Neither AMLO nor President Sheinbaum has reversed the privatization of the retirement system. While the poorest have benefited from expanding social welfare programs, teachers remain on a treadmill, going nowhere.
The job of transporting transnational cargo is something Jesús Iturbero, whom we hear from today, loves to do. But when crossing the Mexico-US border, pressures from both countries have spoiled that kind of job satisfaction.
Asking for peace is dangerous, especially if it’s for a peace that means ending the violence enforcing injustice and exploitation. If you dare to speak out against that violence, you yourself will be subject to threat, attack, arrest — even murder. Maria Elena Valdivia found that out at an early age.
... when Esmeralda talks with such pride about her father at GM Silao, we’re reminded how powerful it is to also have family passing it down. In her daily work at Casa Obrera assisting workers build independent democratic unions able to negotiate better wages and benefits and working conditions, Esmeralda not only has the consciousness, she’s carrying on the work.
As Mexico City teacher Ángel Custodio tells us, teachers greatly influenced the 1917 constitution. Because they spent so much time with students and their families, they knew intimately that beyond reading, writing and arithmetic, the Mexican people needed rights and protections to secure their basic needs.
In today’s issue, we post an updated version of a previous interview with filmmaker Anne Lewis about her film on the historic Texas pecan strike and its leader Emma Tenayuca.
It’s true that, in 1994, when NAFTA implemented “free trade” rules, US automakers moved plants to Canada and Mexico, and wages went down across the hemisphere. But over the past 30 years, the auto industry has changed. Auto production today tightly knits together workers in all three countries as they produce different components of the finished vehicle that rolls into your driveway.
Trump is on a high-speed ethnic and political cleansing campaign. One person caught in this sweep is Lelo Juarez. We hear his story from Edgar Franks, interviewed by Truthout. Lelo has been a strong advocate for immigrant farmworkers, and has organized against the temporary farmwork program Trump favors. It’s likely he was specifically singled out.
