Solidarity for Workers’ Struggles Grows
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From California to North Carolina to Poland, workers, community and faith activists are standing in solidarity with workers in Wisconsin, Ohio and around the nation in their fights against a coordinated attack on middle-class jobs.
In a letter of support to Wisconsin workers, Piotr Duda, President of the Polish Trade Union Solidarnosc, writes:
Dear Friends, please rest assured that our thoughts are with you during your protest, as we truly do hope that your just fight for decent working and living conditions, for the workers’ rights will be successful Your victory is our victory as well.
Click here for the full letter.
More than 150 worker and civil rights activists rallied outside the North Carolina state legislature in Raleigh Monday, and tonight you can tune in live to a candlelight vigil for the Wisconsin workers from Sacramento, Calif. SEIU Local 1000’s Channel 1000 will offer a live stream starting at 5:50 p.m. Pacific. Click here.
In other solidarity actions:
- The Minnesota AFL-CIO organized a rally Saturday at the border town of Hudson, Wis. Check out Working America’s photo stream here. Read the rest of this entry »
Young Workers Summit: NFL Players Call for Union Solidarity
When an offensive or defensive line of a football team stands shoulder to shoulder, it is almost impossible to move it. Today, two National Football League (NFL) players came to the AFL-CIO Young Workers Summit to invite their fellow union members to stand with them in one of the toughest battles they face on or off the field.
The NFL team owners, most of whom are super-rich, terminated the current collective bargaining agreement two years early because they say “it isn’t working for them,” Domonique Foxworth of the Baltimore Ravens and a member of the NFL Players Association (NFLPA) executive committee told the young union activists.
But in a scenario all too familiar to other union workers, the NFL owners refuse to provide audited financial information to help the players’ union understand how they are hurting after generating $9 billion in revenue during the worst economic crisis since the Great Depression. Foxworth said:
We’re in the middle of the biggest battle with the team owners of the National Football League that our union has faced since we won the right to free agency over 20 years ago.
Like most management these days, the owners are demanding givebacks, this time to the tune of a staggering $1 billion, although not one team has lost money. In fact, all 32 teams increased in value about 500 percent over the past 15 years, Foxworth said. The owners also want players to pay for team travel and the cost of running the practice facility.
AFL-CIO: Mexican Court Ruling Eliminates Right to Strike
AFL-CIO President Richard Trumka today condemned the Feb. 11 decision by a Mexican appeals court to allow the Grupo Mexico mining company to fire 1,200 striking workers, members of the National Union of Mine and Metalworkers (SNTMMSRM), at its Cananea copper mine.
In a statement, Trumka said that by finding the strike illegal, despite the lack of evidence to support its decision, the court effectively eliminated the right to strike in Mexico.
Trumka reaffirmed the strong support of the U.S. union movement for the SNTMMSRM and condemned the Mexican government’s four-year-long campaign to destroy the independent union.
AFL-CIO President John Sweeney: Solidarity Is Our Way of Life
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| AFL-CIO President John Sweeney gives his final keynote to convention delegates. |
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| Pennsylvania AFL-CIO President Bill George (above) and former Pittsburgh Steeler Franco Harris (below) help open the AFL-CIO Convention. |
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With the convening of the 26th AFL-CIO Constitutional Convention this afternoon in Pittsburgh, nearly 2,000 delegates, alternates and guests took part in the formal opening ceremony and paid tribute to retiring AFL-CIO President John Sweeney. Following greetings by Pennsylvania AFL-CIO President Bill George, Jack Shea, president of the Allegheny County [Pittsburgh] Labor Council, and former Pittsburgh Steelers player Franco Harris, AFL-CIO Secretary-Treasurer Richard Trumka welcomed everyone, noting how great it is to be in Pittsburgh, “the city of bridges.”
And bridges are the perfect illustration of what we’ll be talking about over the next few days. Bridges that connect diverse people, diverse unions, diverse communities and diverse nations. Bridges to cross together, so we can turn around America….Some of the bridges America needs have been burnt—destroyed by years of a rampant corporate agenda embraced by the Bush administration. It’s hard to overstate just how damaging those years have been.
Our unions and the workers we represent are suffering in a historic collapse. But at the very same time, we have historic opportunities. New bridges with a new administration, a new Congress and rivers of hope flowing through the people of our country. Our Convention has a theme for today: We are many, we are one.
That’s our power—and it’s our joy.
