Troublemakers Blog
June 11, 2020 /
At 9 a.m. on Tuesday, ports across the U.S. West Coast ground to a halt as longshore workers stopped work to mourn the death of George Floyd. For nine minutes—the amount of time police officer Derek Chauvin knelt on Floyd’s neck—members of the Longshore and Warehouse Union (ILWU) performed no work, from Southern California to »
June 11, 2020 /
Since the video was released of Officer Derek Chauvin pressing his knee on the neck of George Floyd for almost nine minutes as Floyd said his last words, “I can’t breathe,” protests have exploded in eighteen countries and all fifty states. The cry of Black Lives Matter can be heard in small towns and big cities throughout the United States. »
June 11, 2020 /
As the world and the United States navigate the coronavirus pandemic, there’s a common refrain that we’re living in unprecedented times, with mass unemployment, unsafe working conditions for those still working, lack of access to health care, and food scarcity.
For some Americans these experiences are unimaginable, but for many Black people they are too »
June 10, 2020 /
Labor lawyer Susana Prieto Terrazas was arrested on Monday in the Mexican border city of Matamoros, Tamaulipas, where she was attempting to aid factory workers to recover wages owed to them during a two-month coronavirus shutdown. »
June 10, 2020 /
On Sunday postal workers in Minneapolis organized a display of solidarity with the Black freedom movement that is emerging after the brutal police murder of George Floyd. »
June 08, 2020 /
With unemployment now reaching levels not seen since the 1930s, should you really want to spend a few hours immersed in the hardships endured by working people during the first Great Depression? Yes. »
June 05, 2020 /
Trauma would be the best way to describe the effect of the COVID-19 pandemic on the working class. Suddenly workers found ourselves in a situation beyond our control. But it’s also a moment of opportunity to actually take more control over our work lives and push for a more democratic society. Workers and unions have to hit the streets and organize. »
June 05, 2020 /
At a Taco Bell in Washington Township, Michigan, the action began when Jonathon Foster, a shift leader, approached the district manager about paid sick leave during the pandemic. She flat-out refused, despite pledges from Taco Bell’s CEO. »
June 02, 2020 /
For five days in 1919, union members took control of the city of Seattle. They arguably ran it better, and certainly more justly, than it had ever been run before.
The strike began when waitresses, laundry workers, streetcar workers, and more—65,000 union workers in all—walked off the job on February 6, 1919, to support striking shipyard workers. »
![Drawing of four fist of different skin tones emerging from a megaphone; one holds a heart wand. head shots of nine artists. text: "Event I: Unionism in America: June 6, 2020, at 8:00 PM EST. PICplays: perform inform change." @actorscirclensemble [with social media logos]](https://labornotes.org./sites/default/files/styles/blog_thumb/public/main/blogposts/Unionism-In-America---LaborNotes_Poster.jpg?itok=8teVK2gH)
June 01, 2020 /
In a free, online event June 6 at 8 p.m. Eastern time, the nonprofit theatre company Actors Circle Ensemble will present via Zoom three short plays that explore the contemporary American labor movement. »