His mother, a revolutionary left for the USA after six years in a czarist prison, returned to Russia in 1917 with her young son, to work in the cause of labor organizing.
Worked as Union Activist In 1929, age 15, Richmond joined the Young Communist League (YCL).
After high school, he moved to Philadelphia and helped unionize factory and dock workers.
[2] After a 1951 raid by the Federal Bureau of Investigation on People's World offices, Richmond and 13 other CPUSA members in California were tried, convicted, and sentenced to five years in prison under the Smith Act for advocating violent overthrow of the US Government.
[1] After criticizing the USSR for invading Czechoslovakia in 1968, Richmond faced censure by CPUSA leaders, quit the Party, but remained a Marxist.