Railroad Worker Denounes Anti-Islamic Bigotry on 9-11

(After being introduced as Steve Millies from the Bail Out the People Movement)



I'm a railroad worker and a union member. I know that anti-Muslim bigotry is a train wreck for all poor and working people.



Thirty-five years before the Declaration of Independence, John Ury was hanged near this spot. He was alleged to be a Catholic priest.



That’s right. In 1741 it was a death penalty offense in New York to be a priest.



Today it is Muslims who are under attack. The attack on Islam is racism.



John Ury was swept up in a witch hunt against Black slaves and their supporters.



New York City and Wall Street was built on slavery. All over lower Manhattan are sacred grounds containing bodies of enslaved Africans.



In 1741, the slave masters and moneybags burned to death 13 Black slaves and hanged 17 enslaved Africans. In addition, four whites were hanged.



The gentry were terrified of a poor peoples’ alliance, like the one that Dr. Martin Luther King was trying to build before he was assassinated.



So the wealthy created a hysterical campaign against a so-called Catholic plot.



At least 22 million people in the U.S. are unemployed. Fifty million people don’t have health insurance. Transit fares and college tuition are being increased.



The Bail Out the People Movement says we need to fight back!



The billionaires are using the Tea Party bigots to try to divert the people’s struggle against economic misery into a war drive against Islam. Their first target is Iran.



We won’t let them!



Bigotry leads to murder. We will never forget Addie Mae Collins, Denise Mc Nair, Carol Robertson and Cynthia Wesley who were murdered when Birmingham’s 16th Street Baptist Church was bombed by the KKK on September 15, 1963.



We need unity, not racism, not anti-immigrant bigotry or hate against our Muslim sisters and bothers!



Thank you.