‘Your fight is my fight,’ declare May Day marchers

Jessica Ríos Viner led a group of about 350 noisy marchers down Forbes Avenue, Downtown, after rush hour on Wednesday night. This caught the attention of a blue-suited businessman hustling toward Market Square. He turned to look, then did a double take.

Viner, president of the Pittsburgh Chapter of the Labor Council for Latin American Advancement, thrust a giant cardboard fist into the air and used a megaphone to lead a chant: “Say it loud, say it clear, immigrants are welcome here.”

Then, “We are the union, the mighty, mighty union.”

For the rushing businessman as well as those just hanging out Downtown on a pleasant sunny evening, the chants and the handmade signs (among them “Librarians for Palestine” and “Defend our Workers, Refugees and Immigrants”) hinted at the theme of this year’s International Workers Day rally and march: “Your fight is my fight.”

The event reflected the advocacy of its organizers, which included LCLAA Pittsburgh, the Thomas Merton Center, Casa San José, and the Pittsburgh Chapter of the Asian Pacific American Labor Alliance.

Speakers addressed immigrants rights, accessible and affordable public transit, an end to the killing in Gaza, and the struggles of organized labor. A quick glance at the crowd revealed signs identifying museum workers, library workers, University of Pittsburgh graduate student workers and Pitt staffers who’ll soon be voting to organize, hospital service and clerical employees, and striking Post-Gazette workers.

Shortly after the event kicked off with a rally at the plaza next to the United Steelworkers headquarters, Viner read the names of six Latino workers killed when Baltimore’s Francis Scott Key Bridge collapsed after being struck by a cargo ship in March. Those workers: Alejandro Hernández Fuentes, Carlos Daniel Hernández, Miguel Luna, Maynor Yassir Suazo Sandoval, Dorlian Ronial Castillo Cabrera and Jose Mynor Lopez.

“No matter the color of the hands covered in dirt of the people working next to you, you have way more in common with them than you have with your boss,” Viner told the crowd. “No matter what language they speak or where they or their parents were born, everyone has the right to get home safe after their shift. No matter who they pray to or who they love, everyone has the right to work with dignity and respect.”

Here are a few highlights:

Not everyone has access to public transportation … if we [immigrants] don’t have access to public transportation, we have to get a car. If we don’t have a Social Security number, we cannot have access to that car and can’t get a driver’s license for it. For that reason, the coalition Driving Pennsylvania Forward is working in Pennsylvania since 2018 to try to change this. We can get all the immigrants to mobilize, to move forward legally. Getting a driver’s license has been an issue that 13 other states have been able to legalize. We’d like to be state No. 14 to move forward on this, and together we can accomplish that.

— Lorena Peña of Driving Pennsylvania Forward, who lived in Panama and Venezuela before coming to Pittsburgh in 2021

Sometimes all you’re left with is bad choices. And that’s what it’s looking like we’re going to have all over again in 2024. Bad choices. So I use my vote as a tool for harm reduction, and that’s the strategy we have to use our vote for. Empowerment doesn’t end after you cast your vote. It’s how you organize, it’s how you advocate — for yourself, for your neighbor and for the things you want to see.

— Farooq Al-Said, director of operations for 1Hood Media

Public transit is a human right. Whether you are black or white, whether you live in Beechview or Fox Chapel or McKeesport, everybody needs a safe, affordable, accessible way to get to their basic needs.

We’re organizing for a visionary baseline public transit service so that every resident in this county has access to service within walking distance of their home coming a minimum of every 30 minutes. And we’re demanding that transit services be provided in languages other than English. Casa San Jose has taken the lead on this. They’re winning. There are now Spanish announcements on the “T.” 

— Laura Chu Wiens, executive director of Pittsburghers for Public Transit

I’m a Filipino immigrant. When I first arrived here, I used to hate Pittsburgh so much. When I first arrived here with my family we experienced a lot of racism, discrimination and xenophobia. People would think that immigrants have some hidden agenda, that we came here for some hidden reason. However, we know this isn’t true. If you ask any immigration here as to why they came they’d answer, without hesitation, to give my children and family back home a better life.

We at Pitt Divest condemn the active participation of Joe Biden in the genocide against the Palestinian people. Instead of investing into a genocide we need to invest in the communities that built Pittsburgh. This city was built on the backs of brown, black and Indigenous, poor and working-class immigrant workers.

— Irene Tandoc, student organizer of Pitt Divestment From Apartheid