In St. Louis, Missouri, the African Peoples Socialist Party (APSP) and the International Peoples Democratic Uhuru Movement (InPDUM) convened a three-day international plenary to discuss their activities and plans for the coming year on April 17-19. The event centered around a lengthy report issued by Chairman Omali Yeshitela that discussed the fight against the FBI and the battle in federal court.

In July, a federal court in Georgia will hear the appeal of the Uhuru 3 defendants to have their convictions on the minor charge of “conspiracy to defraud the US government” completely nullified. In a widely publicized trial in 2024, the Uhuru 3 were acquitted of acting as foreign agents and only convicted on the lesser charge. They received a sentence of no jail time, no fines, and only probation, and shortly afterward the judge granted early release from probation.

At the gathering, the different regions of the APSP and InPDUM described their activities, including running farmers markets, prison re-entry programs, educational services for pregnant mothers, and other activities serving African Americans in St. Petersburg, Florida, and St. Louis, Missouri, where Uhuru Houses are located.

Special attention was given to the international situation, with solidarity with Palestine and Iran being particularly central, along with admiration for Ibrahim Traoré and the achievements of the Alliance of Sahel States (AES). New York State Assemblyman Charles Barron, Native American scholar Ward Churchill, and representatives of Union del Barrio all presented to the gathering and gave messages of solidarity.

The Center for Political Innovation was represented by its founder and director, Caleb Maupin, who had recently returned from Russia. John McCarthy, who normally functions as the liaison between the two organizations, was unable to attend for personal reasons but participated in the conference online.

Caleb Maupin delivered two solidarity statements on behalf of the Center for Political Innovation, and multiple times during the plenary Chairman Omali praised CPI for its consistent solidarity in the years following the 2022 FBI raids, during the federal trial, and at international gatherings.

The plenary included a session devoted to the difficulties and rewards of finding a romantic partner involved in the same kind of activist politics, as well as multimedia presentations and displays showing the achievements of Chairman Omali and the APSP since its origins in the 1970s.

The Uhuru Movement is preparing to mobilize activists from around the country for the appeal in Georgia federal court, and the Center for Political Innovation will continue its policy of full solidarity with anti-imperialists targeted for their solidarity with Russia and their work serving and educating working families.

Humanity Will Not Be De-Grown! Africa is the Future!

Caleb Maupin’s solidarity statement to the African Peoples Socialist Party Plenary on April 17th, 2026 in St. Louis, Missouri.

Well, I’m really honored to be here. I was just recently in Russia for a meeting. They’re forming a new election observation organization, and I was able to participate in some of the meetings. There were people from all over the world.

I want to bring greetings today on behalf of my entire organization, the Center for Political Innovation. I know John McCarthy is watching this from home. He really wishes he could be here, so I want to bring greetings on behalf of John McCarthy.

FBI Repression of Dissent

But in light of the FBI repression this organization has suffered, I want to share something.

When I first got politically active, when I was about 19 years old, some of the members of the political group I was with decided to take me up to Buffalo, New York. We went to Buffalo, New York, and we sat in the living room of a woman who was well over 80 years old.

She took out the photo album and showed us pictures from the bad old days of McCarthyism. She showed us a picture of protesting out in front of the steel plant after they had fired every single steel worker who was a member of the Communist Party. They said, “Steel workers have the right to be members of whatever political party they want, Democrat, Republican, Communist, or whatever.”

She talked about how she was an elementary school teacher at the time. The next day after that demonstration, they printed her name and address in the town newspaper. Then the FBI came to the school and said, “Is this you? Is this you in this photograph protesting for the right of steel workers to join the Communist Party?”

She said yes.

They said, “Well, you’re fired.”

A couple years later, she got another job working as a teacher. The FBI showed up there too.

“Is this you in this photograph protesting for the Communists?”

“Yes.”

“Well, you’re fired.”

That was McCarthyism.

And it was during those bad old days of McCarthyism that members of the Communist Party and other revolutionary organizations went door to door in Black neighborhoods all throughout this country with a mimeographed piece of writing that was a report delivered by William L. Patterson called We Charge Genocide, where the Soviet Union gave a platform to the Civil Rights Congress to expose the crimes of the American government against Black Americans.

Generals Fighting The Last War

Even though the Communists were functioning under conditions of illegality, they were able to get thousands and thousands of copies of We Charge Genocide circulated all throughout the United States.

Now, the reason I’m bringing that up is because there’s an expression: “Generals fighting the last war.” Well, that’s what’s going on right now.

During the original Cold War, the strategy of the U.S. imperialists was to accuse the countries opposing them of being dictatorships and say, “We believe in democracy and freedom.” So all the Soviet Union, China, and Cuba had to do was hold up a picture of Emmett Till’s mutilated body and say, “Oh, that’s the democracy they believe in in the United States.”

By exposing the crimes against African Americans, they were able to rip a hole in the imperialist propaganda.

The reason that’s important in our time is because, as they geared up for what we’re now in — Cold War Number Two — they decided, “Okay, we’re going to get it right this time. We’re going to have a Black president of the United States. We’re going to have gender and race studies at every university. We’re going to have every 12-year-old kid accuse their parents of being racist. We’re going to show the world that we are the center of social justice.”

That way, when they get ready to attack, they can accuse Russia of being fascist, accuse China of being racist against the Uyghurs, and accuse Iran of oppressing women. They believed they would have the moral high ground and would be able to ride roughshod over the whole world.

That was their strategy.

But if you look at what’s happening right now, with Donald Trump threatening to destroy entire nations on Twitter, and the ruling elite unable to get public support for war against Iran, with 80% of the public disapproving, that strategy has failed.

Solid Anti-Imperialist Work

And it has failed largely because of the work of this organization.

By calling out Barack Obama when he was running for president, through electoral campaigns, but largely through real economic development programs, this organization ripped a hole in the imperialist attempt to give themselves a “woke” makeover for propaganda purposes around the world.

They ripped a complete hole in it.

Because if you build a farmers market, provide classes to pregnant mothers, and engage in real economic development, that is very different than renaming a street or putting up a mural someplace. Those are real changes that they cannot deliver within their system.

By exposing the symbolic and purely visual nature of their politics, you have ripped a hole in their strategy.

The truth is, the imperialists need the Democratic Party. They need someone to talk nice while they kill you. They need degrowth. They need drug addiction. They need suicide. They need regulations through which they can control business.

The only way their system can survive is through massive depopulation and degrowth.

But humanity will not be degrown.

A great socialist named Wallace Wattles said, “Growth is God expressing himself through human beings.”

As you can see across the African continent, the Alliance of Sahel States kicked out the French. They said, “We’re not going to be degrown.”

And I see what you’re doing here in St. Louis, Missouri. You are expressing the wishes of the population here that is refusing to be degrown.

You have set a real example, and you have heroically stood up to the FBI. We at the Center for Political Innovation are in absolute admiration of everything this organization has achieved.

We stand with you 100% against the FBI. We will always be with you.

Dare to struggle, and dare to win.

Chairman Omali Yeshitela’s Tribute to CPI

Remarks from Chairman Omali to the African Socialist Party plenary

“I want to mention Caleb Maupin from CPI. I’m just so pleased and proud of this relationship with this comrade because there were people who told us that we shouldn’t work with Caleb and CPI. I don’t know how the hell you’re going to say that.

When this attack came, CPI was first on the front lines fighting back against the attack on us. First out. First out of the gate.

Then I saw Comrade Caleb in a video where he was in Russia. It might have been some youth gathering, I’m not sure. President Vladimir Putin was on the platform speaking, and I saw Caleb stand up and ask the president about the Uhuru 3.

He said, ‘I want to tell you about this case in the United States where we’ve been attacked because they accused us of working for the Russians.’

These comrades have just been on the case. Just remarkable.

I’ve seen members of CPI dragged out of public forums, public forums where all these big-shot editors of the so-called legacy media were present. I’ve seen them dragged out because they brought up the Uhuru 3. They brought up the attack on the Uhuru House.

So that’s my comrade. That’s my comrade.

And the people who said they would not work with us because we were working with Caleb, this is the white left, what I call the ‘white left behind’ these comrades said they wouldn’t work with us because we worked with Caleb.

And we said, ‘Bye.’

So I just wanted to acknowledge this comrade. I really, really worked hard. I pursued everything we could to make sure he tried to get here to this plenary.

He had us at a convention they held not too long ago in Chicago. They have a publication, their journal, where they reported on that convention. You hear from Caleb and from John McCarthy, our dear, dear comrade who represents CPI at most of our meetings.”