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Unions Must Go Beyond Calling for a Cease-Fire in Gaza

By Jeff Schuhrke - Jacobin, February 13, 2024

Four months into Israel’s brutal assault on Gaza that has killed over twenty-eight thousand Palestinians, the American Federation of Labor and Congress of Industrial Organizations (AFL-CIO) — the US labor federation whose member unions represent 12.5 million workers — issued a statement on February 8 urging a negotiated cease-fire to end the violence.

The move came after over two hundred US unions and labor bodies — including national unions like the United Electrical Workers (UE), American Postal Workers Union (APWU), United Auto Workers (UAW), International Union of Painters and Allied Trades (IUPAT), National Nurses United (NNU), Service Employees International Union (SEIU), National Education Association (NEA), Communications Workers of America (CWA), and American Federation of Teachers (AFT) — had already made cease-fire calls of their own. Many unions, especially at the local level, have also expressed solidarity with the Palestinian liberation movement.

With the backing of the AFL-CIO and the nation’s two largest unions (NEA and SEIU), support for a cease-fire is now the mainstream position of the American labor movement. Given US labor officialdom’s history of providing substantial political and material aid to the state of Israel — along with its frequent partnering with US empire (which I examine in my forthcoming book, Blue Collar Empire) — this is a remarkable development highlighting the power of rank-and-file organizing to push union leaders on critical issues, and signaling the possibility of building a more internationalist labor movement.

Now, the task for rank-and-file members who successfully organized to get their unions to issue cease-fire statements increasingly is to translate that commitment into concrete action to stop what the International Court of Justice considers Israel’s plausible acts of genocide. Across the US labor movement, networks of pro-Palestine workers are continuing to organize to get their unions to cut economic ties with Israel, put pressure on political candidates and elected officials, and interrupt the flow of union-made weapons and research to the Israeli military.

Educators Organize for a Just Transition

By staff - Labor Network for Sustainability, January 30, 2024

A just-published article by Todd E. Vachon, “Climate Justice for All: Pursuing a Just Transition in the Education Sector”—published in the American Federation of Teachers journal The American Educator—lays out in detail “what educators can do—and many already are doing—through their unions to promote climate justice and equity in their schools and communities.”

Vachon is an assistant professor of labor studies and employment relations at Rutgers University, the director of the Labor Education Action Research Network, and the author of Clean Air and Good Jobs: U.S. Labor and the Struggle for Climate Justice. He is also a co-author of the Labor Network for Sustainability report “Workers and Communities in Transition”.

Vachon argues that “the world is in the midst of two simultaneous and interconnected crises: a crisis of ecology and a crisis of inequality.” But “the good news is that there is an important role that students, educators, our local unions, and community allies can play in addressing the dual crises of climate change and inequality.” Confronting the climate crisis offers “a potential pathway for making some of the important changes in our economy that are needed to recenter the lives and well-being of people.” Such a “just transition” offers “a vision of economic democracy, including public investments to account for the full social costs and benefits of environmental and economic policies to create the most just—not necessarily the most profitable—outcome for all.”

Educators can start by promoting “green and healthy schools” that involve “installing renewable energy generation and storage systems, renovating existing school buildings to improve efficiencies, constructing new green buildings, securing strong labor standards, ensuring an open and democratic process for all stakeholders, and requiring local and preferential hiring to ensure that local communities and displaced workers benefit from the jobs that are created in the process.”

Forging a just transition in education with healthy green schools and social and economic justice requires “grassroots organizing and power building,” such as “forming local union climate justice committees, building strong partnerships with students and community groups, bargaining for the common good, and holding decision makers accountable.” The cross-union Educators Climate Action Network, convened by the Labor Network for Sustainability, brings together over 100 union educators from across the country to tackle climate change and promote climate justice in education.

Vachon ends with a challenge and an invitation: “Perhaps your local union will be the next to take bold climate action and become a part of the solution by helping to forge your own local Green New Deal and joining the national effort.”

Link to the article: https://www.aft.org/ae/winter2023-2024/vachon

Link to ECAN: https://www.labor4sustainability.org/ecan/

Link to LNS Just Transition Listening Project report: https://www.labor4sustainability.org/jtlp-2021/

Labor unions are making unprecedented calls for a ceasefire in Gaza: Unions are figuring out what comes next after taking a public stand against the apartheid State of Israel’s genocide in Gaza

By Laura Weiss - Prism, January 22, 2024

Before dawn broke on Jan. 14, hundreds of labor organizers and activists convened at the Port of Oakland for a protest to prevent ships carrying weapons bound for Israel from leaving the docks. Activists from the Arab Resource and Organizing Center (AROC) and the International Longshore and Warehouse Union (ILWU), which co-organized the event, kept the momentum going all day. In the afternoon, 200 workers reportedly refused to cross the picket line to help load the ships. 

“The labor movement has the power to disrupt supply chains,” said Zachary Valdez, a union steward with United Auto Workers (UAW) Local 2110 based in New York. “Workers can shut everything down.”

The action was an impressive show of solidarity between the labor movement and the Palestinian cause, one of a number of actions in the Bay Area and across the country co-organized or supported by unions in recent months, including teach-ins and other civil disobedience efforts.

Since the October attacks on the apartheid State of Israel by Hamas, the political and military organization that governs Gaza, Israel’s genocidal bombing campaign has killed more than 23,000 Palestinians in Gaza, and the Israel Defense Forces has destroyed critical infrastructure, including electricity, hospitals, and the internet, shut off access to water, and purposefully created famine conditions. This has prompted a sea change in public opinion on Israel, with two-thirds of Americans saying they support a ceasefire in Gaza, all while the U.S. government continues to send billions of U.S. military aid to Israel. 

Within the labor movement, hundreds of unions and union locals have responded to a call from Palestinian labor unions and signed resolutions calling for a ceasefire, even those whose leadership has historically supported Israel. On Dec. 1, UAW, one of the largest unions in the country, made history when it released a ceasefire statement. Other influential unions, such as the United Electrical Workers, American Postal Workers Union, and 1199SEIU (United Healthcare Workers East), and countless other smaller unions have also released similar statements. On Jan. 22, the Service Employees International Union (SEIU), the second-largest public service employees union in the country, also released a call for a ceasefire. 

“We, members of the American labor movement, mourn the loss of life in Israel and Palestine. We express our solidarity with all workers and our common desire for peace in Palestine and Israel, and we call on President Joe Biden and Congress to push for an immediate ceasefire and end to the siege of Gaza,” reads the petition signed by UAW and hundreds of other union locals.

Labor activists say the increasing number of unions supporting this call is a big deal. 

Pursuing a Just Transition in the Education Sector

By Todd E. Vachon - American Federation of Teachers, January 2024

On Sunday, October 28, 2012, teachers across the Northeast were glued to their television sets to watch the latest weather forecast about the approaching hurricane. Schools would be closed Monday. Emergencies were declared, line crews were summoned, shelters were prepared, and command centers were opened. New York City made the unprecedented decision to stop all subway service.

As feared, Superstorm Sandy arrived with a vengeance the next evening, knocking out power for eight million people across 17 states, destroying countless homes, rendering the NYC subway system nonoperational, and closing all 1,750 of the city’s schools for a week. Dozens of damaged schools remained shuttered even longer, forcing students to share buildings with other schools, sometimes in distant boroughs of the city. Over 100 deaths were attributed to the storm, including at least one teacher. As with previous extreme storms such as Hurricane Katrina that hit the Gulf Coast in 2005 or later storms like Hurricane Maria that ravaged Puerto Rico in 2017, it was the working class and poor—the frontline communities—who were hit first and worst.

Nine years later, New York and New Jersey were devastated again by Hurricane Ida while still continuing to shore up infrastructure ruined by Sandy. The National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration places the total cost of Superstorm Sandy at over $70 billion—possibly the costliest to ever hit the region, making it the most economically devastating event to hit New York City since the terrorist attacks of September 11, 2001.

While individual weather events like Sandy cannot be directly attributed to climate change, their likelihood, frequency, and intensity are all increased by climate change. As the Earth warms, storms that used to happen once a century are now happening more frequently, and the impacts on students, teachers, and communities are devastating. This article explores some of the causes of the climate crisis, including its relationship to social and economic inequality, and what educators can do—and many already are doing—through their unions to promote climate justice and equity in their schools and communities. Perhaps your local union will be the next to take bold climate action and become a part of the solution by helping to forge your own local Green New Deal and joining the national effort.

The UAW Just Challenged the Entire Labor Movement to Get More Ambitious

By Hamilton Nolan - In These Times, November 30, 2023

Regular people who are not directly involved in the labor movement often find it hard to get interested in stuff that is happening at unions. Here is the short chain of reasoning I use to explain why they should care: What is the biggest underlying problem in America? Inequality. What is the single most potent and plausible weapon against inequality? Labor unions. What do labor unions need to do to actually roll back inequality in a way that would improve your life? They need to organize millions of new working people. 

So while it is understandable that the average person who is not in a union sees the topic of ​“union organizing” as some esoteric niche unrelated to them, that is not the case. This is the path to fix the whole fucking country. When people feel like this doesn’t affect them, well — that’s just an indicator of the problem.

The next question in this chain is: What will it take for unions to organize at the scale that we need? There are some practical answers to this question — it will take money, it will take organizers, it will take a structure conducive to keeping the money flowing towards organizing. But there is a more basic answer, that captures what has been lacking during the post-Reagan decades of declining union power: It will take ambition. Ambition!

Large parts of the union establishment still carry the sheepish look of a dog that has been beaten down for years. Living in a state of permanent decline, a life spent playing defense, has sapped them of the belief that things can be different. Their goals have gotten modest. Modest goals won’t get us where we need to go. We need to think big. The labor movement needs, before anything, genuine ambition for a new America. Rather than gazing at the scale of the problem and concluding that it is impossible, we need labor leaders who see their jobs as climbing mountains no matter how high they are. Ambition is the most precious quality of all.

That is why yesterday’s announcement from the United Auto Workers that they are launching a campaign to unionize more than a dozen non-union automakers at once is so important. The UAW knows that the biggest threats to its long term industrial power are the rise of big non-union auto companies like Tesla, and the fact that the auto industry has long been able to move plants to anti-union southern states in order to operate union-free. If left unchecked, those two trends will drain the UAW like a vampire, leaving it a hollow shell of a once-mighty institution. 

Hamilton Nolan is Labor’s BIG IDEAS Guy

Unions Rally for Ceasefire in Gaza as Climate Crisis Lurks

By Ted Franklin - Labor Rise, November 22, 2023

Labor Unions across the country are calling for a ceasefire in Gaza, one of the most climate-challenged places on Earth. In the best of times, Gazans live on the frontline of climate change. Now they are living in a warzone rapidly turning to rubble.

U.N. experts say Israel’s bombing campaign has hit wells, water tanks, and other water supply infrastructure necessary to supply the minimum amounts of water needed to sustain human life. In early November, the UN reported that only 5% of Gaza’s water needs are now being met. The enclave lacks potable groundwater and depends on power and water supplies that have been cut off by the Israeli siege. UNRWA, the U.N. agency for Palestinian refugees, has warned that 70 percent of people in the Gaza Strip are now drinking contaminated water.

In mid-October, Palestinian trade unions issued an urgent global call to action, calling on workers everywhere to halt the sale and funding of arms to Israel and block related military research. The responses of the U.S. labor movement have varied. Some unions have aligned themselves with Palestinian calls for an end to Israeli occupation. Some have focused on ending U.S. support for the Israeli military effort. All are backing a ceasefire that President Biden and most U.S. politicians have so far refused to endorse.

American Federation of Teachers Says, “Declare a Climate Emergency”

By staff - Labor Network for Sustainability, October 3, 2023

On October 3 the Executive Council of the American Federation of Teachers passed a resolution “Declaring a Climate Emergency and Developing Climate Action and Healthy Building Plans.” It resolved that:

  • The AFT urgently demands that President Biden take bold action by declaring a national climate emergency and working to build a robust, just and regenerative energy system
  • The AFT will bring together AFT leaders and district/city/employer teams, at the earliest time and place practicable, to discuss and develop model clean energy and healthy building climate action plans specific to employers―local government, school districts, colleges, universities and hospitals―to access the new federal resources
  • Such plans will advocate that states and municipalities use President Biden’s clean energy and infrastructure program funds to do their part to mitigate and prepare for the unfolding climate crisis, with plans including such items as retrofitting and weatherizing, remediating facilities for toxic substances, installing energy efficient systems, integrating climate justice curriculum, implementing sustainable practices to reduce carbon footprint, and supporting green careers through training and education for students and communities 
  • Such plans will also be rooted in community needs and include input from students, parents, local administrative leaders, appropriate green and union allies, and diverse community representatives

The resolution came in the wake of extensive organizing by union educators through the Educators Climate Action Network facilitated by LNS, the AFT Climate and Environmental Justice Caucus, and LNS’s organizing of the “labor hub” of the September 17th March to End Fossil fuels in New York.

Labor Joining September 17 NYC Climate March

By Maria Brescia-Weiler - Labor Network for Sustainability, August 30, 2023

On September 17 thousands of people will march in New York City calling on President Biden to make good on his promises to deliver a just transition for workers and our communities, to provide solutions to the economic and climate injustices we face, and to end fossil fuels. Five hundred organizations have endorsed the march. For more information on the March including list of endorsers visit https://www.endfossilfuels.us

The Labor Network for Sustainability is coordinating a labor hub for the march, because it is essential that working class environmentalism is at the forefront of any true transition to a more sustainable economy. We welcome workers and union members who will be in New York on September 17th to come march with us! Sign up here.

California public pension divestment bill building momentum; passed Senate Labor and Judiciary Committees

By Shana DeClercq - Fossil Free California, April 18, 2023

Today, SB 252 – a widely-supported bill for CalPERS and CalSTRS to phase out fossil fuel investments – passed its second Committee hearing in the California State Senate at the Senate Judiciary Committee. After an opening statement from bill author Senator Lena Gonzalez (D), Long Beach), and expert testimony from Hannah Estrada, Youth vs. Apocalypse, and Ron Rapp, Legislative Director, California Faculty Association. The Committee opened the floor to in-person and phone call public testimony. Nearly 150 Californians called in or joined in person to support SB252 yesterday. The phone lines overflowed with Central Valley community members, Bay Area youth, organizational representatives, and pension beneficiaries from across California striving to make their enthusiasm for divestment heard.

Eight Senate committee members voted Aye, and the bill has been referred to the Senate Appropriations Committee. This momentum for public pension divestment comes as Californians recover from record-shattering floods, while also girding themselves for ever-lengthening wildfire seasons in the Western U.S. – climate impacts directly caused by the extraction, transportation, and burning of fossil fuels.

Carlos Davidson, CalPERS recipient and California Faculty Association member, gave the following statement: 

“What we are seeing with SB 252 is tremendous momentum, in no small part due to the strong labor support for divestment of CalPERS and CalSTRS. Just as our pensions are the largest in the United States, our union workforce that contributes to those pensions is also a force to reckon with. Unions supporting the bill, such as the California Faculty Association, AFSCME California, the California Nurses Association, the American Federation of Teachers California, and more, together represent over 470,000 California workers.” 

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