Hospitals, schools and transport shut down in Puerto Rico on May Day, as thousands marched to the financial center in San Juan to denounce cuts and privatizations expected under the government’s $123 billion bankruptcy filing May 3. The U.S. Congress created a new Chapter III bankruptcy law especially for Puerto Rico in its 2015-16 session. Unions and social movements say workers would pay the price in the largest bankruptcy filing in U.S. history, dwarfing even Detroit’s.

Many bankruptcy opponents demanded complete cancellation of Detroit’s debt to the banks, blaming them for the city’s crisis.

May 17, 2017–Federal U.S. Court proceedings on Puerto Rico’s $123 billion bankruptcy filing, likely to cause terrifying flashbacks for Detroit’s public workers and residents, began today. 

In Detroit, public union leaders and others capitulated to a disastrous bankruptcy plan in 2014, which stole nearly all the city’s assets including its crown jewel, the $6 billion Detroit Water and Sewerage Department. The theft of DWSD led directly to the criminal lead poisoning for profit of the people of Flint. Chapter IX bankruptcy provisions forbids the takeover of a municipality’s assets “unless the municipality agrees.” U.S. District Court Judge Steven Rhodes recognized state-appointed Emergency Manager Kevyn Orr as “the city of Detroit.” Orr agreed to this wholesale rape of the largest Black majority city in the country. 

The city’s debt rose 300 percent as the banks got paid under a state-enforced emergency manager.  City workers, retirees, and residents took devastating cuts to their wages, health benefits, pensions and services. 

DAREA members disembark from bus in Cincinnati June 15, 2016 to pack 6th Circuit Court in support of their bankruptcy lawsuit. In center is DAREA President Bill Davis, to his right is DAREA VP Cecily McClellan. At far right is retiree Ezza Brandon.  The case has now moved on to the U.S. Supreme Court.

Meanwhile, however, various independent coalitions of retirees, including the Detroit Active and Retired Employee Association (DAREA) have sued the federal government over the bankruptcy, and are currently awaiting a decision from the U.S. Supreme Court over whether they will hear the case.

But in Puerto Rico, which has a long history of struggles for independence from the U.S., a much more militant fightback began with a general strike May 1. The outcome of THESE proceedings will depend on the workers’ determination to fight for victory. Below are excerpts from articles in Bloomberg and Telesur on Puerto Rico’s battle.

Video above: Miller Buckfire was a key player in Detroit bankruptcy.

HEDGE FUNDS VIE WITH PUERTO RICO WORKERS OVER GETTING PAID FIRST

Commonwealth’s pension systems set to go broke this year

Island’s $123 billion bankruptcy biggest in municipal history

By Michelle Kaske and Steven Church

May‎ ‎12‎, ‎2017‎ ‎5‎:‎00‎ ‎AM‎ ‎EDT

The message in Puerto Rico is blunt: pay us, not Wall Street.

Anger over the biggest municipal bankruptcy in U.S. history has centered on the urgent question of public pensions. Puerto Rico has promised its workers and retirees $49 billion in benefits, but it’s guaranteed bondholders even more. 

The pension system is scheduled to run out of money as soon as July, and many on the island fear, with benefit cuts already under discussion, that the hedge funds who own one-third of the commonwealth’s bonds will wrangle a better deal than ordinary Puerto Ricans.

U.S. District Court Judge Laura Taylor Swain

“The whole situation is unfair,” said Maria Rodriguez, a 64-year-old retired employee of the Public Building Administration. “I worked for over 35 years for the government and now it’s apparently clear that my pension will be cut by at least 10 percent. This is the result of the actions of multiple administrations from both parties.”

It’s a no-win situation for Puerto Rico and its 3.5 million people. Schools are being closed, talented residents are leaving and the economy has been contracting for years. 

That’s the mess confronting U.S. District Judge Laura Taylor Swain as the adversaries face off for the first time in federal court May 17 in San Juan. They’ll be tussling over $123 billion owed to retirees and creditors.

Massive May Day strike in Puerto Rico May 1, 2017. Black and white Puerto Rican flag is symbol of independence from U.S.

 ‘Don’t Care’

In pre-hearing rhetoric, labor groups are painting rich hedge funds as uncaring vultures looking to extract money from less-wealthy public workers. The creditors say there would be more money for everyone if Puerto Rico improved its revenue collections and thinned its hulking government bureaucracy.

Emilio Nieves, Pres. of PR National Union of Educators and Education Workers

“Hedge funds don’t care what happens to the people, they want to get more profits,” said Emilio Nieves, president of Puerto Rico’s National Union of Educators and Education Workers. “They are our oppressors. We will resist and the government of Puerto Rico must decide if they are in favor of the people or the bondholders.”

Puerto Rico must decide if they are in favor of the people or the bondholders.

Average annual pension benefits are $14,000, according to Puerto Rico’s federal oversight board, and roughly one-third of employees are ineligible for Social Security benefits. Nearly half of island residents live in poverty and the median household income is $19,350, compared with $53,889 in the 50 states, according to U.S. Census data.

The commonwealth’s federal oversight board anticipates a 10 percent cut in pension expenses. That’s more generous than what Governor Ricardo Rossello offered bondholders in his latest public proposal. General-obligation bonds, or GOs, which the island’s constitution says must be repaid before other bills, would receive a best-case recovery of 90 cents on the dollar. Since that estimate depends on an improvement in the government’s finances, the recovery could be as low as 70 percent.

Divide Payments

Rossello’s fiscal plan would pay bondholders less than a quarter of what they’re owed in principal and interest through 2026. The government hasn’t said how they would divide those payments, or which group is first in line.

Puerto Rico’s “Federal Oversight Board” is appointed by the U.S. President. The City of Detroit and its new school district are similarly overseen by the State of Michigan.

“As much as there were promises made to various stakeholders on the island — pensioners, current government employees or contractors who work for the government — those are all implicit promises,” said David Tawil, president and co-founder of Maglan Capital LP in New York, who bought Puerto Rico bonds in 2013 but has since sold them. “The bondholders have explicit promises whether they be in offering documentation or whether they be pursuant to the constitution.”

The court hearing comes two weeks after Puerto Rico’s federal oversight board filed a form of bankruptcy called Title III to help reduce its $74 billion [now re-estimated at $123B] of debt and tackle its unfunded pension crisis. It will be the largest restructuring in the history of the $3.8 trillion municipal-bond market.

Title III, a provision in the Puerto Rico relief law that [the U.S.] Congress passed last year, is the only way for the island to force pension recipients to accept benefit cuts in court. Puerto Rico needed to pursue Title III in part because of its pension crisis, the board wrote in its May 3 filing. Another negotiating provision called Title VI didn’t include retirement savings. (To see bill passed by U.S. Congress without representation of Puerto Rican people, go to http://voiceofdetroit.net/wp-content/uploads/Puerto-Rico-HR-4199-bill.pdf.)

PUERTO RICO NATIONAL STRIKE PROTESTS ‘COLONIAL’ DEBT CRISIS

Nearly half the alleged $132B debt is interest to banks and hedge funds

 More than $30B in debt issued illegally

Washington’s austerity prescription is hitting workers and students hard

6o percent of Puerto Rican children live in poverty; Detroit’s child poverty rate is 59 percent

TeleSUR

Puerto RIcans rise up against oppression by U.S. and banks.

May 1, 2017–Thousands of Puerto Rican workers, students and other demonstrators took to the streets in a national strike in the early hours of International Workers’ Day Monday to protest against the harsh austerity measures pummeling the island and the controversial federal control board managing its economy and crippling debt load.

RELATED: Puerto Rico Resistance Heats up as Major Cuts Target Education

The strike shut down businesses and blocked several streets, including traffic to the Luis Muñoz Marin international airport on the outskirts of the city as well as to the University of Puerto Rico, while dozens of others gathered at the offices of the Department of Labor in the capital’s Hato Rey area to prepare for a thousands-strong march on the financial district.

University of Puerto Rico students mass in streets.

Demonstrators carried signs with slogans against U.S. colonialism and against the neoliberal austerity measures targeting the island’s public education, health care, social security and other public services. Protesters chanted slogans including “Ricky is selling the island!” to criticize Governor Ricardo Rossello, while others marched with images of the Puerto Rico flag in black and white as a symbol of resistance amid crisis on the island.

Marches led by students, feminists, trade unionists and other groups began by congregating at five points in the city and later converged by late morning in the one-mile stretch of San Juan’s Ponce de Leon Avenue, known as the Golden Mile, where the controversial U.S. president-appointed fiscal control board steering the island’s economy is headquartered in the heart of the city’s financial center.

Juan Camacho at right with other Puerto Rican organizers

The fiscal control board — set up last year through the contentious PROMESA law that gained bipartisan support in the U.S. Congress as a plan to save Puerto Rico from its nearly US$73 billion debt crisis — has become a powerful symbol of the island’s colonial relationship with Washington and the sacrificing of basic rights in the name of servicing the island’s unmanageable debt load.

“This debt cannot be paid from the pocket of the workers,” community leader Juan Camacho said during the demonstrations.

RELATED: Puerto Rico Lays Groundwork for Upcoming Vote on Statehood

Puerto Rican artist Rene Perez, known as Residente, also joined the marches and addressed the demonstrators. Wearing a T-shirt promoting free public education, the famed rapper said he was proud to see the massive strike against the debt and in favor of workers’ and students’ rights.

“I’m very certain that is happening is completely unjust,” he said on stage to a large crowd, giving a shout out to students of the University of Puerto Rico, the island’s main public post-secondary education system with a total of 11 campuses and 70,000 students, and criticizing the hundreds of millions of dollars in cuts targeting the institution. “Education is fundamental for all countries’ development. That is what they are taking away from us and that’s what we have to defend until the end and that’s why we’re here.”

Protests against the cuts and the fiscal control board have argued that much of Puerto Rico’s debt is illegitimate. An initial audit report found that up to US$30 billion of Puerto Rico’s more than US$70 billion debt load was issued illegally.

A mind-boggling report by the ReFund America Project found that nearly half of the debt the island owes is not borrowed funds, but interest on bonds underwritten by Wall Street firms, who are raking in big profits from predatory lending schemes.

Puerto Rican children in housing settlement.

Nearly half of Puerto Rico’s population lives in poverty and child poverty is soaring at 60 percent. [Detroit’s child poverty rate is 59 percent.}The island faces a Medicaid funding gap of $650 million this year, while unemployment is nearly twice the average of the rate in U.S. states.

Puerto Rico’s ability to deal with its debt crisis has been crippled by the fact that it is a colony of the United States, which bars the island from filing for bankruptcy. Critics argue that the PROMESA bill and fiscal control board — which can override the local government in making decisions on the economy and debt restructuring — lays bare Puerto Rico’s lack of independence.

(For VOD’s dozens of stories on Detroit’s bankruptcy filing, put “bankruptcy” in VOD search engine at top right.)

Black Youth Project 100, Michigan Abolition Alliance, Mertilla Jones, others demand end to new Wayne Co. Jail, Dan Gilbert’s gentrification of Detroit

Protest held at new jail construction site during rush hour April 21, 2017; dozens honked horns in support

Group previously disrupted Feb. 16 Wayne County Commission meeting where commissioners voted $500,000 to study Gilbert jail swap proposal

Mertilla Jones announces protest on 2nd anniversary of 19-year-old dad Terrance Kellom’s execution by Detroit and ICE, to be held Thurs. April 27 from 1-3 pm outside the Frank Murphy Hall, Gratiot and St. Antoine

By Diane Bukowski

April 25, 2017

DETROIT — As evening rush hour traffic raced down Gratiot April 21, youth from Black Youth Project 100 and others, including Mertilla Jones, grandmother of Aiyana Jones, protested outside the foreboding structure of the half-done Wayne County Jail, calling for millions to be spent on schools, housing, and water for the people instead.  

Yana (center) was among these protesters outside the failed Wayne County Jail site April 21, 2017

“I don’t want to see any jail, abolish jails, stop mass incarceration of Black people, it’s all connected,” a young woman named Yana told VOD.

“We have money to support stadiums and jails, but a bunch of schools closing, that’s fine.  The school to jail pipeline is so obvious right now, like crowded schools, kids get disinterested, kids get ignored, and the next thing you know they’re in the streets, they haven’t learned anything. It’s perfect for the people in charge—all you have to do is lock ’em all up, put ’em away, and you can have all the white people come and enjoy all the fruits of the labor. It’s not OK.”

David Langstaff of the Michigan Abolition Alliance said the group earlier disrupted a Wayne County Commission meeting on multi-billionaire developer Dan Gilbert’s proposal to build a soccer stadium at the failed jail site, while constructing an entirely new “justice complex” at the current site of the Wayne County Lincoln Hall of Justice (Youth Division) on East Forest and I-75.

Langstaff and others demanded a complete end to prisons and police as they are currently configurated, calling instead for people’s “restorative justice.” He said the group’s fight against mass incarceration began with support for a national strike by prisoners Sept. 9, 2016, on the anniversary of the historic Attica prison rebellion in 1971. Prisoners from Michigan’s Kinross Correctional Facility took part. (See http://voiceofdetroit.net/2016/09/12/remember-attica-michigans-kinross-prisoners-join-nationwide-strikes-protests/)

Arthur, a leader of Black Youth Project 100, a national organization, spoke at the rally. He said the group has chapters here in Detroit, Chicago, New York City, and New Orleans, among others. They have a Facebook page at https://www.facebook.com/BYP100 and a website at http://byp100.org/.

The Detroit Public School system, largely under state-appointed CEO’s and emergency managers, has shut down over 224 schools in the city beginning in 2005 with its initial closing of 50 schools. Last year, the entire district was demolished and replaced with the “Detroit Public Schools Community District.” The previous DPS was left to pay off the gargantuan debt accumulated by the state during its reign since 1999.

The state recently claimed it would not shut 24 more schools “for the time being,” but would hand over such classic historic schools as Durfee Middle/Elementary to a “non-profit” organization called “Life Re-Modeled,” which intends to transform them into incubators for entrepreneurs. Many activists in Detroit continue to fight the closures as depicted in the video by We the People of Detroit and Kate Levy below.

The Last Cut? We the People of Detroit Documentary on School Closings from Kate Levy on Vimeo. (One correction by VOD: the closings did not begin in 2009, but in 2005 as covered by this author in the pages of the now defunct Michigan Citizen. The state first took over the district in 1999 despite the fact that it was running a budget surplus and students’ grades were on the rise.)

Mertilla Jones, still grieving over police slaughter of 7-year-old Aiyana Jones May 16, 2010

Mertilla Jones, who was sleeping with her seven-year-old granddaughter Aiyana Jones when a military-style Detroit police raid team broke into their home May 16, 2011, and shot the child to death, joined the protest at the Wayne County Jai as well.

She called for the youth present to attend a protest called by P.O.S.T. (Protect Our Stolen Treasures) on the second anniversary of the multi-police task force execution of Terrance Kellom April 27, 2015.The protest will take place Thurs. April 27, 2017 from 1 to 3 p.m. at the Frank Murphy Hall across the street from the Wayne County Jail ruin.

Jones said she will not stop fighting the system that slaughtered her beautiful granddaughter and has incarcerated Aiyana’s  father Charles Jones and his brother Norbert Jones for crimes they did not commit. They are part of the 2.5 million people incarcerated in the U.S., which has five percent of the world’s population, but 25 percent of its incarcerated population.

Jones was at the protest to represent P.O.S.T. as well, part of a national coalition of families and friends who have lost loved ones to police violence.

PROTEST ON 2ND ANNIVERSARY OF TERRANCE KELLOM’S EXECUTION BY I.C.E., DETROIT POLICE

Thurs. April 27, 1 to 3 pm,

Frank Murphy Hall of Justice, Gratiot at St. Antoine in downtown Detroit.

National monument in honor of Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr.

Cortez Davis: key juvenile lifer case challenges Michigan’s merciless re-sentencing statutes

Davis’ sentencing judge, the Hon. Vera Massey Jones, called JLWOP unconstitutional 18 years before the USSC  did, in Miller v. Alabama

Hon. Shannon Walker to conduct re-sentencing Thurs. April 27, 2017 @9am in Frank Murphy Hall

By Diane Bukowski

April 26, 2017

Cortez Davis (Facebook)

DETROIT – Tomorrow, Detroiter Cortez Davis, whose first Judge Vera Massey Jones condemned juvenile life without parole as unconstitutional in 1994, 18 years before the U.S. Supreme Court agreed in Miller v. Alabama, faces re-sentencing before Judge Shannon Walker in the Frank Murphy Hall of Justice at 9 a.m.

Will Judge Walker, just elected in 2014, pay heed to words of her elder, Judge Massey Jones, just retired, who said in 2012:

“. . . .This court held [in 1994] that to sentence this defendant to natural life in prison was cruel and unusual punishment. . . .The U.S. Supreme Court has finally held in Miller v. Alabama that to sentence juveniles to life in prison without the possibility of parole is cruel and unusual punishment. This court says ‘finally held’ because Mr. Cortez Davis has been in prison for 18 years without a parole hearing. . .Thus we have locked him behind bars for over 18 years as a juvenile who did not pull the trigger, who told the victim he held at gunpoint that everything will be alright, and who had the potential to be rehabilitated. We, the people of the State of Michigan, have treated this juvenile, now man, inhumanely.” 

Cortez Davis, 16 when he went to prison after a horrendous childhood, is now asking Judge Walker, through his attorney Clinton Hubbell, to give him the sentence Judge Massey Jones originally called for. Hubbell contends every day of the 21 years he has served so far is now part of an unconstitutional sentence as declared by the U.S. Supreme Court.

WCCC Judge Shannon Walker

Retired Judge Vera Massey Jones

Davis is asking for,  “Reinstitution of the September 26, 1994 sentence for First-Degree Felony Murder of 10-40 years, with proper credit for time served of 21 years as opposed to a sentence of 25-40 years (min) – 60 years (max) pursuant to MCL 769.25a(4)(c), for the reason that MCL 769.25a(4)(c) is an unconstitutional ex post facto law as applied to Cortez; . . . . That Cortez be immediately released, or deemed immediately parole-eligible.” 

It will take courage for Judge Walker to follow in her predecessor’s footprints, in a state and county which have vigorously fought U.S. Supreme Court decisions on juvenile life without parole (JLWOP) every inch of the way. Michigan has the second highest number of juvenile lifers in the country, and Wayne County has the highest number in the state of Michigan.

Excerpt from John O’Hair’s column.

Michigan legislators who enacted MCL 769.25a deliberately sabotaged the intent of Miller v. Alabama and the USSC’s successor opinion that Miller was retroactive in Montgomery v. Louisiana. They passed statutes inserting what they termed mandatory time limits for re-sentencing of juveniles.

Those time limits have been condemned by a host of retired Michigan legal luminaries, including former Wayne County Prosecutor John O’Hair, former Michigan Governor William Milliken, and numerous advocacy groups. O’Hair even called for federal courts to step in to rectify what he termed the gross injustice of re-sentencing juvenile lifers to maximums of 40 to 60 years, which he termed nothing more than more than renewed life sentences.

 “There are many juvenile lifers that have already started trying to contribute to society while still incarcerated,” Cortez Davis said in an article published in VOD. “A few of them are housed at the Thumb Correctional Facility in Lapeer, where Cortez Davis El, Jose Burgos, Keith Maxey of Wayne County and Dontez Tillman of Oakland County are members of the G.O.A.L.S. Program, where we share our stories with at risk youth that are brought in by various agencies.”

He also cited Burgos’ work counseling suicidal prisoners, and the work of others in Stiggy’s Dogs, which “with the help of these individuals, transforms battered, abandoned, and abused dogs into service dogs and pets for veterans living with PTSD and other traumatic brain injuries and elders that need companionship.

(See full article at http://voiceofdetroit.net/2016/09/27/mich-citizens-support-2nd-chances-for-juvenile-lifers-state-county-prosecutors-induce-fear/ )

Zerious “Bobby” Meadows

A Michigan Appeals Court ruled March 28 against Wayne County Circuit Court Judge Bruce Morrow’s re-sentencing of Zerious Meadows, a juvenile lifer who has been incarcerated for over 47 years, to 25-45 years. It claimed Morrow must sentence him to the maximum of 60 years. Meadows is now 63, and was sent to die in prison when he was 15, in 1972. With conditions of inadequate medical care and unhealthy food in the Michigan prison system, he may not survive that long.

In his article, Davis asked for the same thing Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr. demanded, that justice “roll down like water and righteousness like a mighty stream.”

 “Understand that the changes we’ve made didn’t start once the U.S. Supreme Court made the 2012 decision (Miller v. Alabama) nor once they made the 2016 decision (Montgomery v. Louisiana),” Davis said. “We saw the need for change long before the possibility of freedom existed for us. We want to contribute to society’s growth, not its destruction. We don’t want just anyone living next to our loved ones and we know society feels the same way about all that they love and vowed to protect. We no longer threaten the community. So instead of fearing our release, help us become successful upon release by advocating for the tools that are needed.”

The details of Davis’ individual case are spelled out in a “sentencing memorandum” submitted by Attorney Hubbell to Judge Walker, which cites his numerous accomplishments in prison, and says that his firm wants Davis to come work for it as a paralegal due to those accomplishments.

See full memorandum at http://voiceofdetroit.net/wp-content/uploads/Sentencing-Memorandum-Cortez-Davis.pdf.

Some related stories (more cited within those stories):

http://voiceofdetroit.net/2016/09/27/mich-citizens-support-2nd-chances-for-juvenile-lifers-state-county-prosecutors-induce-fear/ (Article by Cortez Davis-El)

http://voiceofdetroit.net/2013/01/10/michigan-juvenile-lifers-justice-delayed-is-justice-denied-re-sentencing-in-key-detroit-case-cortez-davis-jan-25/

http://voiceofdetroit.net/2016/10/07/stop-new-death-penalty-for-mich-juvenile-lifers-rally-tues-oct-11-for-charles-lewis-others/

http://voiceofdetroit.net/2017/03/24/appeals-court-hears-juvenile-lifer-meadows-case-pros-kym-worthy-objected-to-release-after-47-yrs/

Rasmea Odeh thanks her supporters outside the Detroit federal courthouse June 13, 2016.

Assistant U.S. Attorney Jonathan Tukel appears to want to sabotage the plea agreement

WHEN: Tuesday, April 25^th, 2017, at 1:00 PM Eastern Time (rally at 1:00 PM, hearing starts at 2:30 PM)

WHERE: U.S. District Court, 231 W. Lafayette Blvd., downtown Detroit, Michigan

MEDIA CONTACT: Hatem Abudayyeh, 773.301.4108, hatem85@yahoo.com

DETROIT — On Tuesday, April 25^th, Palestinian American icon Rasmea Odeh will be joined in a Detroit courtroom by supporters from across the Midwest. There, Judge Gershwin Drain will consider the plea agreement Rasmea signed in March, which ended a three-and-a-half-year legal battle against immigration violation charges brought against her.

U.S. District Court Judge Gershwin Drain

Rather than risk 18 months or more of imprisonment, and the possibility of indefinite detention by Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE), Rasmea will plead guilty to Unlawful Procurement of Naturalization, lose her U.S. citizenship, and be forced to leave the country. However, she will exit the U.S. without serving any more time in prison or ICE detention, a victory considering the government’s sought after sentence of 5-7 years.

The plea agreement took away the chance for zionist Assistant U.S. Attorney Jonathan Tukel to grandstand in support of the Israeli occupation of Palestine; so on April 21^st, he filed a Memorandum to enter into the record a number of points that were rejected by Rasmea in the plea negotiations, claiming that he would be able to “prove” that she committed “terrorist” acts and was a member of a “designated terrorist organization.”

Rasmea’s lead defense attorney Michael Deutsch and his team immediately filed a motion in response, denying any of the “facts” alleged by Tukel, and accusing the government of political posturing.  Judge Drain has not yet ruled on either filing.

Numerous reports have documented Israeli torture of women and children.

The 69-year old Rasmea was tortured and sexually assaulted by the Israeli military in 1969, and spent 10 years imprisoned by the Israelis, until she was released in a negotiated prisoner exchange. Years after her release, Rasmea came to the U.S. as a permanent resident to care for family, later becoming a naturalized citizen and making a home for herself in Chicago. When she was indicted in 2013, almost 20 years after she arrived here, the government claimed that Rasmea’s immigration documents were not in order. The case against her was never about immigration; it was always about attacking the Palestine liberation movement.

In her 2014 trial in U.S. federal court, where Rasmea was convicted and sentenced to 18 months in prison for allegedly giving false answers to questions on her applications for permanent residency and citizenship, Judge Drain barred the defense from challenging the legality of the 1969 Israeli military tribunal. Rasmea was not allowed to explain that she suffered from Post-Traumatic Stress Disorder as a result of the torture, but she won an appeal and a new trial expressly based on the excluded torture evidence. The crimes of Israel would have been part of that new trial.

However, just weeks before the re-trial was to take place, Tukel unveiled a vindictive new superseding indictment, falsely accusing Rasmea of being a “terrorist” and a member of a “designated terrorist organization.” These new allegations laid bare the government’s motivation in this case, to criminalize the cause of Palestinian liberation. Rasmea would be on trial for her lifetime of dedication to that cause. It is impossible to imagine a fair trial for any Palestinian in an immigration case framed around accusations of “terrorism.”

Prof. Angela Davis, Frank Chapman of Chicago Alliance and Rasmea Odeh at 2015 rally.

Tens of thousands of people across the U.S. have rallied in support of Rasmea over the past three-and-a-half-years, including many organizations and individuals within the Movement for Black Lives, the anti-torture movement, and the sexual assault survivors’ movement, respectively. She is embraced by the women’s rights movement as well, having been celebrated on International Women’s Day this year.  And over 1,000 members of Jewish Voice for Peace gave her repeated standing ovations at their national member meeting in Chicago earlier this month.

Hundreds of these supporters from Chicago and other parts of Illinois, as well as from Milwaukee, Detroit / Dearborn, Grand Rapids, Ann Arbor, Minneapolis / St. Paul, Ohio, Indiana, and other Midwest areas are already committed to stand with Rasmea at the Tuesday, April 25th hearing, and rally with her outside.

Previous related stories:

http://voiceofdetroit.net/2016/06/18/protesters-demand-freedom-for-rasmea-odeh-and-palestine-as-judge-drain-orders-possible-new-trial/

http://voiceofdetroit.net/2016/02/26/rasmea-odeh-may-get-new-trial-us-appeals-court-rules/

http://voiceofdetroit.net/2014/11/07/palestinian-heroine-torture-victim-rasmea-odeh-convicted-in-detroit-appeal-planned/

DETROIT PROTEST VS. TRUMP BOMBING OF SYRIA HELD ON TIGERS’ OPENING DAY APRIL 7; LARGE DOWNTOWN AUDIENCE REACHED

VOD INTERVIEW WITH SYRIAN-AMERICAN YOUTH ORGANIZER JOE MSHAHWAR OF WORKERS WORLD PARTY AT PROTEST 

ABIYOMI AZIKWE RE:  HISTORY OF ATTACK ON SYRIA, U.S. LIES

VOD Videos: Detroit Rally vs. U.S. attack on Syria April 7

DONATE TO VOD at https://www.gofundme.com/VOD-readers-up

(Excerpt) By Kris Hamel, Workers World Newspaper

April 10, 2017

Anti-imperialist forces from Detroit and the surrounding area joined an emergency demonstration called by Workers World Party immediately following the U.S. missile attack. Militant youth from WWP and Students for a Democratic Society at Wayne State University organized and led the rally, which was strategically held downtown at Campus Martius Park during rush hour.

Couple holds Syrian flag to protect infants. Photo: VOD

Protesters raised slogans such as “Feed the hungry, not the Pentagon!” and “The only road to peace is U.S. out of the Middle East!” drawing a direct link between the struggle at home and the struggle of Syrians against U.S. imperialist aggression.

Syrian-American (U.S.) youth organizer Joe Mshahwar of WWP told Workers World, “Students and young workers in the U.S. have nothing to gain supporting U.S. imperialism’s attempts at regime change in Syria. A militant and uncompromising anti-war movement must be ready to challenge further U.S. aggression in the region.”

Putin says trust erodes under Trump, Moscow icily receives Tillerson

Bumps up support for Syria, Pres. Bashar Al-Assad

By Yeganeh Torbati and Vladimir Soldatkin

April 12, 2017

Russian leader Vladimir Putin denounces U.S. Pres. Donald Trump

MOSCOW (Reuters) – (excerpt) Vladimir Putin said on Wednesday trust had eroded between the United States and Russia under President Donald Trump, as Moscow delivered an unusually hostile reception to Secretary of State Rex Tillerson in a face-off over Syria.

Any hope in Russia that the Trump administration would herald less confrontational relations has been dashed in the past week after the new U.S. leader fired missiles at Syria to punish Moscow’s ally for its suspected use of poison gas.

Tillerson started a meeting with Putin in the Kremlin after talking to his Russian opposite number Sergei Lavrov for around three hours. The Kremlin had previously declined to confirm Putin would meet Tillerson, reflecting tensions over the U.S. strike on Syria.

U.S. Secretary of State Rex Tillerson and Russian Foreign Minister Sergey Lavrov before meeting

Just as Tillerson sat down for talks with Lavrov earlier on Wednesday, a senior Russian official assailed the “primitiveness and loutishness” of U.S. rhetoric, part of a volley of statements that appeared timed to maximize the awkwardness during the first visit by a member of Trump’s cabinet.

“One could say that the level of trust on a working level, especially on the military level, has not improved but has rather deteriorated,” Putin said in an interview broadcast on Russian television.

In his interview, Putin doubled down on Russia’s support for Syrian President Bashar al-Assad, repeating denials that Assad’s government was to blame for the gas attack last week and adding a new theory that the attack may have been faked by Assad’s enemies.

Tillerson’s official itinerary in Moscow started with the meeting with Lavrov, in an ornate hall in a foreign ministry-owned residence. In opening remarks in front of reporters, Lavrov greeted Tillerson with unusually icy remarks, denouncing the missile strike on Syria as illegal and accusing Washington of behaving unpredictably.

U.S. launches Tomahawk missiles against Syrian airbase

“I won’t hide the fact that we have a lot of questions, taking into account the extremely ambiguous and sometimes contradictory ideas which have been expressed in Washington across the whole spectrum of bilateral and multilateral affairs,” Lavrov said.

“And of course, that’s not to mention that apart from the statements, we observed very recently the extremely worrying actions, when an illegal attack against Syria was undertaken.”

Lavrov also noted that many key State Department posts remain vacant since the new administration took office — a point of sensitivity in Washington.

One of Lavrov’s deputies was even more undiplomatic.

“In general, primitiveness and loutishness are very characteristic of the current rhetoric coming out of Washington. We’ll hope that this doesn’t become the substance of American policy,” Deputy Foreign Minister Sergei Ryabkov told Russia’s state-owned RIA news agency.

The U.S. earlier bombed the city of Kobani in Syria, near the Turkey border, under Obama.

“As a whole, the administration’s stance with regards to Syria remains a mystery. Inconsistency is what comes to mind first of all.”

Tillerson kept to more calibrated remarks, saying his aim was “to further clarify areas of sharp difference so that we can better understand why these differences exist and what the prospects for narrowing those differences may be.”

“I look forward to a very open, candid, frank exchange so that we can better define the U.S.-Russian relationship from this point forward,” he told Lavrov.

After journalists were ushered out of the room, Lavrov’s spokeswoman, Maria Zakharova, wrote on her Facebook page that U.S. journalists traveling with Tillerson had behaved as if they were in a “bazaar” by shouting questions to Lavrov.

Moscow’s hostility to Trump administration figures is a sharp change from last year, when Putin hailed Trump as a strong figure and Russian state television was consistently full of effusive praise for him.

COVER-UP

Also under Obama, the U.S. bombed the city of Raqqa in Syria

The White House has accused Moscow of trying to cover up Assad’s use of chemical weapons after the attack on a town killed 87 people last week.

Trump responded to the gas attack by firing 59 cruise missiles at a Syrian air base on Friday. Washington warned Moscow, and Russian troops at the base were not hit.

Moscow has stood by Assad, saying the poison gas belonged to rebels, an explanation Washington dismisses as beyond credible. Putin said that either gas belonging to the rebels was released when it was hit by a Syrian strike on a rebel arms dump, or the rebels faked the incident to discredit Assad.

Trump came to the presidency promising to seek closer ties with Russia and greater cooperation fighting against their common enemy in Syria, Islamic State. Tillerson is a former oil executive who was awarded Russia’s Order of Friendship by Putin.

Last week’s poison gas attack and the U.S. retaliation upended what many in Moscow hoped would be a transformation in relations between the two countries, which reached a post-Cold War low under Trump’s predecessor Barack Obama.

Putin gave Tillerson. a former U.S. oil executive, a Friendship Award earlier.

The United States and its European allies imposed financial sanctions on Russia in 2014 after Putin seized territory from neighboring Ukraine.

Washington is leading a campaign of air strikes in Syria against Islamic State fighters and has backed rebels fighting against Assad during a six-year civil war, but until last week the United States had avoided directly targeting the Syrian government.

Russia, meanwhile, intervened in the civil war on Assad’s side in 2015 and has troops on the ground, which it says are advising government forces. Both Washington and Moscow say their main enemy is Islamic State, although they back opposing sides in the wider civil war which has killed more than 400,000 people and spawned the world’s worst refugee crisis.

In cities around U.S., attack on Syria protested

By Kris Balderas-Hamel

Workers World

April 10, 2017

Protest in Philadelphia

In cities large and small throughout the United States, the response was swift and strong in condemnation of the U.S. imperialist, cruise missile attacks on Syria in the late evening hours (Eastern Daylight Time) of Thursday, April 6.

Many activists, a good many of whom are socialists and revolutionaries, withstood the corporate-media-spewed Big Lie that Syria allegedly utilized chemical weapons against its own people.

Although most Democrats, liberals and a good chunk of social democrats quickly sided with imperialism and the Pentagon, others took to the streets to protest this blatant intervention and warn others about the dangers of a widening war on the part of U.S. imperialism and its junior “allies.”

The protests linked the imperialist wars abroad with the war against the workers and oppressed here in the U.S., noting there is plenty of money for cruise missiles and weapons of mass destruction while basic social services and public education are slated for demolition by the Trump regime.

Following are reports from activists in several cities where demonstrations took place.

In Philadelphia, Black and Brown youth, workers, Vietnam war veterans and anti-imperialist activists carried out a militant march and rally in support of Syria, refusing to be intimidated by the police, who outnumbered the 100 or so protesters.

The messaging and chants connected various struggles and also condemned U.S. attacks against Yemen, Venezuela and the Democratic People’s Republic of Korea. Chants included “No bombs, no registry! Fuck white supremacy!” and “From Syria to Palestine, occupation is a crime!”

The march ended at the statue of vile racist Frank Rizzo, the city’s former police commissioner, 1968 to 1971, and then mayor from 1972 to 1980. The marchers connected Imperialist occupation and attacks abroad to racist police occupation of oppressed communities at home.

New York City protest

In New York City, after gathering at Union Square, hundreds took to the streets — including large numbers of youth — where protesters were attacked by members of the New York Police Department, who arrested at least 11 people. Among those arrested was Steve Millies of Workers World Party.

Some of the arrestees were brutalized by police, including Nerdeen Kiswani, a NYC Students for Justice in Palestine organizer and a leader in the march. Her head was slammed into the concrete as cops viciously tore her hijab from her head, choking her in the process. (samidoun.net, April 8)

Nerdeen Kiswani

Bayan USA and the International League of Peoples Struggle activists also played a strong role in the NYC march and rally.

In Portland, Ore., an emergency hands-off Syria protest got thumbs up and supportive vehicle honks from workers during Friday’s afternoon rush hour. The protest, which was covered by KOIN television, later joined other anti-war demonstrators in the downtown area.

Demonstrators in Seattle marched from Capital Hill to downtown, condemning the racist U.S. war against Syria. The Friday action was energetic despite the driving rain because of the many youthful demonstrators. The protest, called by the Answer Coalition, included participation by Veterans for Peace, the Democratic Socialists of America and World Can’t Wait.

Protesters also gathered in San Francisco in the late afternoon. The rally, organized by the Answer Coalition, included speakers from a broad range of organizations, including the International League of Peoples’ Struggle and Workers World Party.

Protests continue on weekend

On April 8 in Madison, Wis., a diverse group of labor and community representatives came out to protest at Library Mall. Zach Gevelinger, of Wisconsin Bail Out the People Movement, said, “We will remain in the streets until U.S. capitalism and imperialism are defeated.” (wibailoutpeople.org).

Protesters turned out in Buffalo, N.Y., on Sunday, April 9, to demand “Stop U.S. war on Syria!” and “U.S. out of the Middle East!” and to explain these demands to the many passersby who stopped to ask. The rally was called by the International Action Center and the Buffalo branch of Workers World Party and endorsed by the National Lawyers Guild Buffalo Chapter & Friends and the Sister District for Western New York, and supported and joined by many other groups.

Durham, N.C.

In Durham, N.C., anti-war protesters gathered at CCB “People’s” Plaza on Sunday for a rally initiated by the Durham branch of Workers World Party. People attending included members of Muslims for Social Justice; Electrical Workers Local 150, the North Carolina Public Service Workers Union; and the Triangle People’s Assembly.

Protesters held a rally at 3rd and Wisconsin streets and then marched to the Federal Building in Milwaukee to demand no U.S. war in Syria and money for human needs not war. Youth, students and members from many labor and community groups participated in the protest, which was sponsored by the Iraq Veterans Against the War-Milwaukee, the Milwaukee Antiwar Committee and the Milwaukee Coalition Against Trump. The Wisconsin Bail Out The People Movement and other organizations supported the action.

According to reports in fightbacknews.org, demonstrations also took place in Minneapolis; Houston; Salt Lake City; Tucson, Ariz.; and Tampa and Fort Lauderdale, Fla. Protesters in Jacksonville, Fla., were viciously attacked by a small group of Trump supporters and police on April 7. Several were arrested and one protester was beaten so severely he required hospitalization.

Terri Kay, Ava Lipatti, Jim McMahan, Tom Michalak, Lyn Neeley, Tom Scahill and WW staff contributed to this report.

Photos: Brenda Ryan and Joe Catron in New York City; Tom Blake in Buffalo, New York; Joseph Piette in Philadelphia; Terri Kay in San Francisco; Hannah Fahoome in Detroit; MAWO in Vancouver; Milwaukee Antiwar Committee.

Below: earlier VOD article announcing April 7 Detroit rally

Continue reading →

Bernie Sanders, Top Progressives Announce New Medicare-For-All Push

The Huffington Post

Daniel Marans

March 27, 2017

HP says Sanders using “Overton Window” strategy to obtain concessions, not necessarily complete single payer health care

CREDO’s Murshed Zaheed: No to “collaborating with right-wing extremists that control Congress

National Nurses United in Chicago push to tax Wall Street to fund single-payer health care.

WASHINGTON ― In the wake of the Republican  failure to repeal the Affordable Care Act on Friday, leading figures in the progressive wing of the Democratic Party are rallying behind a single-payer health insurance and a raft of other bold reforms.

These lawmakers and grassroots leaders have long believed that the problems plaguing the Affordable Care Act, also known as Obamacare, are rooted in the original health care law’s attempt to accommodate, rather than gradually replace, the private, for-profit health insurance system.

Now that efforts to eliminate the law wholesale are effectively dead, they are again arguing that the best way to improve the country’s health care system is to confront the power of corporate health care providers more directly.

“We have got to have the guts to take on the insurance companies and the drug companies and move forward toward a Medicare-for-all, single-payer program,” Sen. Bernie Sanders (I-Vt.) said on MSNBC’s “All In with Chris Hayes” on Friday night. “And I’ll be introducing legislation shortly to do that.”

Even before the Republicans withdrew their Obamacare repeal bill, Rep. Keith Ellison (D-Minn.), the deputy chair of the Democratic National Committee and a close Sanders ally, previewed this message at a rally in defense of Obamacare on Thursday.

“Don’t just be satisfied with defeating Trumpcare ― set your sights on creating real Medicare for all!” he told a cheering crowd of hundreds of activists.

Representatives of several major progressive organizations ― the Working Families Party, the Progressive Campaign Change Committee, Credo, Social Security Works and the National Nurses United ― all echoed this push in conversations with The Huffington Post on Friday and Saturday.

“The problem is the insurance companies, Big Pharma ― they’re gonna come back and use the chaos to their advantage,” predicted Social Security Works executive director Alex Lawson. “If Democrats go with a half-a-loaf policy, Republicans are going to blame them for the failures of Big Pharma. They have to immediately pivot to expanding Medicare.”

Notwithstanding the support of the influential groups for the proposal and ― according to a May 2016 Gallup poll ― even a majority of the American people, Medicare-for-all legislation is a non-starter in the current Congress. Single-payer health insurance still lacks support from many, if not most, Democrats, let alone from the Republican lawmakers who control both chambers.

But the proactive strategy speaks to increasing confidence among progressives that if they stick to their ideals and build a grassroots movement around them, they will ultimately move the political spectrum in their direction.

“It does take time for social change,” said Chuck Idelson, communications director of the National Nurses United, a 150,000-person labor union that has long advocated for a single-payer health insurance system. “We didn’t end slavery overnight. It took from Seneca Falls in 1848 ’til 1920 until women won the right to vote. But they only won it by building a movement.”

Overton Window

In the meantime, a potential benefit of this ambitious approach is what’s known as shifting the “Overton Window,” a political science term for the narrow range of acceptable political views at a given moment in time.

By adopting a position that is considered extreme by contemporary standards, politicians and activists can make more attainable policy goals start to seem reasonable by comparison. [VOD: i.e. Sanders et al are not REALLY working to achieve single payer health care at this point, just concessions from corporate health care industry and other politicians.]

That phenomenon already seems to be working in progressives’ favor.

Sen. Jeff Merkley (D-Ore.), the only one of Sanders’ Senate colleagues to endorse his presidential bid, discussed the possibility of lowering the Medicare eligibility age or empowering Medicare to negotiate drug prices in his statement on the Republican bill’s collapse.

“There are plenty of ideas already on the table that would make health care more affordable for working families, from a public option, to prescription drug negotiations, to offering older Americans the chance to buy into Medicare,” Merkley said on Friday. “I’m happy to work with anyone, from either side of the aisle, to explore these or any other ideas that would improve health care for working Americans.”

U.S. Senator Jeff Merkley/AP photo

Lowering the Medicare eligibility age from its current level of 65 is a “very interesting” idea, because of the positive financial effect it would have on the Obamacare insurance exchanges, said Austin Frakt, a health economist for the Department of Veterans Affairs.

By allowing the oldest exchange participants to enroll in Medicare, lowering the Medicare age would relieve the health insurance marketplaces of some of their costliest customers, said Frakt, who also has academic posts at Boston University and Harvard.

“It would reduce the premiums in those markets,” he predicted. (Frakt noted, however, that absent measures to offset the cost of the additional beneficiaries, the change would increase Medicare’s financial burden.)

Social Security Works’ Lawson praised the idea as an incremental step toward Medicare-for-all. 

“Start by lowering the age to 62 and get it down to zero,” he said. “If Democrats go with a half-a-loaf policy, Republicans are going to blame them for the failures of Big Pharma.”

Trump meeting with big pharmaceutical companies; he flipped his original position on lowering drug prices.

Another progressive policy gaining mainstream traction is legislation permitting the importation of prescription drugs from Canada, where the existing single-payer system keeps prices lower. Sen. Cory Booker (D-N.J.) was one of several Democratic senators to endure heavy criticism in January for helping block a resolution supporting drug importation. In late February, Booker became a co-sponsor of legislation Sanders introduced that would legalize prescription drug importation from Canada and other countries.

President Donald Trump  talked about getting tough with pharmaceutical companies over the price of prescription drugs as recently as early January.

But he has remained silent on the matter since inauguration, including the 17-day period when he was trying to pass House Republicans’ Obamacare repeal bill. What’s more, the ordeal cast serious doubt on his willingness to take on the GOP’s ultraconservatives, who no doubt oppose any form of government intervention to reduce drug prices.

Trump now claims he is counting on Democrats to negotiate over Obamacare on his terms, since, in his telling, the law is on the brink of collapse .

Obamacare’s insurance exchange markets have major problems in some states and regions, but the nonpartisan Congressional Budget Office characterized them as stable overall.

Mushed Zaheed of Credo and Netroots Nation

Still, Senate Minority Leader Chuck Schumer (D-N.Y.) suggested in a CNN interview on Friday night that Democrats would be open to working with Trump and congressional Republicans on reforming the law.

“We’re not gloating that they failed. We’re sad that they won’t work with us to improve Obamacare,” he said.

Murshed Zaheed, political director of Credo, warned Democratic leaders that any Democratic efforts to work with Republicans would not get any help from grassroots groups like his.

“If Democrats want to push their version of so-called moderate proposals ― good luck to them,” Zaheed said. “I don’t think anybody should be under any illusion that Schumer or [House Minority Leader Nancy] Pelosi will get anything from collaborating with the right-wing extremists that control Congress.”  

Massive march for single-payer health care, kick out insurance companies

Open Letter to Delegates Attending the National Single Payer Strategy Conference in New York City

“Let’s Fight For What We Need: Medicare For All”–not “Obamacare”

Jannuary 13, 2017

Dear Sisters and Brothers:

The Call for the National Single Payer Strategy Conference begins with an affirmation with which we agree wholeheartedly:

“We believe that a powerful resistance movement anchored in the labor and social movements can turn the tables on Trump and all that he represents. To win, we must inspire Americans to fight for what they need, not what the political establishment tells them they can get.”

And what they need is Single Payer, now! The American people support Single Payer (or Medicare For All) overwhelmingly. The Bernie Sanders campaign made Single Payer a household term; his call for it galvanized young people and workers from coast to coast.

With the Affordable Care Act now under attack by the incoming Trump administration, a wing of the establishment — the corporate Democrats — are telling us to hold our horses on Single Payer and focus on the defense of ACA. Many are the same people who told us that Single Payer could not be included in the Democratic Party platform or raised during the final months of the presidential campaign. (A San Francisco Bay Area nurse who appeared before the DNC Platform Committee to argue for Single Payer told a San Francisco report-back forum she felt like she was “crashing the Democratic Party’s country club party.”)

Yes, we must defend the gains contained in the Affordable Care Act (ACA), but we cannot and must not defend ACA as such. Nor should we put the ACA on the same level as Medicare and Medicaid, two historic gains.

Labor economist Dr. Jack Rasmus

The ACA was a law written by insurance industry lobbyists and representatives of other price-gougers in healthcare. Under ACA, hundreds of billions of dollars meant for the care of patients are siphoned off as profits for the big healthcare insurance companies — money that would be saved by their elimination from the system. This money could be used to ensure quality and comprehensive coverage for all residents.

The ACA’s flaws are fundamental: rising premiums (which are scheduled to spike big time in 2017), rising deductibles, rising co-pays, tens of millions still without coverage, exclusion of undocumented immigrants, bloated and wasteful administrative costs, growing problems in collective bargaining in negotiating good benefits programs, etc.

Labor economist Jack Rasmus summed it up well:

“In his farewell address, President Obama touted the fact that on his watch, 20 million of the 50 million uninsured got health insurance coverage, half of them covered by Medicaid, which provides less than even ‘bare bones’ care, assuming one can even find a doctor willing to provide medical services. The rest covered by ACA mostly got high deductible insurance, often at an out-of-pocket cost of $2,000 to $4,000 per year. Thus, millions got minimal coverage while the health insurance industry got $900 billion a year. . . .

“In the wake of ACA’s passage, big pharmaceutical companies have also been allowed to price gouge at will, driving up not only private health insurance premiums but Medicare costs as well, and softening up the latter program for coming Republican-Trump attacks.”

Indeed, the Democrats’ failure to campaign for Single Payer played right into Trump’s hands. This was best explained by Jack Kingston, a Republican former member of Congress from Georgia:

“One of the reasons that Hillary Clinton lost the election is the widespread anger in the Rust Belt and other regions over the rising costs of healthcare under Obamacare. It might not be a top media story, but it is certainly a discussion at the dinner tables in working-class and middle-class households across the country. Everyone is concerned that premiums and healthcare costs are going to soar in 2017 under Obamacare. Trump said that Obamacare has to go, and he got a real hearing.” (from interview on PBS at the Republican election-night gathering)

At a time when the national discussion is heating up around the question of what the ACA should be replaced with, the labor movement needs to go on the offensive with the call to replace ACA with Medicare For All. This, in fact, is the best way to defend and expand the gains contained in ACA. It is the only real solution!

To focus, as the Democrats are urging labor to do, on defense of ACA is a losing proposition. To win, we must inspire Americans to fight for what they need, not what the political establishment tells them they can get — and that includes the Democratic Party wing of the establishment.

It is time to break with this “lesser-evil” approach to politics. It is time for labor to assert its independent voice. It is time for the labor movement to break with its ties of subordination to the Democratic Party and launch a full-scale offensive to demand: Single Payer Now!

This is the message, we believe, that needs to come out of the National Single Payer Strategy Conference.

Issued by the Labor Fightback Network. For more information, please call 973-975-9704 or email conference@laborfightback.org or write Labor Fightback Network, P.O. Box 187, Flanders, NJ  07836 or visit our website at laborfightback.org. Facebook link https://www.facebook.com/laborfightback.