FtOn Sunday, Jan. 6 from 2 to 5 p.m., at the Pride of Fort Lauderdale Elks Lodge 652, 712 N.W. Second St., Fort Lauderdale, the Party for Socialism and Liberation (PSLwill announce at its Florida state convention its candi-dates for president and vice president — Gloria La Riva and Eugene Puryear, and 22nd district Congressional candidate, Mike Prysner. The PSL will appear on the Florida 2008 election ballot.
The three candidates will speak at the Florida state convention of the Party for Socialism and Liberation. In addition, activists from local struggles will address the participants, including Lana Shehadeh, a Muslim student leader, along with a farmworker from Immokalee. There will be performances by hip hop group The Dead Beats Writer’s Lab.
Gloria La Riva, PSL’s presidential candidate, is a Latina trade union leader and president of the Typographers Union in San Francisco, Calif. She is the National Coordinator of the National Committee to Free the Cuban Five. Eugene Puryear, PSL’s vice presidential candidate, is a BlackAmerican student leader of Act Now to Stop War and End Racism at Howard University in Washington, D.C. who is organizing to free the Jena 6. Mike Prysner, PSL’s candidate for the 22nd Congressional District in Florida, is an Iraq war veteran and student leader at Florida Atlantic University.
Supporters of the campaign are going door-to-door and shop-to-shop to talk to workers about the campaign that is being organized in their interest. Already crowds have gathered to hear about the PSL campaign with great interest in working class areas of Broward County.
“Our Party is running to insert the voice of working people into the 2008 elections. The Democrats and Republicans represent the interests of big business, the landlords, bankers and Pentagon. Our campaign will bring the message to the people of the United States that a people’s movement is what will make real and meaningful change,” says La Riva.
“The profit system—the capitalist system—is in reality a democracy for the wealthy. We live in the richest economy in the world, yet over 47 million people have no health coverage and millions more have inadequate care. The [Black] American, Latino, Native, Arab and Asian communities face terrorism by the police and government. The Liberty City 7 and the Jena 6 are only two examples,” says Puryear.
“Who has benefited from the 379 billion dollars spent to invade and occupy the people of Iraq? Who has benefited from the nearly two million dead Iraqis, the thousands of dead U.S. soldiers, and tens of thousand maimed soldiers—only the richest of the rich can reply in the affirmative—Exxon, British Petroleum, Blackwater, Halliburton. Our campaign stands in solidarity with the Iraqi people, the soldiers and the majority of people in the U.S. who are resisting this war. We call for the immediate withdrawal of the U.S. military now and for reparations to the Iraqi people to help rebuild Iraq,” says Prysner.
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