This is a conversation between John Meehan and Paul LeBlanc in Dublin on Friday, the 20th of June, 2025.
Paul Le Blanc has for many years been a teacher and activist in Pittsburgh. His writings include “Lenin and the Revolutionary Party” [1990; new ed. 2015]
Last weekend (Saturday June 14 2025) a large number of “No Kings” protests occurred in many parts of the United States. One participant was Paul LeBlanc. Would you like to give us an overview of the No Kings protests, describe the one you attended?
Paul Le Blanc: Sure I can speak especially about my own experience in Pittsburgh and in other cities and towns across the country.
The “No Kings” demonstrations were part of a wave of demonstrations that have developed over the past few months. The first big one was the April 5 demonstration, under the slogan of “Hands Off.” Hands Off the health care system, education system, various other things that are being dismantled or attacked by the Trump regime. In Pittsburgh, there was a massive demonstration. It was the largest that I had seen in the city up to that time, 8000 people minimum.
This was followed by May Day demonstrations. And Pittsburgh is not and hasn’t for decades been a centre of May Day demonstrations. But this was massive, the biggest May Day demonstration that I’ve seen. It wasn’t quite as big as April 5, but there were several thousand people participating. Again, it was focused especially on social issues and economic issues in the United States. There was also some reference to foreign policy stuff — Palestine, Ukraine, so forth.
The biggest demonstration of all was the most recent, the “No Kings” demonstration. There were over 10,000 people protesting in Pittsburgh, and millions of people throughout the country: a massive outpouring of anger and rage and ridicule of Trump’s pretensions of being popular and powerful and so forth. People said “No Kings,” with many accusing him of being a fascist, a totalitarian, a dictator. Certainly, he’s authoritarian. There was general agreement on a defence of the principles of the Declaration of Independence and even of the US Constitution, which he’s walking all over.
So, this was massive, and pro Trump elements have not come close to mobilising anything on this scale. There’s a lot of anti-Trump sentiment. Trump claims that he has an overwhelming mandate from the American people, and that’s a lie. He tells all kinds of lies, makes all kinds of distorted claims. He did not get a majority, certainly not a landslide majority. He was able to rack up more votes than his competitors. But his mandate is razor thin, and I think the number of people who support him is dropping. I believe that he is eroding his own base of support with policies that are hurting all of us. It’s an interesting development, for sure.
The shadow fleet consists of poorly maintained, often uninsured ships with unclear ownership that export Russian oil and gas via the Baltic Sea, in violation of EU sanctions against Russia.
The proceeds from these exports fund the war in Ukraine. The shadow fleet threatens both the environment and the people of Ukraine.
With today’s resolution, which Hanna Gedin and Jonas Sjöstedt (pictured) skilfully succeeded in pushing through in the European Parliament, hard pressure is now being put on both the European Commission and the Member States to take the decisions needed to stop the shadow fleet. This is a great victory for all of us who want to stop the war in Ukraine.
Carola Rackete, a left-wing German Member of the European Parliament (MEP) with a high profile, supports Ukrainian resistance against Russian Imperialism.
Carola Rackete is a consistent anti-imperialist and is also an ecosocialist activist. Here is Carola’s Wikipedia entry :
Rackete participated in several research expeditions to Antarctica and the Southern Ocean and is co-founder of the Antarctic Rights initiative. She also supported the Extinction Rebellion movement and took part in forest protests in Sweden, as well as the occupations of the Hambach Forest and the Dannenrod Forest in Germany. Between 2016 and 2019, she occasionally volunteered for non-governmental sea rescue organisations in the Mediterranean.[2] In June 2019, she was arrested for docking a migrant rescue vessel without authorization in the port of Lampedusa, Italy. The custodial judge considered Rackete’s actions as justified because she had a duty to save lives at sea and ruled that Rackete should not have been arrested. In 2021, the pending investigation was formally dismissed, since the state prosecutor didn‘t see reason to proceed to court.[3]
A newspaper acting as the mouthpiece of Vladimir Putin’s Russian imperialism (Junge Welt) launched a vicious campaign against Carola Rackete, who, as a leftist member of the EU parliament, agreed to a resolution supporting the Ukrainian resistance.
Provisional results of the 2024 European Elections, as at June 19. Source: results.elections.europa.eu
At first glance it looks as if the parties to the left of the social democracy held their ground against the surge of the far right and mainstream right that marked the June 9 European Union (EU) parliamentary elections (see here for results in detail).
Although the smallest of the European parliament’s seven groups, The Left managed to maintain its EU-wide vote at 5.4% and increase its seat tally from 37 to 39 in the 720-seat assembly.
In addition, left green Members of the European Parliaments (MEPs) and those representing stateless nations (part of the Greens group as the European Free Alliance) at least maintained their numbers in the chamber.
Yet the Greens group as a whole shrank from 71 seats to 53 while that of the liberals (known as Renew) fell from 102 to 79. This drop reflected that the environmental issues that in part drove the big advance of these parties in the 2019 election were less important for many voters this time.
The campaign was dominated by insecurity about the future, the cost of living (particularly housing), the fear of war, the “immigration threat” and intolerance of difference.
In this grim atmosphere the biggest growth went to the mainstream right European People’s Party and the two far-right groups (Identity and Democracy and Conservatives and Reformists): taken together the right and far right won an extra 30 seats, bring it to 324.
Because it would take only 37 ungrouped MEPs to join them to from a reactionary majority, the June 9 result poses with new urgency two old questions about politics in the European parliament. How much, if at all, does the real balance of political forces in the chamber differ from that among its formal groupings? And how much does membership of a group represent disciplined commitment to its positions?
Left divisions over Ukraine
The questions are sharply relevant in the case of the Left group, where differences over what stance to take towards the Russian invasion of Ukraine were already pointing towards a split before June 9.
On May 31, Li Andersson, chairperson of the Finnish Left Alliance told the Helsinki Times that these differences could not be tolerated in the group in the new legislature. Referring to Clare Daly and Mick Wallace, Irish left independent opponents of military aid to Ukraine, Andersson said: “The Nordic Green Left as a whole [covering Finland, Sweden, Denmark, Norway, Iceland, Greenland and the Faroe Islands] is of the opinion that if they manage to win re-election, they can’t join our group.”
For Andersson, the same went for the new Sahra Wagenknecht Alliance: For Reason and Justice (BSW), a split in Germany from leading Left group member Die Linke (The Left). BSW opposes military aid to Ukraine and supports resuming the gas trade with Russia, in common with most of Europe’s far-right parties.
We thank Joan McKiernan for bringing this article to our attention. It is a very thorough analysis of the myths about the genocidal Russian invasion of Ukraine. The author, Paul Schäfer, astutely observes :
24 February 2022 mark(s) a historical turning point. It was a watershed moment that raised new questions and intellectual challenges, particularly for the traditional Left, which has not exactly covered itself in glory by declaring that US/NATO imperialism and Ukrainian nationalism are the driving forces behind the war and failing to mention the fact that Russia was the aggressor.
The Russian invasion must prompt the Left to re-think its geopolitical assumptions
There is good reason to doubt whether we have, in fact, entered a “new world” since the start of Russia’s war of aggression against Ukraine. Nonetheless, 24 February 2022 does mark a historical turning point. It was a watershed moment that raised new questions and intellectual challenges, particularly for the traditional Left, which has not exactly covered itself in glory by declaring that US/NATO imperialism and Ukrainian nationalism are the driving forces behind the war and failing to mention the fact that Russia was the aggressor. Current events should have prompted the Left to recognize its own blind spots and tackle the issues of Vladimir Putin, his regime, and the roots of the long-standing Ukrainian–Russian conflict. But no such reckoning has taken place.
Since the fact that Russia invaded is undeniable, parts of the Left and the peace movement have shifted their focus to the run-up to the war. But while any analysis must undoubtedly look at the run-up to the war, too many are relying on a one-dimensional view that falls back on old, familiar patterns of thinking and categories. A glance at the Russian president’s speeches is enough to reveal the motives and objectives behind the ruling Russian elite’s decision to start a war of aggression. It is astonishing how little-known those speeches are in the relevant circles. Moreover, too little attention is paid to the role of the Russian Federation’s military-industrial power complex and intelligence networks. Looking at these — in conjunction with an analysis of the collapse of the Soviet empire, its consequences, and Russia’s geopolitical decline to semi-peripheral status — would have provided an adequate basis for explaining the war.
If we examine the reasons for such a reductive analysis, it is not difficult to see that parts of the Left are reluctant to give up old ways of thinking.
However, other parts of the Left also took some time after 24 February 2022 to understand the history of the conflict, the reasons behind the establishment of the Putin regime, and the current configurations of international conflict. Peace researcher Klaus M. Schlichte from the University of Bremen recently made a creative and complex contribution to a sourced historical and sociological analysis of the war. In an important forthcoming manuscript, sociologist Klaus Dörre from the Friedrich Schiller University Jena addressed the circumstances and background of the war and identified several open questions. It is essential to build on this if we want to leave the superficial debate behind us.
Across the globe left-wing forces over-influenced by conspiracy analysis methods have created propaganda smokescreens about the sabotage of the Nordstream Russian Gas pipelines in the Baltic Sea. The left-wing 21st century conspiracists use research methods which are not based on painstaking hard-grind work. Journalists such as Bob Woodward and Carl Bernstein brought the world’s attention to the 1972 Watergate with evidence based research. Today’s conspiracists begin with their own fantasy theories – and never mind the facts which get in the way. They create a circus 🤡 – it is the method of the bumbling Irish police who attempted to frame Joanne Hayes in the infamous “Kerry Babies” case.
Christian Zeller is an activist in the European Network for Solidarity with Ukraine (ENSU). https://ukraine-solidarity.eu/
Germany’s Sozialistische Zeitung gets it wrong on energy and geopolitics
Angela Klein’s commentary “Blowing up NordStream 2. An act of Ukrainian warfare” is bizarre. A long-time SoZ editor, Klein takes the revelation story as a confirmed finding and inserts it in her own account of the war in such a way that she even insinuates that the Ukrainian defence is waging an economic war against the German population.
On 6 June, the Washington Post again triggered all kinds of speculation with the publication of an exposé story on the sabotage of the Nord Stream pipelines. The journalists “revealed” without providing substantial evidence that a Ukrainian commando destroyed the pipelines on 26 September 2022. Since then, this speculation has been doing the rounds. A few months ago, Seymour Hersh “revealed” that the US had blown up the pipelines. Significantly, the same circles that followed Hersh’s US hypothesis are now following the Ukraine hypothesis….
Russia’s imperialist invasion of Ukraine is re-shaping the left across Europe and other parts of the globe. In Germany, the die Linke party (the Left) seems on the verge of a damaging split.
Leftwing party’s future in balance after series of resignations, as former co-leader calls coalition ‘stupidest government in Europe’
Germany’s Die Linke could split into two parties over the Ukraine war, as the ailing leftwing party’s indecisive stance over economic sanctions against Russia triggered a series of high-profile resignations this week.
The German Left party’s future has hung in a precarious balance since it snuck into the national parliament last autumn under a special provision for parties that win three or more constituency seats. Should three of its 39 delegates resign from the party, Die Linke would lose its status as a parliamentary group and attached privileges over speaking times and committee memberships.
Europe Solidaire Sans Frontières (ESSF) http://www.europe-solidaire.org/ has published and translated an exceptionally good interview about Ukraine :
Taras Bilous is a Ukrainian socialist, editor of the left-wing intellectual magazine Spilne and an activist in the Social Movement. Bilous has been serving in Ukraine’s territorial defence forces since early March. And in his spare time, he engages in lively polemics with Western left-wing activists, intellectuals and politicians on Twitter and in the most authoritative left-wing publications about the need for solidarity with Ukraine. “Meduza spoke with Taras Bilous about where foreign stereotypes about Russia and Ukraine come from and what can be done about them.
In Russia there is rather little knowledge about the inner workings of Ukrainian politics, it is usually discussed only in the context of “pro-Russian – pro-Western”. Please explain what place you and Social Movement have in it.
We should start with the fact that in Ukraine, as in Russia, there are systemic and non-systemic politics.
Today’s radical left has long recognised only one foe, that which Ayatollah Khomeini aptly titled “The Great Satan” – namely the USA. Little attention was paid lately to about “The Lesser Satan” – or Russia. For over 30 years after the fall of the USSR, we only imagined a single imperialist actor on the world stage. But 179 days ago we were reminded of the presence of another imperialist contender with full force. For too many, memories of the World War I collaboration of Social Democratic parties and the labour movement linger. The depressing jingoism of Western Europe and the USA prevents us from assessing a moral and rational response to the situation. As useful as historical parallels are, when we face a situation with almost no convenient parallel, at least none that are readily accessible and understandable to a population at large, we face a most difficult intellectual challenge. Let us not be fazed.
The content of this article is tremendously important. It strikes to the heart of significant dilemmas many activists have never before imagined, but which they cannot walk away from.
Can we be in favour of arming the popular resistance fighters in Ukraine without playing into the hands of NATO? Do we favour a Ukrainian victory over the Russian invaders? A strongly recommended article. Source : http://www.europe-solidaire.org/spip.php?article61396
The invasion of Ukraine by the Russian military is an act of aggression that causes untold suffering for the Ukrainian population and cannot be justified by anything. The bloodshed also affects Russian soldiers and the population in Russia will have to pay bitterly for the war costs. Both the resistance among the Ukrainian population and the first signs of Russian protests against the war therefore deserve our full solidarity.
It is good that the party and parliamentary group strongly condemned the war of aggression by Russia and demanded an immediate ceasefire and the withdrawal of Russian troops. Also, the humble admission that our party did not believe the war by Russia was possible was correct and looks credible. Only a few days before the first bombs fell, individual party members had called for a rally under the slogan “Security for Russia means security for Germany,” relegating warnings of an invasion to the realm of storytellers. What a devastating misjudgement. The dispute over relations with Russia has preoccupied the party since its founding. The role of the Red Army in the liberation from fascism, the 27 million deaths caused by the fascist war and terror, hardship and deprivation imposed on the people of the then Soviet Union were not forgotten worldwide in the left. Especially in times of the Cold War, this was not a popular stance. Parts of the party also moved in the line of tradition of Soviet-influenced “real socialism,” which still shapes its attitude toward Russia today. Regardless of the justified criticism of many leftists of the character of this system, a neoliberal-influenced transformation to capitalism has taken place in Russia. The Putin regime embodies an authoritarian oligarch capitalism that goes hand in hand with a strengthened nationalism. This system has nothing to do with leftist ideas; on the contrary, it falls far short of the standards of even bourgeois liberal democracies. Under Putin, Russia has once again taken a more active role in world politics. This involves hard-nosed interests that are also being enforced militarily. Tommaso Di Francesco of il manifesto, who already assessed Putin’s decision to recognize the independence of Lugansk and Donetsk as an “act of violence” and an adventurous harbinger of a new war, describes Russia as “driven by its ideological and military expansion”.
Tomás Ó Flatharta 