On November 5, 2024, Donald Trump was elected as the 47th President of the United States of America. This came as a shock to many of the liberal elite, but to regular working class people this was far from a surprise. As capitalism is in decline, neither bourgeois political party will be able to fix a fundamentally broken system. However, a majority of voters believed that the economy would improve under a Trump presidency, and that’s why they voted for him.
As the Green Party’s candidate Dr. Jill Stein stated, there is a vacuum in people’s electoral choices – the fact that there is no progressive alternative meant that the people resorted to right-wing populism.
While the liberal Democratic Party and the forces of social democracy are opposed to right-wing populism (and by extension fascism), they are objectively unable to formulate an effective defense against it. The extent of reaction that will occur under the second Trump administration is yet to be seen, but we can reasonably expect, based off of his words and fascist-minded associates in Wall Street, that the gateway to fascism has been opened further.
As Communists we understand that fascism is the open, terroristic dictatorship of the most reactionary, most chauvinistic elements of finance (that is, monopoly) capital. In order to successfully fight monopoly capitalism and the fascist movement which emerges from it, workers and progressive people of the United States must build the labor-led anti-monopoly coalition.
We have already seen with this election cycle that independent organized labor is beginning to turn away from the two-party duopoly, now that it has become clear that neither the Democratic nor Republican Party leadership is interested in the concerns of workers.
The labor-led anti-monopoly coalition, which will follow in the footsteps of the Farmer-Labor Party, the Progressive Party, and the All-People’s Democratic Front, will be a formation of all progressive elements in American society, led by organized labor.
The policies of this anti-monopoly coalition could be reflected in popular progressive reforms, including
- expanded access to healthcare
- democratic electoral and judicial reforms, such as protection of third-party formations
- price controls to fight inflation
- rent control and expansion of public housing
- repealing the Taft-Hartley Act to empower organized labor
- moving the money from the military-industrial complex to fund these reforms
With the election of President Trump, we are now in danger of backsliding in terms of our civil liberties, like freedom of speech, press, and association, as well as our labor rights. These rights were hard-won by our forefathers, and we should expect to have to struggle as well to maintain them in the coming years. It is the duty of all Americans to fight for the democratic rights on which our nation was built. The most effective way to channel the energy of this struggle will be through the form of the labor-led anti-monopoly coalition.
“The preservation of the sacred fire of liberty and the destiny of the republican model of government are justly considered, perhaps, as deeply, as finally staked on the experiment entrusted to the hands of the American people.”
-George Washington, First Inaugural Address, April 30, 1789
Secretariat,
Central Committee,
Party of Communists USA