The Communist Party USA joins other communist, leftist and progressive governments and organizations around the world in denouncing the coup d’etat carried out against the government of President Evo Morales of Bolivia yesterday, Sunday November 10. Moreover, we point out and denounce the role of U.S. imperialism in encouraging and supporting this barbaric act.

Since his election, Morales and his government have scored notable triumphs against the historic poverty, inequality and racism in what had been the one of the poorest countries of the Western Hemisphere. The economic, social, cultural and linguistic rights of the large indigenous population were greatly advanced under Morales.

The plot against the Morales government had its regional base in the wealthy province of Santa Cruz, where the indigenous population is relatively small. The main leader of the opposition protest, Santa Cruz lawyer, entrepreneur and politician Fernando “el Macho” (“the he-man) Camacho is connected to extreme “Evangelical Christian” and racist elements that resent the advances of the indigenous and mestizo majority in the “Plurinational” Bolivia of Morales.

Dissatisfaction with last month’s elections was a pretext, not a reason for the coup. Morales had agreed to an audit by the Organization of American states and to a new election if this audit found problems. But right wing runner-up Carlos Mesa Camacho and their allies did not want to take a chance that the left forces would actually win a second election. They ramped up increasingly violent protests in which officials and activists allied with Morales and his MAS political party were beaten and their houses, plus government property, were burned. This gave treacherous elements in the police and military their cue to pull off a classical Latin American coup d’etat. Morales, Vice President Alvaro García Linera and other officials resigned to try to stem the violence. Nevertheless, it continues as the right wing moves to take over the Venezuelan embassy, to arrest officials and to threaten to roll back the achievements of the Morales government.

For us in the United States, it is most important to respond to our own government’s role in these events. Imperialism, especially the Trump administration, has made it a priority to roll back the “pink tide” in Latin America; this is the reason for the constant harassment of Cuba, Nicaragua and Venezuela. U.S. Secretary of State Mike Pompeo was not slow to jump on the anti-Morales bandwagon. It also includes right wing leaders in Latin America such as Jair Bolsonaro of Brazil and Ivan Duque of Colombia. It is highly likely that Bolivia’s rich deposits of lithium, which Morales was hoping to use to pull his nation out of poverty, was a major factor in imperialist strategy for Bolivia.

The Communist Party USA joins progressive governments, organizations and individuals worldwide in denouncing the coup in Bolivia. We express our solidarity with the members of the Morales government, with the Communist Party of Bolivia, with the MAS party and with the Bolivian people. We demand that people currently being “rounded up” because of their support for, or participation in, the Morales government be released immediately. We salute the governments of Cuba, Venezuela and Mexico for the solidarity they are exhibiting toward the Bolivian people.

We demand, further, that the U.S. government cease and desist from its violent interference in the internal affairs of Bolivia and so many other countries.

We ask our party members and friends to speak out against the coup in Bolivia and especially the Trump administration’s efforts to turn Latin America back to the dark ages of military coups.

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