The state of Maryland and Baltimore City in particular have been dominated by Democratic Party politics for decades, yet many residents struggle under a repressive police force, a lack of affordable housing, gentrification, inadequate investment in schools and in majority black communities, environmental pollution, and more. Black workers in the state have spent the past ten years building their own political structure, the Ujima People's Progress Party, to challenge the Democrats and now having established a base of support, they are working to achieve ballot access. Clearing the FOG speaks with the state organizer, Nnamdi Lumumba, about building black worker power in the state by engaging with communities around the struggles they are facing, building self-sufficiency and providing political education. He explains why this is necessary at this moment in time and how it fits into the broader picture of building political power on the Left. For more information, visit PopularResistance.org.

Jovenel Moïse's term as president in Haiti ended on Sunday, February 7, but he is refusing to leave office with the support of the Biden administration, the United Nations and other western imperialist countries and institutions. Moïse was placed in power by the United States and is ruling unilaterally by decree. He is violently repressing anyone who challenges his power. Clearing the FOG speaks with Wilkenson Bruna, a filmmaker and political activist in Haiti, about the dire situation, the events surrounding Moïse's refusal to step down and what people in the United States can do to support the rights of the Haitian people. For more information, visit PopularResistance.org.

President Biden declared early in his presidency that he wants to advance racial equity. The new Secretary of Defense, General Lloyd Austin, the first Black person to serve in that role, announced his intentions to root out racism in the Pentagon. The Black Alliance for Peace (BAP) recently launched two new campaigns calling for specific actions the Biden administration can take to end militarization of black and brown communities and to end the 'forever war' on Afghanistan. Clearing the FOG speaks with Ajamu Baraka, the national organizer for BAP, about these initiatives and the imperative to build the antiwar, anti-imperialist movement during the Biden administration. For more information, visit PopularResistance.org.

On January 22, the Treaty for the Prohibition of Nuclear Weapons went into effect. This treaty, which is supported by more than two-thirds of the countries in the world but none of the nuclear states, is groundbreaking in many ways and is a significant step toward nuclear disarmament at a time when the threat of nuclear war is the highest it has ever been. I speak with Seth Shelden of the International Campaign to Abolish Nuclear Weapons about the treaty, how it came about, what it will do and what people in the United States can do to press our government to ratify it. For more information, visit PopularResistance.org.

Baltimore Maryland is a majority-black but hyper-segregated city. Following the uprising in Baltimore in 2015 in response to the police murder of Freddie Gray, Dr. Lawrence Brown, a public health expert at Morgan University, a historically black university in Baltimore, found that historical context and data were missing from the conversation about what was happening. Thus, he wrote "The Black Butterfly: The Politics of Race and Space in America." In this book, Dr. Brown describes the history of and the players who created the urban apartheid and how Baltimore became a template for many cities across the country. His book, available through Johns Hopkins University, provides the data, language and solutions necessary for the struggle to dismantle systemic racism. For more information, visit PopularResistance.org.

In the last years of his life, Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr. rejected duopoly politics and challenged the roots of the crises we face, what he called the triple evils of racism, capitalism and militarism. As many people active in the Civil Rights Movement moved into the Democratic Party, Dr. King taught that the movement must be independent of political parties and be "the conscience" of them. For this, Dr. King was shunned and hated. In this interview from MLK Day in 2015, Kevin Zeese and I spoke with Kymone Freeman, co-founder of We Act Radio in Washington,DC, JasiriX, an activist and artist out of Pittsburgh, PA, and Cat Brooks, an activist in Oakland, CA about the revival of the radical Dr. King and how they are continuing his work in their communities. For more information, visit PopularResistance.org.

On January 6, 2021, thousands of Trump supporters rallied in Washington, DC at the White House with President Trump and then marched to the Capitol as the presidential election was being certified. Some of them entered the Capitol illegally, either with the assistance of police, as the police passively allowed them to enter or by breaking in through windows and doors. Some of them sought out and threatened lawmakers and ransacked offices. I speak with longtime DC organizer, Brian Becker, who is the national coordinator for the ANSWER Coalition about the events of January 6, the rising extreme right wing movement in the United States and what can be done to turn the current dangerous situation around. For more information, visit PopularResistance.org.

This past weekend, new members of Congress voted for the speaker of the House. Given the slim majority of Democrats, progressives urged members of Congress who ran on a platform of Medicare for All to negotiate a floor vote for the Medicare for All bill in exchange for their support for Nancy Pelosi. Given the recession, pandemic, the millions who have lost their health insurance, growing support for Medicare for All and this rare opportunity of holding political power, the floor vote was seen as an important demonstration that progressives in Congress would fight for the people's interests this year. The campaign went by the hashtag #ForceTheVote. I speak with Nick Brana of the Movement for a People's Party about the campaign and next steps to win National Improved Medicare for All. For more information, visit PopularResistance.com.

Judge Vanessa Baraitser will announce her decision on the United States' request to extradite Julian Assange on January 4. Assange faces 18 charges, 17 of them under the Espionage Act, which has been weaponized to go after journalists who expose war crimes and other truths the United States wants to keep secret. If he is extradited, it will end press freedom as we know it. Any journalist anywhere in the world will know they could face similar consequences if they expose the US government. I speak with Kevin Gosztola of Shadowproof, who has been following the extradition process closely, about what is likely to happen and what activists can do to protect Julian Assange and our right to know. For more information, visit PopularResistance.org.

You won't hear this in the corporate media but the struggle for Palestinian rights is gaining power and that is why there is an escalation by the Zionists to hold onto their power. Author and activist Miko Peled provides an update of what we need to know including a new study about the Palestinian refugee crisis, the status of the annexation of the West Bank, what is behind Arab states normalizing relations with the Israeli state, the new definition of anti-Semitism that is spreading and the current political instability in Israel. He also talks about the incoming Biden-Harris administration in terms of what that means for the Palestinian struggle and what activists should be demanding. For more information, visit PopularResistance.org.