Worker's World by Tony Murphy 6/14/2022
New York City ‘March Against Union-Busting Billionaires’ keeps the struggle in the streets
The June 7 Starbucks union win in Memphis, Tennessee, showed that the bosses’ tried-and-true, union-busting tactics aren’t working like they used to. In the face of the February racist firing of the Memphis 7, election tampering by the bosses and constant anti-union interference, workers at that store still voted 11-3 for the union.
Workers’ victories at Starbucks, Amazon and other workplaces are happening in the face of anti-union retaliation campaigns, with more firings and cuts in workers’ hours and benefits.
That’s why activists with Workers Assembly Against Racism (WAAR) hit the streets June 9 with a ‘March on Union-Busting Billionaires.’ The raucous, militant protest — accompanied by the steady, pro-worker beat of the Rude Mechanical Orchestra — started at the penthouse of Starbucks CEO Howard Schultz and ended at the luxury apartments of Amazon boss Jeff Bezos.
June 9 was chosen because that was the day a federal judge began hearing the National Labor Relations Board suit demanding the reinstatement of the Memphis 7. Just the day before, an Arizona federal judge rejected the reinstatement of three Arizona Starbucks union supporters. What the NLRB can do for workers is limited; WAAR activists wanted to make sure that in the broad fight against union-busting, on the workers’ side is not just NLRB lawyers in the courtroom but protesters on the bosses’ doorsteps.
The need for mass solidarity protests goes for Amazon workers too. And June 9 wound up being the day Amazon’s Staten Island management fired Pasquale “Uncle Pat” Cioffi, one of the Amazon Labor Union’s (ALU) fiercest supporters.
More:
https://www.workers.org/2022/06/64829/
