Mar 15
Dear Union Siblings of UAW Local 2710,
We write to express our solidarity and our commitment to support your struggle against Columbia University’s egregious attacks on democratic rights and Local 2710. The illegal abduction and ongoing detention of Mahmoud Khalil by ICE, along with yesterday’s detention of Leqaa Kordia, are historic attacks on democratic rights that we join you in steadfastly opposing.
Over the last year, we have closely followed the courageous anti-genocide protests at Columbia and have watched with outrage as the university administration has legitimized and facilitated Biden and Trump’s crackdowns. We condemn in the strongest terms the Columbia administration’s use of police violence, mass expulsions, and retaliation against students for exercising their First Amendment rights, and Columbia’s cooperation with Trump’s campaign of deportations and anti-immigrant terror. We likewise condemn the expulsion of SWC President Grant Miner, yet another thuggish act of union busting, followed today by Columbia’s decision to “cancel bargaining two hours before it was set to begin.”
As at Columbia, over the past year and a half, the University of California has used police and mob violence, arrest, and student conduct charges to punish students, faculty, and workers for protesting Israeli genocide on campus. UCLA has been turned into a mini police state, with a highly militarized police force and garrison of private security guards. Our union, UAW Local 4811, has played a critical role in defending students from these attacks on our rights, including by going on strike last summer. The university responded by attacking our union in the courts, and sending private security guards and police against our picket lines.
We recognize that Columbia University is a testing ground where the Trump regime is attempting to lay the groundwork for criminalizing all protest and opposition to US foreign policy. Trump has said that Mahmoud Khalil’s illegal detention is “the first arrest of many to come.” The withdrawal of $400 million in federal funding, together with a letter demanding sweeping anti-democratic changes to the university, are transparent attempts to intimidate other universities into compliance. Trump is carrying out Project 2025, which aims both to destroy universities as a bastion of free speech and thought, and to destroy public worker unions and privatize all public education and public services. In attacking the anti-genocide movement and our union, the Columbia administration is showing that it is a willing tool of a state that is turning toward dictatorship.
We are committed to fight with you against these attempts to destroy our democratic rights, abolish our collective bargaining rights, and break our unions, and we will provide all possible support to your struggle. Forward toward a united front of all public workers and a mass working class movement to stop the genocide, deportations, and Trump’s drive toward dictatorship.
In Solidarity,
UAW 4811 (UCLA) Rank & File Caucus
