Build the Strike!
No Reprisals for Honoring Picket Lines

GEO is fighting for living wages, better healthcare benefits, protections for international student workers and better job security. The UIC Administration’s attacks on GEO are only one side of an all-out war on education and working people. Universities are in Trump’s crosshairs – from his racist DEI purge to crackdowns on pro-Palestinian activism to his ICE stormtroopers rounding up immigrant students. All students and campus workers stand to gain in a GEO victory. We all lose if the grad students go down to defeat. The Chicago Spartacus Youth Club has been on the picket lines with grad workers. We call on students not to go to class, turn in assignments, or take exams until the strike ends! Likewise, campus organizations (especially socialist student groups like SDS and Socialist Alternative at UIC) should suspend on-campus meetings, and mobilize their membership to join the picket lines! We say: Picket Lines Mean Don’t Cross! All Out to Defend GEO!

Build the strike, fuse the union struggles

A victory is only possible if the whole campus is shut down – and the grad students cannot do this alone. We have been told by a picketer that Teamsters have refused to make deliveries – this is exactly the kind of labor solidarity needed to shut down the campus and win the strike! UIC United Faculty and IBEW technicians have contracts expiring this August. The Plumbers’ contract expires at the end of June. IBEW electricians’ contract is up at the end of May! This is a genuine opportunity to wage a powerful joint fight for decent conditions for everybody and a first step in getting all campus union contracts on the same expiration date! GEO should call on all campus employees to come out and join their strike!

Right now, UF is crossing GEO’s picket lines based on a no strike clause in their contract. This clause is a weapon in the hands of admin, dividing campus workers and dictating when it is and isn’t an okay time to strike. Its existence is a betrayal on the part of UF leadership. There are instructors who are risking their neck by canceling class and refusing to grade anything while the strike is ongoing. UF members shouldn’t have to stand alone to defend grad students! When the UF contract expires in three months it’ll be the faculty on the chopping block. Faculty and grad workers have an interest in fighting for each other. A defeat now will weaken the position of faculty in August. Faculty – Smash the No Strike Clause! No Grades Until the Strike is Won! An Injury to one is an Injury to All!

To strengthen the pickets, defend students!

Many students support the strike but don’t join in for fear of retaliation by their professor or the administration. Students appealing to their professors for accommodations in light of their principled desire to honor picket lines are being told by profs that their hands are tied or simply go to hell! Students should not have to fear failing a class or losing financial aid for standing with the GEO. Scholarship students, many of them black and brown, are penalized even more for refusing to cross the picket lines and thus stand to lose everything! GEO should demand – No Reprisals for Those Honoring the Strike!

Why students should honor the picket lines

Many students may think to themselves – why should I miss class and exams for the strike? Remember this, conditions on campus degrade as the conditions of campus workers continues to worsen. This includes TAs and grad student workers who do much of the research and grading on campus. As they get screwed over and ground down, the quality of education they can offer plummets in response. Picket lines are battle lines: just as previous strikes have won things like an 8-hour day, health care, and a safe workplace, the pickets at UIC are the front lines in the battle for better conditions and education. Students – Honor Picket Lines! No Homework, No Class, No Exams!

We need a strategy that doesn’t waste time with appealing to admin’s conscience but hits them where it hurts – that means shutting the campus down tight! To win this strike, its gotta be ‘one out, all out’!