Because of the help from supporters like you, we succeeded in qualifying Kshama Sawant to be on the ballot for Seattle City Council by turning in over 2,400 signatures, more than double the number of signatures required!

"The hypocrisy of the mass media, owned by a handful of mega-corporations, is evident. While relentlessly blaming the protesters on Broadway, they maintain a polite silence regarding the gruesome violence of US wars or the devastating cuts to social services and education in Seattle and statewide."

With the political system increasingly dysfunctional, it is becoming ever more obvious that working people need to organize independently around their own political demands and break away from the Democrats and Republicans. There is a huge anger at the political establishment and a desire for a political voice for the 99%.

Socialist Alternative leaflet distributed at the protests against the KKK and neo-nazi's in Memphis, Tennessee on March 30

Vic Paananen, who died on March 24, aged 75, was a veteran socialist activist.

The Marikana massacre, where police armed with automatic weapons opened fire and killed 34 striking miners, was a watershed in post-Apartheid South Africa. Echoing this, one headline covering the launch read “born in post-Marikana anger, Workers & Socialist Party enters SA politics”.

The Republicans are trying to make working people and the poor pay for the government’s deficit by making deep cuts to Social Security and Medicare instead of taxing millionaires. Obama and the Democrats are proposing to make unprecedented cuts to these social safety net programs, too. Events like these are leading more and more people to conclude that the richest 1% has two political parties and it’s time the 99% had a party of our own.

The Vote Sawant Campaign kicked off our campaign for Seattle City Council on Friday, March 22. It was clear from the energy in the room that Socialist Alternative and the Sawant Campaign are making a real impact in Seattle.

Kshama Sawant announced today at a press conference that she is running as a Socialist Alternative candidate for City Council against Democratic incumbent and former City Council President Richard Conlin. This comes on the heels of Sawant's historic 29% vote (over 20,000 votes) that she won against Democratic state House Speaker Frank Chopp in 2012, the strongest vote of any independent left-wing candidate in the country in 2012.

Joined by 13 community members, including union and community leaders, Ward 9 City Council candidate Ty Moore was arrested in a civil disobedience at the Wells Fargo Home Mortgage center, standing up for housing rights for all Minneapolis residents.

The sea of self-made signs, placards, and banners at the historic Keystone XL protest in Washington DC showed that the destruction of the environment and climate change are definitely on the minds of ordinary people. After Hurricane Sandy and growing severe weather patterns, many more people realize climate change affects our day-to-day lives.

Hundreds of striking municipal workers meeting in a Pretoria park loudly cheered, sang and toyi-toyied after hearing speeches from visiting CWI members Peter Taaffe and Alec Thraves.

The discussion on South African perspectives reflected an organisation thoroughly rooted in struggle, in particular in workers’ struggle. The conference heard reports from the various strike committee members and mineworkers who attended as delegates and visitors. The discussion had to both reflect on the lessons of the past seven months of struggle and consider the looming new clashes in the mining industry.

Garfield High School teachers voted unanimously to boycott the MAP test and in doing so have given bold action to the simmering anger amongst teachers in Seattle and nationwide at constant standardized testing.

Just outside Sao Paulo, Brazil, between 22 and 27 January, the largest and most enthusiastic and confident CWI Latin American school took place. Approximately 160 comrades from Brazil, Chile, Bolivia and Venezuela participated with comrades also present from Sweden, USA and Britain and the International Secretariat of the CWI.