Headlines at the World Socialist Web Site today:
1. Democrats help kill resolution to impeach Trump over Iran war
In a demonstration of political support for Trump’s illegal and unconstitutional war against Iran, a majority of Democrats in the House of Representatives joined a unanimous Republican caucus on Tuesday to block a resolution to impeach the president. Democrats voted by 128-79, and Republicans 216-0, to table the resolution that had been introduced by Democrat Al Green of Texas.
Every Democratic Party leader—from Minority Leader Hakeem Jeffries on down, along with former Speaker Nancy Pelosi, former Majority Leader Steny Hoyer and former Majority Whip James Clyburn—voted to kill the measure. At a press briefing before the vote, Democratic Caucus Chair Pete Aguilar dismissed the impeachment resolution as a “distraction.”
Notably, Green’s resolution did not denounce Trump’s bombing of Iran as an unprovoked aggression or a violation of international law. Instead, it focused narrowly on his failure to seek congressional authorization, accusing Trump of abusing presidential powers by “usurping Congress’s power to declare war” and ordering strikes “without the constitutionally-mandated congressional authorization or notice.”
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The Democratic Party is an advocate and instrument of American imperialism. While supposedly “antiwar” figures like Green, Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez and Bernie Sanders engage in political stunts to give a “left” cover to this right-wing party, the real concerns of the Democrats are those of the Pentagon and the CIA. They object not to the homicidal belligerence of Trump but to his erratic and even seemingly manic conduct of the US foreign policy.
These concerns were spelled out most bluntly by Biden’s former Secretary of State Antony Blinken in an op-ed column in the New York Times, published under the headline, “Trump’s Iran Strike Was a Mistake. I Hope It Succeeds.” He called the decision to bomb Iran’s nuclear facilities “unwise and unnecessary,” but added, “Now that it’s done, I very much hope it succeeded.”
2. How the New York Times launders Zionist slanders against children’s content creator Ms. Rachel
The New York Times emailed questions to Accurso [Ms. Rachel], including the big bomb shell: did she receive money from Hamas? The “newspaper of record” has the temerity to ask this question solely on the basis of a piece of Zionist hatchet work!
One can admire her response, “This accusation is not only absurd, it’s patently false.”
But, the Times assures, “She did not dispute that she has posted more frequently about Gazan children.”
Caught red-handed! How could Accurso escape this charge, posting “more frequently” about Gazan children because they were being massacred “more frequently”?
“The painful reality is that Palestinian children in Gaza have been killed by the thousands and continue to be killed, maimed and starved right now” she replies, adding, “the idea that caring about one group of children prevents us from caring about another group of children is false.”
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In reality, the New York Times is waving, clapping and pronouncing its pedagogy in alignment with the US State Department and the murderous Netanyahu regime. This is not journalism, but propaganda, designed to intimidate and silence dissent. The Times, long a mouthpiece for the Democratic Party and the American foreign policy establishment, has once again demonstrated its role as an enforcer of ideological conformity.
Rachel Accurso has dared to say what tens of millions of working people around the world feel instinctively: that the mass killing of children is unacceptable, and that silence in the face of such crimes is unjustifiable. Her advocacy is not “wading into a debate”—it is legitimate and, one might add, elementary political activism. Quite rightly, Accurso recently told an interviewer that “it should be controversial to not say anything.”
3. Israel, confirming ceasefire, declares “campaign against Iran is not over”
Following his ceasefire announcement Tuesday, Trump traveled to the NATO summit in Brussels, which is set to announce major increases in military spending by all NATO members.
In a post on Truth Social, Trump shared a series of texts from NATO Secretary-General Mark Rutte, who praised the illegal US attack on Iran. “Mr President, dear Donald, Congratulations and thank you for your decisive action in Iran, that was truly extraordinary, and something no one else dared to do. It makes us all safer,” Rutte wrote.
Despite Trump’s boastful claims about having obliterated what he called Iran’s “nuclear weapons” program, the actual damage inflicted on the program appears to have been limited.
On Tuesday, CNN, the New York Times and other media outlets disclosed a classified US intelligence report indicating that the attack set back Iran’s nuclear program by only a few months.
4. Detroit high school student, on brink of graduating, deported to Colombia
Maykol Bogoya-Duarte, a senior at Western International High School in Detroit, has been deported to Colombia by the Trump administration. A June 12 post on the Facebook page of the Michigan Immigrant Rights Center read: “We are deeply saddened to report that our young client Maykol was deported yesterday. His flight left approximately 3 hours after his stay was denied. Instead of being able to complete his education, Maykol was abruptly removed from his family and friends. These are the real life and heartbreaking consequences of the policies of this administration.”
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The working class must take action to force a stop to Trump’s immigration gestapo, which is a key part of his broader strategy to build a dictatorship in the United States. This was shown by the deployment of Marines and National Guard troops to the streets of Los Angeles in response to largely peaceful protests, denouncing immigrants and their supporters as an “invasion.” Mass outrage contributed to the massive turnout in nationwide protests on June 14, by some estimates the largest in American history.
But the fight to stop deportations must be rooted in the industrial and political mobilization of the international working class. This requires workers take action themselves. Not a single major trade union, including the AFT or the Teamsters, has called for any real action—such as strikes or protests—in defense of immigrant rights.
To that end, workers, students and community members must build independent rank-and-file committees in every school, workplace and neighborhood. These democratic structures, united through the International Workers Alliance of Rank-and-File Committees (IWA-RFC), must take up the following immediate tasks:
- Organize emergency meetings in schools, hospitals and workplaces to expose the full extent of immigration repression.
- Plan for a general strike to unite workers—immigrant and native-born alike—against deportations, police violence, and economic exploitation.
- Expand the movement internationally, linking struggles in the US with those of workers worldwide.
In a revealing whistleblower complaint first reported by the New York Times on Tuesday, Erez Reuveni, the former acting deputy director of the Office of Immigration Litigation (OIL) at the Department of Justice (DOJ), accused several senior figures in the DOJ of “knowingly and willfully” defying court orders and directing “their subordinate attorneys to make misrepresentations to courts” in order to advance Trump’s mass deportation operation.
Reuveni’s complaint is supplemented by emails and direct quotes, lending credibility to its allegations. It exposes the criminal and lawless character not only of the Trump administration but of the entire US government.
Vincent Jen Chin ( 陳果仁) days before he was murdered
The brutal killing of Chin took place amid an earlier wave of anti-Japanese hysteria whipped up by the UAW and Democratic Party officials, who scapegoated Japanese workers for supposedly “stealing” American jobs. The UAW has never acknowledged, let alone apologized for its role in fueling anti-Asian hate.
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One would hardly learn from the official speeches what is taking place all across America: the virtual declaration of martial law in Los Angeles, the mass round up of immigrants and “foreign looking” people by the Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) Gestapo, and their detention in inhuman conditions without due process. Among those immigrants being rounded up are also US citizens and legal residents.
7. In an act of political censorship, Deutsche Bank terminates publisher Mehring Verlag’s account
The attack on Mehring Verlag is inseparable from the return to war and militarism and the assault on social and democratic rights. What is unfolding in Trump’s America—the ICE-Gestapo’s hunt for migrants, the domestic deployment of the military, gangster-style foreign policy, and the illegal bombing of Iran—is also developing, in varying forms, across all imperialist countries, including Germany.
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The attack on Mehring Verlag reveals what the ruling class in Germany fears most: the spread of ideas that threaten the foundations of its tottering, rotten capitalist system—namely, the program of socialism. As the great French writer Victor Hugo said 150 years ago: “One can resist the invasion of armies; one cannot resist the invasion of ideas whose time has come.”
8. German finance minister presents war budget
The very fact that [Finance Minister Lars ] Klingbeil has the financial leeway for such high new borrowing is the result of decades of social cuts. The debt brake, which sets strict limits on government borrowing, was enshrined in the Basic Law in 2009 specifically for this purpose. As Klingbeil himself emphasized, the low debt ratio of 63 percent compared to other countries now allows him to take out large new loans. What has been saved in social spending, local government and other socially relevant areas, is now being poured into rearmament and war.
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Before leaving for the NATO summit on Tuesday, Chancellor Friedrich Merz emphasized that Germany was not increasing its military spending “to do the US and its president a favor. We are doing this based on our own views and convictions.” That is undoubtedly the case. However, Merz’s claim in his government statement that the issues at stake are peace in Europe and protection against alleged planned attacks by Russia is a lie.
For years, leading representatives of the German elite have been demanding that Germany once again play a political and military role in the world commensurate with its economic weight. The Merz government has declared its goal of making the Bundeswehr (German Armed Forces) the strongest army in Europe.
With NATO’s advance into Eastern Europe and its support for the 2014 coup in Ukraine, the Western powers provoked a reactionary attack by the Putin regime, which felt surrounded and threatened in its existence. Since then, Germany has deliberately fueled the war in Ukraine, supporting it with arms deliveries worth billions and sabotaging any negotiated solution that does not involve Moscow’s complete surrender.
For the first time, the German armed forces have permanently stationed a brigade in Lithuania, at a key strategic location that would place them at the center of the war if the conflict with Russia escalates.
The goal is not only complete control over Ukraine, but also the subjugation and destruction of Russia and unhindered access to its valuable natural resources. In a world increasingly dominated by great power conflicts, trade wars and military confrontations, German imperialism is once again expanding in the same direction as in the First and Second World Wars, when it also occupied Ukraine and attempted to subjugate Russia, or rather the Soviet Union.
9. Britain’s National Security Strategy prepares militarization of society
Britain’s National Security Strategy (NSS) 2025 is Labour’s blueprint for militarizing society in preparation for major wars. It calls for a “hardening and a sharpening of our approach to national security across all areas of policy, already seen in a shift towards more investment in hard power and an emphasis on increasing the lethality of our armed forces.”
The document’s release comes just days after Prime Minister Keir Starmer announced a commitment to lifting military spending to 5 percent of GDP by 2035, adopted as a common goal at yesterday’s NATO summit, which the NSS hails as “the largest sustained investment in our armed forces since the Cold War, with an emphasis on greater lethality” and “warfighting readiness”.
10. Thai government on brink of collapse
The main opposition People’s Party has called for the dissolution of parliament and a new general election, saying it is necessary to prevent a coup. Army head General Pana Klaewplodthuk claimed that the military was committed to “democracy” and that the armed forces would continue to operate within “existing mechanisms.”
This is no guarantee a coup will not occur, especially in a country that has experienced two in the present century alone. Anti-government protests have taken place, with more planned. The military could use these demonstrations or the overall instability in the government to carry out a coup under the pretext of restoring order.
The factional warfare among the Thai ruling class now erupting to the surface is not the result of a diplomatically embarrassing phone call. It has been ongoing behind the scenes for months and has already claimed one Pheu Thai prime minister. Srettha Thavisin was removed from office on trumped up ethics charges last August. It is an expression of the profound contradictions gripping not only Thailand but the entire region, under the impact of the crisis of global capitalism and escalating US-instigated wars in Ukraine and the Middle East.
Washington is escalating its preparations across the Indo-Pacific region for war against China and is applying pressure on countries like Thailand to line up with its military plans, including through Trump’s “reciprocal” tariffs. Thailand faces a potential rate of 36 percent when the tariffs are set to take effect on July 9 if a trade deal is not worked out.
The permanent closure of Cruz K‑12 and Paz Elementary—two Acero charter schools in Chicago that serve predominantly working‑class, immigrant and Latino communities—was officially carried out in mid‑June. June 11 marked the last day for students and June 12 saw teachers and staff barred from their classrooms by “end of business.”
These closures represent nothing less than social arson, orchestrated by the Acero Schools management in collaboration with the Chicago Teachers Union (CTU), Chicago Public Schools officials and Mayor Brandon Johnson. The brazen attack will displace hundreds of students and nearly 100 educators, dissolving vital community institutions. Far from defending educators and students, the CTU bureaucracy has functioned as an enforcer of austerity.
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The final closure of Cruz K-12 and Paz Elementary on June 11-12 was met with almost total silence from both the corporate media and the CTU. Only a single Spanish-language news outlet reported the last day students walked through the doors or the moment educators were barred from returning to their classrooms. The deliberate media blackout, despite the presence of media companies with journalists devoted to covering education matters, underscores the political calculations behind the closures: Cruz and Paz had to be disappeared, quietly and without resistance, lest their destruction provoke broader opposition among educators and working-class families throughout the city.
Monday marked 11 weeks since the fatal accident that took the life of 63-year-old machine repairman Ronald Adams Sr. at the Dundee Engine Complex in Michigan. The highly skilled and respected worker, a husband, father and grandfather, was crushed to death on April 7, 2025, when an overhead gantry that lifts engine blocks suddenly engaged, pinning him to a conveyor.
In the nearly three months since the tragedy, Adams’ family and co-workers have not received any explanation of the causes of his death from the company, the United Auto Workers or the Michigan Occupational Safety and Health Administration (MIOSHA). In an email to this reporter Tuesday morning, MIOSHA Communications Specialist Mike Krafcik wrote, “Our investigation remains open. No updates to share at this time.”
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One Toledo Jeep worker said she knew Antonio Gaston, who was crushed to death at the factory on August 21, 2024, just eight months before Adams lost his life at the Dundee plant. “We still don’t know what happened to Antonio,” she said, telling IWA-RFC supporters that she would spread the word about the rank-and-file investigation to her fellow workers.
13. Australian universities in crisis: Oppose Labor’s cuts to international students and jobs
Staff and students at public universities across Australia face a deepening crisis. Over the past six months, despite protests at individual universities, managements have announced the destruction of more than 3,000 jobs—both academic and professional—mostly as a result of the Labor government’s reactionary cuts to international student enrollments.
14. Canada’s Liberal government gives full-throated support to US imperialism’s war on Iran
Within hours of the US attacking Iran’s civil nuclear facilities last Saturday evening with the most powerful non-nuclear bombs ever deployed, Prime Minister Mark Carney issued a statement on X welcoming the attack and America’s entry into the illegal war of aggression Israel launched against Iran on the night of June 12.
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The Canadian prime minister’s statement went even further than those of his European counterparts, including British Prime Minister Keir Starmer and German Chancellor Friedrich Marz, who both also endorsed the US strike on the Fordow, Natanz, and Isfahan Iranian nuclear sites.
Trump’s Monday night announcement of a ceasefire between Israel and Iran was immediately praised by Carney, who called for a return to “negotiations” and a “diplomatic solution.” This under conditions where Israel and the US have worked together to repeatedly use the White House’s promise of negotiations as a ruse to cover their aggression. Moreover, it is Trump who in 2018 blew-up the UN backed Iran nuclear accord, then imposed a campaign of punishing globally-applied sanctions, continued under Biden, aimed at crashing Iran’s economy and provoking “regime change.”
15. One year since the Gen-Z Uprising in Kenya: The need for a socialist and internationalist strategy
The eruption of mass protests across Kenya in mid-2024, led primarily by young people, marked a turning point in the social and political life of the country, with reverberations felt across the African continent. Opposition to Ruto’s International Monetary Fund (IMF)-imposed Finance Bill 2024 rapidly developed into an insurgency against the entire post-independence capitalist order. It exposed the deep crisis of Kenyan and global capitalism.
The Trial of Dedan Kimathi, the powerful historical drama co-written by Ngũgĩ wa Thiong’o and Micere Githae Mugo, has returned to the Kenya National Theatre in Nairobi nearly 50 years after its original performance in 1976. This long-awaited revival comes just weeks after the death of Ngũgĩ on May 28 at the age of 87.
The performance ends in total darkness, with Ngũgĩ’s pre-recorded voice echoing through the theater, urging the audience to “resist tyranny”, a direct call to Kenya’s youth to rise against the corrupt ruling elite and its imperialist backers.
17. UK teachers walk out at Outwood Grange Academy schools over plans to lengthen school day
The strikes are part of a growing movement of educators against the effects of decades of government funding cuts, imposed with the collaboration of the education unions.
18. Stagecoach West Scotland bus drivers’ strike betrayed by Unite
After nine days of a solid and determined strike in pursuit of an improvement in their pay, 430 bus drivers at Stagecoach West Scotland have been dragooned by company management and Unite trade union officials into accepting a miserable pay deal which meets none of their demands. In the aftermath of the dispute, several workers are reported to have been suspended for picketing.
Ahmed, a rail worker, told the World Socialist Web Site, “The attack on Iran is totally unjustified, it’s also a total threat to democracy… Before we know it, we won’t be able to protest.”
20. South Australian Socialists launch: The pseudo-left promotes reformism, parochialism
For the Socialist Alternative, the electoral fronts are a means of cultivating ties with elements of the union bureaucracy, the Greens and the Labor Party, while seeking to parachute its leadership into the corridors of power and influence. The objective function of the new outfits, amid a massive breakdown of capitalism globally and a crisis of the Australian political establishment, is to divert growing anti-capitalist sentiment into the safe channels of parliament.
21. Free Ukrainian socialist and anti-war activist, Bogdan Syrotiuk!
