shoot to kill.

Gemma: In researching the PSL, I was surprised by some news reports – for example, your party’s call for the withdrawal of the U.S. from the United Nations, and ending all foreign aid. How will that help American presence on the international stage?

La Riva: The United Nations is dominated by the five states with veto power and particularly by the U.S. It was conceived in the last years of World War II as an instrument of U.S. global hegemony. A revolutionary government would propose with other countries and people that it be converted to a truly equal association of states and peoples.

Gemma: Another surprise for me was your position on guns – the PSL believes the Second Amendment guarantees the right of individual citizens to own guns, and oppose restrictions on the purchase and possession of guns. Will you explain that?

La Riva: I support the position stated in the Peace and Freedom Party platform: “We support the right of working people to keep and bear arms.” That doesn’t mean that I think the overwhelming numbers of weapons in the U.S. population is healthy, especially with the proliferation of semi-automatic and automatic weapons that are pushed so heavily by arms manufacturers. Congress has exempted the corporations from any liability in the case of murders or the massacres that we see – that loophole allows the companies to take no responsibility.

Gemma: You said that you, “strongly support the Employee Free Choice Act.” What is that?

La Riva: EFCA, which remains un-ratified, called for workers to be able to achieve labor union recognition when a simple majority of eligible workers signed a card indicating that they wish to be represented by a union. It also would prevent a company from stalling on negotiating for a contract, which often kills a union drive. It was a truly radical legislation and the AFL-CIO and Change to Win, the whole labor movement, fought for its passage in 2008. But, the halls of Congress are filled with corporate lobbyists who made sure the politicians in their pockets buried it.

The current long, drawn-out system of seeking union recognition provides employers with numerous ways to intimidate and often fire workers who advocate for union recognition.

Gemma: The PSL “demands that the Black community be compensated fully, with interest, for the historical racism and wrongs forced upon them by capitalism.” How would the government organize a reparations program?

La Riva: The U.S. capitalist system was erected on a foundation of genocide against Native people and the theft of their land, and billions upon billions of hours of unpaid slave labor by Black people. Even after slavery was formally ended, the plantations were not broken up and the formerly enslaved people were not granted the right to property in the form of adequate land.

There is not enough knowledge in our country about the legacy of slavery and how much of the terror, theft of wealth, and denial of opportunity that still exists today. That causes the Black community in many cities to remain poor.

The Black population has far less personal wealth compared to White families or any other community. It has to do with racism – which is deeply embedded into our society – not always among the people, but there is White supremacy. The capitalists and politicians have done everything they can to foster that White supremacy in ways that are not necessarily so obvious – but are rooted in the denial of rights to Black people.

Jim Crow laws were the legacy of the counter-revolution – the turning back of the reforms after the Civil War, the Black Codes that created peonage and re-enslaved people in another form with prisons. Prisons are filled with Black and Latino people. That’s a direct result of the extremely racist notion that Black people should be given a harsher sentence than a White person for the exact same crime, who are denied a proper defense, or racially profiled.

As far as reparations goes, we would also start by honoring the broken treaties that the U.S. has refused to abide by with Native nations, and a program of reparations for the Black nation in the U.S. Let’s convene a committee of representatives from all the oppressed groups to calculate all that has been taken from them. It would be an important step for these groups to continue rebuilding their communities after centuries of suppression.

Gemma: Bernie Sanders’ campaign introduced the word socialism into the American politics and it may be a factor in many campaigns in the future. You have stated that, “I was hoping that Sanders would win the Democratic nomination,” and the PSL urged registered Democrats to vote for Sanders in New York and California. Is your platform much like the one Sanders ran on?

La Riva: Bernie Sanders represented an era of a more liberal policy that has been totally suppressed in the last 35 years. We agreed with many issues he spoke on, like free quality education and healthcare. We also believe that every person should have housing and food to eat. Sanders did a great thing to help popularize socialism. Of course, we had key differences with him, especially on foreign policy.

But for us, the question was how are we going to relate to the supporters of Sanders, millions who were energized by progressive ideas, who waged an admirable fight for their candidate. We had a positive attitude and constant engagement with Sanders’ supporters.

Today, we are promoting our campaign to expand on what socialism is in its entirety. Socialism also stands in full solidarity with all oppressed people around the world like the Palestinians, or the Cubans, whose socialist government is constantly threatened by U.S. aggression and blockade. We are running to further explain that real socialism can only come about through a mass peoples revolution, not by the decree of any politician.

Gemma: One news item maintains, that the PSL “considers itself generally on the same side as the on many issues,” and quotes you as saying that the PSL and the Green Party are “not running against each other.” What sets you apart from Jill Stein’s candidacy?

La Riva: We do have many points of agreement, and the existence of more than one progressive campaign is a very good thing. But our campaign is different than the Greens in that we are running an explicitly socialist campaign. Only a system where the people take real power, and own the means of production – the wealth that produces wealth – in a planned economy, can really transform society. We don’t believe that capitalism can be reformed. Look at every aspect of capitalism – the entrenched wars and global expansion, the vast production that is only motivated by profit and not people’s real needs and sustainability. Each time there is the mildest legislation to rein in the capitalists, they defeat it because they hold the real power in this system.

Gemma: Which states does the Party for Socialism and Liberation have ballot access in?

La Riva: Let me first point out that I am also on the ballot in California as the candidate of the Peace and Freedom Party, and in Vermont as the candidate of the Liberty Union Party. The PSL is on the ballot in Colorado, Iowa, New Mexico, with Dennis Banks as my running mate, and in Washington State, New Jersey and Louisiana with Eugene Puryear as my running mate.

Gemma: Why two different candidates for vice president? Tell me a little about each one.

La Riva: It has been very helpful for us to have two candidates, allowing us to cover more of the country, and to have representation from two great fighters for justice. Dennis Banks is the legendary Native leader and co-founder of the American Indian Movement. He just finished a campaign tour in California, which had a phenomenal reception from the people. Dennis Banks has been continually at Standing Rock Sioux Tribe’s encampment with thousands of people resisting to stop the Dakota Access Pipeline. Eugene Puryear is an incredible African American activist from Washington DC, the co-founder of DC Ferguson, a Black Lives Matter organization. He’s young but has done so much in the movement, including authoring the book, Shackled and Chained, a very important explanation of racist mass incarceration and its historical development under capitalism.

Gemma: Why was PSL taken off the Florida ballot? On what grounds are you challenging that decision?

La Riva: It was a change in the middle of this election cycle, with an unconstitutional interpretation by the new general counsel of the Florida Secretary of State. Othr third parties were also thrown off even though we had complied with the same requirements that allowed us to be on in 2008 and 2012. We are challenging with a lawsuit, but it is doubtful we can be made whole this year, since we were notified at such a late date.

Gemma: If you were allowed into the debates, what is one question you would directly ask Hillary Clinton? And how about Donald Trump?

La Riva: I would ask Clinton why she laughed when talking about the U.S.-backed lynching of Muammar Gaddafi, the leader of Libya, an African nation, or why, as Secretary of State, she sided with the U.S.-backed coup that overthrew Manuel Zelaya in Honduras in 2009, or why she referred to Black youth as super predators.

I would warn Trump that if he were to dare try to expel the undocumented workers and continue to attack Mexicans or try to ban Muslims, he would face a mass resistance in this country that will shake the system and show who really the power.

But if I were in the debate, I would also use my time to explain that we the people have always been the engine of change for the better, and that it is vital to understand that the rich are rich because day in and day out they under pay, exploit, lay off for profits, do whatever they have to do to maximize their profits, and in the end, the people have not one guarantee in our lives, no matter how hard we work. I would say that the Mexicans who labor in the hot fields cultivating and harvesting so food is on our tables, are not the enemy, the billionaires like the Walton family that owns more than 62 million Americans because they pay pitiful wages is the real enemy. I would say that the U.S. wars are what have created so much instability and danger in the world, and it is time for real peace by withdrawing our troops and providing a life of dignity for all. These concepts are not alien to the working class – people who struggle to survive instinctively understand this.

I could go on, but these socialist and progressive ideas are anathema to the rulers of the country. This is precisely why we are not allowed in the debates, or on the ballot on all 50 states by their draconian rules. And yet we have made great gains in the 2016 presidential elections. We have reached many thousands directly, person to person, and many people, especially the youth, are ready to fight for true justice. The Party for Socialism and Liberation, the Peace and Freedom Party, the Liberty Union Party have all worked together in a very positive way. We look forward to more collaboration.

Thanks very much for this opportunity to share my thoughts.

Gloria La Riva and Dennis Banks

Banks is on the ballot as the U.S. Vice-Presidential candidate for the Peace and Freedom Party in California, and in Iowa, New Mexico and Colorado for the Party for Socialism and Liberation.

Dennis Banks, co-founder of the American Indian Movement and Vice-Presidential candidate recently visited California to promote the campaign and speak out in solidarity with Native and working-class struggles.

On Sept. 30, Banks spoke along with La Riva to a large and enthusiastic crowd of 100 supporters at the San Francisco campaign headquarters, about his lifelong struggle against the racism directed against Native people in the U.S. He spoke plainly but with great conviction, power and humor. In particular, he shared his experience of the disgusting programs forcibly taking Native American children from their families and raising them in an environment divorced from their culture. The schools’ objective, akin to genocide, was to prohibit their language, spirituality and community, often using brutality.

Videos of Banks and La Riva speaking at the forum can be viewed here and here, respectively.

Following the SF kickoff event Banks, La Riva and their supporters went on to reach thousands of people across the state. They went to San Quentin prison, which houses 730 male inmates on death row, more than any other U.S. prison, and is the largest death-row population in the western hemisphere. There they held a press conference urging people to vote Yes on Prop. 62 to abolish the death penalty and No on Prop. 66, which would speed up executions. While at the prison, the candidates met with family members of prisoners.

Banks supports Monterey County Measure Z

Dennis Banks went with the people of Monterey County to protest the oil companies who are destroying the primary water supply for millions of people in California by fracking and injecting millions of gallons of chemicals into the ground. The campaign expressed support for Monterey County’s Measure Z, the only law up for a vote in the nation this November which would ban fracking.

They spoke to more than 90 supporters at a campaign event at Sacramento State University, and at Ukiah’s annual Indian Fry Bread Contest Festival.The candidates did interviews with numerous media outlets including the SF Chronicle Editorial Board and an hour long feature on KPFA’s Flashpoints.

PSL vice-presidential candidate Eugene Puryear, who is on the ballot with La Riva in New Jersey, Washington state and Louisiana, is now on an eastern tour. You can follow the PSL campaign on-line and volunteer by going to GloriaLaRiva4President.com.