Below is an excerpt from Bob Avakian (BA)—Official Biography, published here with the permission of The Bob Avakian Institute.
The entire Biography is available at The Bob Avakian Institute.
GOVERNMENT ATTACKS AGAINST BA; GOING INTO EXILE
In January 1979, a demonstration was held in Washington, DC on the occasion of Chinese leader Deng Xiaoping’s visit to the U.S. for a meeting with then U.S. President Jimmy Carter. Deng Xiaoping was the leader of the process of overthrowing socialism and restoring capitalism in China. The RCP organized a demonstration in Washington, DC in opposition to this, denouncing and exposing what was represented by Deng Xiaoping and his meeting with Carter. This demonstration was viciously attacked by the police, seriously injuring some of the 500 demonstrators and arresting dozens, including Avakian. The authorities in DC ended up charging BA and about a dozen others with multiple felonies that carried a maximum sentence of 241 years.
Bob Avakian on a speaking tour in 1979 .
In response, the RCP rallied hundreds of supporters to go to DC itself and organized political support around the country for what came to be known as the Mao Tsetung Defendants. In connection with this, BA went on a speaking tour in a number of major cities across the U.S. that reached thousands of people.
Owing to the political support that was rallied, and to the work of the legal team representing the Mao Tsetung Defendants, the charges against BA and the other Mao Tsetung Defendants were temporarily dismissed, although it was clear that the government could, and very possibly would, work to reinstate these charges. At the same time, in connection with BA’s appearance in Los Angeles as part of his national speaking tour, an article appeared in the Los Angeles Times which distorted things to make it seem that BA had threatened the president of the United States. Even though the Los Angeles Times was forced to print a partial retraction, agents of the Secret Service came to BA’s residence seeking to “question” him about this alleged threat to President Carter.
In 1980, the RCP faced many arrests and other repression. Damián García, who was closely associated with the RCP and who was known for having raised a red flag on top of the Alamo a few weeks earlier as part of building for RCP-sponsored demonstrations on May Day 1980, was murdered in Los Angeles. In this same period there were growing reports of death threats against Avakian from various quarters.
Noting the developing pattern of repression directed against BA—and looking at this in light of the historical experience of how the ruling class of the U.S. and its state has dealt with revolutionaries (such as the political assassinations of revolutionaries like Malcolm X and Black Panther Party leader Fred Hampton) and even dissidents who represent serious opposition—the decision was made that BA should leave the U.S. in order to disrupt what were clearly mounting attempts by the powers that be to move against him. In 1981, BA applied for political refugee status in France. During this period, the charges against the Mao Tsetung Defendants, including BA, were in fact reinstated. BA’s application for political refugee status was denied—this application had been a definite embarrassment not only to the U.S. imperialists and their posture as the world’s greatest democracy and “leader of the free world,” but also to the French and UN authorities, who try to act as if there is not, and could not possibly be, political repression in a country like the U.S.
Only through a continuing campaign to rally political support, along with fighting this in the legal arena, was a successful resolution achieved in the case of the Mao Tsetung Defendants, with no defendants having to serve jail time and all the charges against BA completely dropped.