FRSO South Florida Dissolution Letter

A contact forwarded this letter to me on June 19th 2026. They are not one of the letter’s authors. I am publishing it here for the historical record. Real names of the authors have been redacted for anonymity. The rest of the letter is reproduced unedited. The authors have no affiliation with FRSO Accountability.

The leaders named in this letter - Tom Burke, Steff Yorek, and Chrisley Carpio - are named in our report of leadership’s previous cover-ups in Florida.

This letter serves as notice of our formal and permanent departure from Freedom Road Socialist Organization, rendering the South Florida district defunct. The three members which developed and now dissolve the fledgling unit of South Florida FRSO lay out in this letter our grievances and reasons for departing from the organization and the call to our comrades in South Florida to not engage in organizing work with any future re-emergence of FRSO in South Florida until the issues laid out in this document are fully and publicly addressed in accordance with the mechanisms and wishes expressed by those who have been directly harmed by FRSO leadership’s cover-ups and actions/inaction.

This letter will begin by laying out specific grievances of the three general FRSO members, who were engaged in the recruitment process to become cadre. The first issue arises from the total disregard of criticism on the matter of disability justice as it pertains to masking. [AUTHOR 1], a general member that took lead on this issue, brought the matter to Chrisley Carpio, who is a Standing Committee member, and was put in touch with Central Committee member, Steff Yorek. Both of these individuals, we have come to discover, played a hand in covering up sexual assault and protecting abusers in the organization. At the time of the meeting, [AUTHOR 1] was anticipating a one-on-one conversation with Steff Yorek to make the case for masking in our organizing spaces and creating an advisory policy that could be shared amongst the various FRSO districts. Instead, she was blindsided when Chrisley Carpio joined the call and, with Steff, shot down [AUTHOR 1]’s suggestions and dismissed her without even permitting her to make her case to them. She left the conversation feeling ignored and belittled by these two individuals in leadership, who used their position to steamroll a new member with limited organizing experience.

Chrisley had also engaged in dismissive behaviors when another general member, [AUTHOR 3], had brought the concern of working with a local organization that she (Chrisley) had recommended we reach out to and that FRSO had worked with in the past. The concern pertained to communications with a representative of that organization that was transphobic in nature, which made all of the general members uncomfortable since members were either LGBTQ+ themselves (whether trans, non-binary, queer) or maintained close personal relationships with people that were part of the LGBTQ+ community. Rather than take these concerns seriously from the beginning, Chrisley was dismissive and tried to pressure members to simply get over the issue in order to work with that organization because, according to her, it was simply a given that we would have people in our circles and mass organizations that would have reactionary politics. Ultimately, the members themselves decided against Chrisley’s pressure and did their own work to get to the bottom of the issue with other related members of the recommended organization. This was the first major instance in which all of the general members of the South Florida FRSO “district” were made to feel uncomfortable and pressured by a person in FRSO leadership to operate in a manner that felt incongruent with the aims of the membership and in building a district in South Florida.

[AUTHOR 3], had another interaction with Chrisley Carpio on the matter of FRSO’s position on abolition. According to both Chrisley Carpio, and FRSO Organizational Secretary, Tom Burke, they are not an abolitionist organization because this is not something that the masses support. Despite explanations from [AUTHOR 3] rooted in direct organizing experience around abolition in South Florida demonstrating that abolition is something that the masses are amenable to, they maintain their position, and subsequently edited an op-ed she submitted to the FRSO’s online publication ‘Fight Back! News’ to reflect their line, removing the call to “Abolish ICE” and replacing it with “ICE out”. Because of pressure from leadership on this, she begrudgingly acquiesced to the change to her article. At the present moment, [AUTHOR 3] does not feel comfortable with having her written work posted to the FRSO’s publication, and wishes for it to be removed from the site.

There is a clear hypocrisy from FRSO leadership on the mass line, particularly when considering the political context of a place like South Florida. On the one hand, members were expected to put their safety on the line to support the calls to “Free President Maduro”, which the FRSO considers as part of their mass line. Yet on the issue of abolition or masking, it considers these matters “alienating to the masses”. Is it not alienating to the masses in South Florida to call for freeing Venezulan President Nicolas Maduro? Certainly so, in our experience. But this is due to the reactionary politics the masses in South Florida have on the matter; the fact remains that calling to free Maduro is the correct line. Yet, for some reason, FRSO leadership cannot seem to recognize how their positions around masking as part of the struggle for disability justice, or abolition as part of the struggle for immigrant and racial justice are merely adoptions of the same reactionary tendencies that result in the hostile political environment South Florida has towards socialism. They cannot recognize this even as the direct experience of the South Florida general members contradicts their line. We have a direct example of how diverging from the expressed position of FRSO leadership on the issue of masking has resulted in positive relations with the community and even the joining of [AUTHOR 2] into our membership:

“Less than a year ago, I had been involved in politics the way most US Citizens are: by voting at each election and hoping that made a difference, posting and reposting news that attacked our rights, attacked innocents at home and abroad, and shared all the information that I could to help my rather small network of people see the atrocities committed in our name, with our money, and yet - all too obfuscated so that the public doesn’t really understand what goes on. Then, I found FRSO. I had never really found an organization, party, whatever it begs to be called, that really aligned with most of what I believed: that all human beings are inherently valuable, that they all deserve safety and their basic human needs met, and that when you design for the smallest of us - you create an affect that betters us all. I saw [AUTHOR 3] and [AUTHOR 1] committed to masking at FRSO meetings and outreaches, I saw them masking at protests, I saw that they held disabled people and disability justice as one of their core values - after getting to know them, I learned they were disabled themselves! This was a sign - there were people with similar beliefs! There were people who could educate me and help me become more confident in educating others about the specific evils of the US - and of capitalism. I was eager to join. I could use my background, my passions, and make a difference. I am a children’s librarian. My passion has been to help children of all backgrounds get the resources they need and deserve. I am a special educator. I know, work with, love, and am friends with many disabled people and children - and I see the intentional, large gaps left where this population is pushed to the wayside, left to flounder or beg for funding. I wanted to see a change in that. The more we interacted and tried to get FRSO National to move on this point - in bringing disability justice to the forefront of the movement - as there IS NO WORKERS’ MOVEMENT WITHOUT DISABILITY JUSTICE - the more my comrades [AUTHOR 3] and [AUTHOR 1] were disregarded, ignored, and talked-down to. We were constantly asked questions, given tasks and responsibilities, yet - when trying to report successes or criticisms for why certain programs don’t work the same in South Florida - once again, ignored. Once again, it was assumed we were three silly people down in the swamps of Florida when we know very well this is a hub of both fascist and anti-communist sentiment. As a disabled, queer survivor of sexual assault, learning about the extreme LACK of accountability in FRSO, the way allegations have been actively covered up - just shows me and my comrades that this organization takes it’s playbook from the very government its sworn to overthrow.”

This brings us to our next major issue, that of FRSO leadership disregarding the local conditions of South Florida in favor of pushing a “one-size fits all” approach to organizing onto members. South Florida is an incredibly difficult place to organize in and two-thirds of the developing unit in South Florida did not have much organizing experience. FRSO leadership would provide little guidance to members, and what was provided was ineffectual for the local conditions at best, outright dangerous at worst. And it became increasingly clear that FRSO leadership was also not concerned with the safety of our members at all. During a conversation [AUTHOR 1] had with Chrisley, she was told that we should table and flyer in places such as FIU or locations where progressive people would be in Miami. For [AUTHOR 1], a member that does not live in the Miami area, this is a difficult task given her limited familiarity with the area and limited organizing experience. For [AUTHOR 3], this too was a difficult task given that she is employed and has very limited time. Nonetheless, she still dedicated considerable amounts of her free time to attending such events in the community, such as teach ins, town halls, and protests in order to share FRSO materials and make connections with the wider community and progressive organizations. [AUTHOR 2], also a member with limited organizing experience, is employed full time and does not live in the Miami area, greatly limiting her capacity for such intensive work.

It is evident from our conversations with Chrisley that FRSO leadership is unfamiliar, nor did they care to familiarize themselves, with the unique geographical challenges of organizing in South Florida when there is such a large physical distance between where members actually live and where leadership desires the organizing to happen, and they have been dismissive of these expressed concerns and difficulties. As stated previously, there are genuine safety concerns around organizing in South Florida as socialists, particularly given the small size of our group. It is not unlikely that we could receive violent or aggressive responses from some of the residents in the area due to the reactionary anti-socialist and anti-communist politics that are pervasive in this area, more so than in many other places in which FRSO maintains a presence. For example, during a fundraiser for Cuba that was organized by [AUTHOR 3] in her capacity as an FRSO member and in collaboration with the Miami Coalition to End the Blockade Against Cuba and other affiliated organizations, a man came in and smashed a poster of Che Guevara. When having a protest at SOUTH COM to oppose U.S. military threats against Venezuela, [AUTHOR 1] was the sole FRSO member and organizer present and was inexperienced. Prior to the protest, FRSO members struggled to organize the action even as leadership pressured us to put one on ourselves despite our expressed concerns with the logistics and potential safety risks given that the area surrounding SOUTHCOM is heavily surveilled and policed, and home to reactionary right wing Venezuelans. During the protest, there were more cops than protestors. There were times when the chanting got out of hand and [AUTHOR 1], as the only organizer present, struggled to rein it in and has expressed that she felt deeply uncomfortable and terrified at being put in such a position with next to no organizing experience. It is unfair to inexperienced and brand new organizers to be left without support and asking them to have protests in one of the most hostile places in the country.

Our attempts at suggesting actions that we thought would bring us closer to the communities we are organizing in, such as engaging in mutual aid in the tradition of the Black Panther Party, were actively discouraged by leadership. We were pushed to primarily organize protests, and while those kinds of actions are important and have their place, it cannot be the primary or sole focus of our organizing; in a place like South Florida, that does not advance the struggle nearly as much as engaging directly in impacted communities to provide material support and build relationships. [AUTHOR 1] has expressed that, “[It] often felt that if we were not doing what was being asked of us, we would be seen as lagging behind”, and members, particularly those members with limited or no organizing experience, thought that what leadership had been pushing would be the steps to growing our district. The most interest we had in our FRSO “district” was after the fundraiser for Cuba to send supplies and local Cuban-Americans, including [AUTHOR 3], to Havana with the Nuestra América Convoy. The fundraiser that was almost entirely put together by [AUTHOR 3] from scratch. It was not an idea that FRSO suggested to us, and per a conversation that Chrisley had with [AUTHOR 3], she was told that it should not become a main focus or detract attention from “other work”, namely organizing protests. Ultimately, [AUTHOR 3] received positive responses from leadership for organizing the fundraiser and for going to Cuba and representing FRSO in a manner that they approved of. It is not a mystery that they ultimately supported it since it made the organization look good and bolstered its reputation.

None of the aforementioned issues bode well for the development of an FRSO district in South Florida, seeing as it resulted in extreme burnout from members and instilled a sense of doubt in the members’ feelings towards leadership and in their organizing as part of FRSO. It was purely through the efforts of the members, exercising the knowledge they have of the local conditions of South Florida and independently building relationships with people and groups in the Miami and wider South Florida community that this fledgling district was able to develop as far as it has. The members remained committed to organizing as part of FRSO in spite of the grievances and concerns outlined above because we felt that there was room within the organization to struggle for those issues, to push on these issues in a principled manner. That hope was swiftly squashed when we found out about the history and recent cover up of sexual assault by FRSO leadership. We encourage our comrades in South Florida to read through the links provided below for the context and details of these cover ups and draw their own opinions. For us former general members of the South Florida FRSO “district”, it signaled that there was no struggle to be had within this organization nor as a part of it. If leadership’s response to something as egregious as sexual assault among their membership was to brush it aside, hide it, pretend like it doesn’t exist, denounce the members that were victimized as “wreckers” and smear their names and reputation in order to preserve some false sense of an organizational reputation… then we have no further business with this organization. It is clear to see that FRSO, despite its claims for wanting to further the struggle of the multinational working class, does not actually practice what it preaches and is little more than an organization operating at the behest of opportunists cosplaying as revolutionaries. Until leadership changes, until the entire structure in the organization is overhauled to truly reflect the revolutionary aims it espouses, the ex-general members of the South Florida FRSO denounce the organization and recommend that our comrades in South Florida not work with future FRSO districts that may re-emerge in the area.