Ignacio De La Fuente

Ignacio De La Fuente

Ignacio De La Fuente has served as International Vice President of Area 3 of the Glass, Molders, Pottery Workers Union, since 1983, when he was named by International President James E. Rankin. He also serves as the President of the City Council in Oakland, California.

He and his wife, Elvia, have one son, one daughter and one grandchild.

Background

In 1971, at age 21, he arrived in California from Mexico City on a tourist visa, broke and unable to speak English. One week later he met Elvia, his US-born wife-to-be, whom he married after a three-month courtship — a bond that made him eligible for citizenship.

Ignacio De La Fuente entered the trade in 1973 at Macaulay Foundry in Berkeley California, and served on the Local 164B (Oakland CA) Executive Board from 1996 to 1997. He was elected Business Manager for Local 164B from 1978 until July 1987, when he was hired as an International Representative. He attended the West Virginia Molders Institute and the Wisconsin University Molders Institute.

Ignacio has served as a delegate to the Alameda County Central Labor Council for sixteen years and Executive Board Member for eight years. He is a member of the Oakland Housing Authority, the Alameda County Economic Development Advisory Board, Board of Directors of La Raza Labor Institute, San Francisco CA and a member of the Joint Powers Authority for the Alameda County Colisium.

The People's Convention

On July 14-16 (probably 1984) The Coalition for a People's Convention "a broad grouping in the Bay Area", organized The People's Convention in order to "unite on and present a people's program to the DNC and to network the many local efforts to win people's power from around the country. Its purpose is to enhance local efforts and amplify them into a united voice and demonstration for reorienting our society away from military aggression and towards meeting the needs of all our people".

Endorsers from the San Francisco-Bay Area included Ignacio De La Fuente Business Representative, Molders Union Local 164 Oakland.

"SURVIVALFEST 84"

SURVIVAL FEST 84 was held August 5 1984 in MacArthur Park.

"Come To Hear And Strategize With Those Changing The 1980's"

• How can we support each other in electing progressive local candidates?
• How can we make electoral work serve the grassroots movements for a freeze, for U.S. out of Central America and human needs?
• How can we over turn the racist dual primary system in the South?
• Is working inside and outside the Democratic Party a viable strategy and how can it be done?
• How can we formulate demands to revitalize our basic industries without falling into the pitfall of the chauvinist anti-import solution -- letting U.S. finance capital off the hook?

This event was organized by the Communist Workers Party front, the Coalition for a People's Convention. The event was advertised in a half-page notice in the Marxist weekly Guardian, their Book Supplement - Summer 1984, p. 12, and the Communist Workers Party and Federation For Progress were listed as participants.

Bay Area endorsers of the event included:

• Supervisor Harry Britt - San Francisco
• Ron Dellums - Member of Congress
• Ignacio De La Fuente - Business Representative, Molders Union Local 164 Oakland
• Barbara Lubin - Berkeley Board of Education, Marxist and leader of an anti-Israel organization
• Mayor Gus Newport
• Dan Siegel - Executive Committee, Federation For Progress
• Supervisor Carol Ruth Silver - San Francisco
• Bill Wahpepah - International Indian Treaty Council

Greeting Chris Hani

Eight hundred people filled the ballroom of the Hyatt regency Embarcadero Hotel, Sunday April 28, 1991 to greet South African Communist Party leader Chris Hani. the crowd contributed more than $12,000 towards the People's Weekly World fund drive and the work of the South African Communist Party.

Hani was greeted with resolutions of support from Assembly speaker Willie Brown, San Francisco mayor Art Agnos, Oakland mayor Elihu Harris, Richmond mayor George Livingston, Berkeley mayor Loni Hancock, and Doris Ward, chair of the San Francisco board of Supervisors.

Co-chairs of the banquet were were Angela Davis and Ignacio de la Fuente of the Moulders Union.

Davis, introducing Hani said he "symbolizes a courageous, unrelenting struggle for freedom".

CoC National Conference endorser

In 1992 Ignacio De La Fuente, California, International representative, Glass, Molders, Pottery Workers, Oakland, endorsed the Committees of Correspondence national conference Conference on Perspectives for Democracy and Socialism in the 90s held at Berkeley California July 17-19.

Conference on Perspectives for Democracy and Socialism in the 90s

The Conference on Perspectives for Democracy and Socialism in the 90s was the Committees of Correspondence's first national conference held in Berkeley, California July 17-19, 1992.

Workshops that were held at the conference on Saturday, July 18 included:

Strategy 1 What is an effective strategy? Responding to monopoly capital in the era of the permanent replacements (strikes, in-shop actions, community alliances, internation solidarity)

• Ignacio de la Fuente, Intl. Rep., Glass, Molders and Pottery Workers Union member-elect, Oakland City council
• Betty Hughley, vice president, Local 1199, NY
• Leanna Noble, field organizer, UE, Los Angeles
• Corinne Comer, secretary-treasurer, HERE Local 28, Oakland
• Larry Daves, labor attorney, San Antonio
• Annmarie Draham, field organizer, UE, No CA
• John Reed, vice president, Local 1199, NY
• Shelley Kessler, Asst. Exec. Officer, San Mateo County Labor Council

People's Weekly World Banquet 1996

Sponsors of the 1996 Bay area People's Weekly World banquet, at His Lordships, Berkeley Marina, included Oakland City Council members Ignacio de la Fuente, Sheila Jordan and John Russo, Berkeley City Council members Maudelle Shirek, Linda Maio and Dona Spring, San Francisco Supervisors Tom Ammiano and Sue Bierman, Alameda County Supervisor Keith Carson, and California State Assemblyman John L. Burton.

Honored were 5 labor leaders - Walter Johnson, Owen Marron, Shirley Ware of SEIU, Abba Ramos of the ILWU and Francisco Martin del Campo of the San Francisco labor Council for Latin American Advancement.

Cuba delegation

In December 1998, newly elected Rep Barbara Lee hosted an 11 member, five day mission to Cuba. Delegates included Oakland City Council members Ignacio De La Fuente, Henry Chang and Jane Brunner, who all paid their own way. On her return Lee intended to submit a written report to President Bill Clinton and Congress on the delegations findings.

Endorsed Communist Party fund raiser

Peoples Weekly World, September 11, 1999

In September 1999, Ignacio De La Fuente, President, Oakland City Council, co-sponsored a Communist Party USA fund raising event in Berkeley. Rep. Barbara Lee co-sponsored the same event.

Under FBI surveillance

At the same time he was selling U.S. secrets to the Soviet Union, former FBI special agent Robert Hanssen was a key supervisor in a 1980s domestic-spying program questioning the loyalty of American citizens and monitoring their activities, FBI documents have shown. Under this program, federal agents filed reports on teachers, clerics and political activists who primarily were affiliated with liberal causes. There are four letters marked "Secret," and signed by then-labor organizer Ignacio de la Fuente, who was urging that the U.S. government lift a ban on union meetings with Eastern Bloc labor groups. These days, de la Fuente is president of the Oakland City Council.

References

Template:Reflist Template:Endorsers of the Conference on Perspectives for Democracy and Socialism in the 90s