Peace and Freedom Party Candidates Stand with Educators on Strike
Photo Credit: Beth LaBerge/KQED
The Peace and Freedom Party candidates for statewide office stand with the members of United Educators of San Francisco, who are on strike today for the first time in 47 years to demand the schools that students deserve.
Educators in San Francisco are on the frontlines of fighting to solve the affordability crisis. For eleven months they have been bargaining for protections for immigrant students and their families, for more resources for housing and food insecure students, for affordable healthcare, and for raises that allow them to live in the city where they teach. As the school district continues to make proposals that fail to address the education crisis they created, the Mayor’s office and corporate newspapers are waging a narrative war to demonize educators for putting students at risk for going on strike.
We are a slate of candidates composed primarily of educators. As Peace and Freedom Party candidates, we support our educators going on strike and urge all working people to do so as well. As working people, our ability to organize is our greatest power, and the striking educators are wielding that power to demand the schools that our students deserve. As we saw with the January 23 general strike in Minneapolis and the following nationwide shutdown on January 30, workers have the power to stop business as usual. Nothing happens without workers. In the face of federal cuts to major social programs, and in particular public education, San Francisco educators show us how we can and should fight back— in San Francisco, in California, and in the whole country.
The consistent neglect of our public schools is a policy choice by the Democratic Party. With a $4 trillion economy, enough wealth exists in the state to give every child a quality education and pay educators a living wage.The reason that our public schools are in a crisis is because our Democratic politicians have long devised measures to protect the ultra-rich, causing the under-investment in California public schools. At the same time, the same billionaires who have hoarded the vast wealth of this state, with the help of their politicians like Mayor Daniel Lurie, are now flooding mainstream media demonizing educators. But the people of San Francisco know the truth: the unaffordability crisis in San Francisco has nothing to do with “greedy educators” – but the billionaire class that has pushed working people to the brink of survival. The educators are fighting for the future of San Francisco.
It’s time that we build a Party that represents the interests of working people. If you are inspired by the striking educators, help us build an independent movement. We need leaders who are accountable to the working class, not to billionaires. Register with the Peace and Freedom Party today. Join our candidates on the picket line and join our movement.