News

Today’s Teamster News For October 12, 2016

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TEAMSTERS

XPO Logistics Drivers in Philadelphia Seek Teamster Representation  Teamster.org  …Drivers at XPO Logistics in suburban Philadelphia filed for Teamster representation today, the latest action by workers across the U.S. who are banding together to fight for fair treatment at one of the largest transportation and logistics companies in the world. The 52 drivers at the former Con-way Freight are planning to join workers in Miami, Laredo, Texas and Vernon, Calif. who have already formed their union with the Teamsters…

Local 653 Organizes Mini-Bus Workers, Achieves First Contract for Food Processing Employees  Teamster.org  …Drivers and monitors for Middleborough School District have organized with the Teamsters while workers at Uno’s frozen pizza production facility in Brockton ratified their first contract with the assistance of Local 653. Some 22 mini-bus workers who transport students with special needs for the school district voted to join the Teamsters last week… 

Workers at Republic Services in Ohio Vote Teamsters Union  Teamster.org  …Drivers, operators, mechanics, billing coordinators and scale-house clerks who work for Republic Services at the Pine Grove Landfill in Amanda, Ohio, voted overwhelmingly in favor of joining Teamsters Local 637 on Friday. The 16-worker unit reached out to the Teamsters Union seeking a strong voice to address their workplace concerns…

Teamsters Denounce Lawsuit to Block Fair Pay and Safe Workplaces Executive Order  Teamster.org  …The Teamsters Union strongly opposes a lawsuit filed last week on behalf of more than 400,000 federal contractors that seeks to block the implementation of a critical executive order that would establish much-needed worker protections. The Fair Pay and Safe Workplaces Executive Order, which will go into effect on Oct. 25, will put strong protections in place for workers that are employed by government contractors…

Teamsters: behind the scenes with Ringling Bros. animals  Daily News  …Full-time employees provide daily grooming, dietary, exercise and veterinary standards for the animals. Their practices and conditions meet or exceed the standards of the Animal Welfare Act. For more than 145 years, the “Greatest Show on Earth” has been drawing crowds with a fun-filled entertainment experience, and wild and exotic animals have been an important part of circus history, putting smiles on the faces of millions of children and adults…

 

GLOBAL LABOR & TRADE

Korean Truck Drivers Begin Industrial Action as Rail Strike Enters its Third Week  Zoom in Korea  …On October 10 at 12am, South Korean truck drivers, members of the Korean Public Services and Transport Workers’ Union Cargo Truckers Solidarity Division (KPTU-TruckSol) began a national strike against the South Korean government’s plan for deregulation of the trucking transport market. The strike began as the strike of KPTU-affiliated railway and other public institution workers went into its fourteenth day…

Special UN Report: Worker Rights Key to Human Rights  Solidarity Center  …Workers rights—and the freedom to form unions and freely assemble—are key to achieving human rights, according to a new report by UN Special Rapporteur on the rights to freedom of peaceful assembly and of association Maina Kiai. “This report is a clear call to action to governments and employers to immediately recognize worker rights, and for the broader human rights community to advocate for them,” says Solidarity Center Executive Director Shawna Bader-Blau…

Hanjin to Accept Empty Containers at Two West Coast Port Terminals  Wall Street Journal  …Hanjin Shipping Co.  said it would accept empty containers at two of its West Coast port terminals, offering relief to logistics companies stuck with thousands of boxes delivered by the bankrupt shipping line. Since Hanjin filed for bankruptcy six weeks ago, thousands of its containers—unloaded from ships and emptied of their imported goods—have been cluttering warehouse yards…

Controversial TTIP negotiations wrap up in New York  CCTV  …A new round of talks on a controversial trade agreement between Europe and the United States wrapped up in New York this week. Negotiators say they have made progress in some key areas but the discussions come at trying time for trade advocates. There is widespread opposition on both sides of the Atlantic making it unlikely a deal will come through anytime soon… 

South Korea warming to TPP  Asian Review  …South Korea expressed interest in joining the Trans-Pacific Partnership trade agreement in talks between Trade Minister Joo Hyunghwan and Japan’s largest business lobby Monday. Joo asked for “cooperation from the Japanese business sector and government,” citing plans to officially announce participation in the TPP soon…

The National Security Case for a TPP Lame Duck Vote: Not!  (opinion) FPIF  …When Congress returns to Washington after the November 8 elections, its members, particularly the defeated or retiring legislators, will be pressured to vote for the TPP in large part on national security grounds. What these grounds are, just like the draft TPP texts themselves, will remain a closely guarded secret…

1 Million in Haiti Urgently Need Humanitarian Assistance After Hurricane’s “Apocalyptic Destruction”  Democracy Now  …In Haiti, the death toll from Hurricane Matthew has topped 1,000. Haitian interim President Jocelerme Privert is warning the country faces a possible famine from what he described as the “apocalyptic destruction” of Hurricane Matthew. The country is also battling a growing cholera outbreak. The storm hit a week ago, but many areas have still received no aid…

Brazil’s Congress Pushes Decades-Long Austerity Shock Therapy  TeleSUR  …Critics say the proposed 20-year freeze on public spending will deepen and prolong Brazil’s economic crisis. Unelected Brazilian President Michel Temer is a step closer to cementing his long-term austerity plan for the cash-strapped country as the lower house of Congress approved Monday a constitutional reform that would freeze public spending for the next two decades…

 

STATE & LIVING WAGE BATTLES

Virginia voters will see right-to-work law on questions on the ballot  CBS  …Election day is four weeks away and Virginia voters are voting for more than just president and congress. Voters will be looking at whether or not to add the Virginia right-to-work law into the state constitution. The amendment would specifically ban employers from forcing their workers to join a union or pay union dues…

Why Ohio is leaving Donald Trump for Hillary Clinton  CBS  …A month ago, the perennial swing state of Ohio was slipping away from Hillary Clinton, who was struggling to win over working class whites and impress jaded millennials. Today, Ohio looks more and more like it is hers to lose. The story of why is about Donald Trump..

Massachusetts Teachers Unions Battle the Dark Money Behind a Pro-Charter Ballot Measure  In These Times  …Millions of dollars of dark money are streaming into Massachusetts as charter school proponents try to pass Question 2, a contentious ballot measure that would raise the state’s existing cap on charter schools. Teachers unions are scrambling to fight back against what they say is a heavy-handed attempt to dramatically expand public charters while hanging underfunded, traditional public schools out to dry…

Scott Walker Says Wisconsin’s Voter-ID Law Is Working ‘Just Fine’—It’s Not  The Nation  … Federal District Court Judge James Peterson ordered the state to investigate how the DMV is implementing the voter-ID law and scheduled a hearing for October 12 to consider blocking or relaxing the law. Subsequent reporting by the Milwaukee Journal-Sentinel showed how workers at seven different DMVs across the state provided inaccurate information about the law…

Culinary Union endorses legalized recreational marijuana measure  Las Vegas Sun  …Nevada’s largest labor union announced its support of the Ballot Question 2 initiative Monday, in favor of legalizing marijuana for recreational adult use. Culinary Workers Union Local 226, which represents more than 57,000 workers statewide, endorsed the initiative on the basis of taking marijuana out of the black market into tax-paying businesses, said Yes on 2 spokesman Joe Brezny…

North Carolina governor embraces anti-transgender discrimination in heated debate  Think Progress  …In a heated gubernatorial debate Tuesday night, Gov. Pat McCrory (R) and Attorney General Roy Cooper (D) squared off over the future of North Carolina. At the forefront of the discussion, unsurprisingly, was HB2, the anti-LGBT law that has prompted a nationwide economic backlash…

 

U.S. LABOR

Striking Minnesota nurses reach tentative agreement  Washington Post  …A strike that has kept thousands of regular nurses from five Minnesota hospitals for five weeks could be coming to an end after the governor announced a tentative agreement early Tuesday between the nurses’ union and hospital operator Allina Health. The 4,800 nurses represented by the Minnesota Nurses Association have been on strike at five Allina Health hospitals in the Minneapolis-St. Paul- area since Labor Day over issues including health insurance and workplace safety…

No End in Sight to Strike by Harvard’s Cafeteria Workers Over Wages  New York Times  …A dispute over wages and benefits between Harvard and its cafeteria workers has led to a strike that is now in its seventh day, with no immediate resolution in sight, an official at the nation’s wealthiest university said on Tuesday. Harvard was relying on employees who volunteered to work in the university’s dining halls, which were operating on a skeleton schedule and offering reduced options and boxed lunches…

Chicago teachers reach last-minute contract deal, narrowly avert strike  Washington Post  …The Chicago teachers’ union and school system reached a tentative contract agreement late Monday night, narrowly averting a strike that threatened to shut down the nation’s third-largest school system. Teachers — who have been working without a contract since June 2015 — had planned to walk off the job Tuesday, a move that would have forced the school system to cancel classes for more than 300,000 students…

There’s a Nationwide Boycott of Wendy’s Underway  The Nation  …For over a decade the small coalition of farmworkers and community activists have taken on the giants of Big Ag and built a new system of labor protection. Now they’re taking the fight to a Goliath in red pigtails.  The Coalition of Immokalee Workers (CIW) is leading a nationwide boycott of Wendy’s, to pressure the fast-food giant to participate in a “worker- led social responsibility” system that links corporate accountability with labor justice from farm to table…

Michigan Prison Labor Strikers Release Their Demands  Jezebel  …According to the Incarcerated Workers Organizing Committee—an effort by Industrial Workers of the World, an international labor union, to help incarcerated workers organize—Kinross remained on lockdown for nearly two weeks, from September 10 to the morning of September 22. “About 150 prisoners accused of being instigators were transferred to other facilities…

Wal-Mart ups entry-level manager salaries ahead of overtime rule  Reuters  …Wal-Mart has raised salaries for entry-level managers before a rule change that extends mandatory overtime pay to more than 4 million U.S. workers, in an attempt to shield itself from unpredictable additional costs for salaried employees. Wal-Mart raised salaries from $45,000 to $48,500 annually for employees including store management, spokesman Randy Hargrove said on Tuesday. The retailer did not break out the number of employees who received the raise… 

Ex-Wells Fargo worker: Intimidation included no bathroom breaks  CNN  …Harassment, intimidation, even bathroom breaks denied. That’s some of the “unconscionable behavior” a former Wells Fargo worker drove five hours to confront a bank executive about. Nathan Todd Davis said at a California State Assembly hearing on the Wells Fargo (WFC) fake account scandal that he filed 50 ethics complaints during his decade of working at Wells Fargo — but nothing was ever done…

How Stronger Unions Could Fix Our Economy — And Our Politics  (opinion) TIME  …Of the little we’ve heard, much of this election’s economic policy discussion has focused on what can be done about our historically slow growth, rising inequality, and decreasing social mobility. But neither candidate has focused on one no-brainer solution: strengthening unions. That might seem a contentious statement in a country with decades of fraught relations between corporations and labor…

 

SOCIAL JUSTICE & OTHER NEWS

Trump’s Threat to Jail Clinton Also Targets Democracy’s Institutions  New York Times  …When Donald J. Trump told Hillary Clinton at Sunday’s presidential debate that if he were president, “you’d be in jail,” he was threatening more than just his opponent. He was suggesting that he would strip power from the institutions that normally enforce the law, investing it instead in himself. Political scientists who study troubled democracies abroad say this is a tactic typical of elected leaders who pull down their systems from within…

North Carolina’s record floods could have unexpected environmental consequences  Think Progress  …Hurricane Matthew swept across the southeastern seaboard of the United States this weekend, bringing intense rainfall to North Carolina and triggering record flooding across much of the state. But as the rains subside and clearer weather rolls in, some environmentalists are raising alarm bells about the potential for yet another environmental disaster…

Federal government to pursue criminal-contempt charge against Sheriff Joe Arpaio  AZ Central  …Federal prosecutors said Tuesday they will pursue a criminal-contempt charge against Maricopa County Sheriff Joe Arpaio for defying orders to halt the immigration-enforcement operations that made him a national lightning rod. If convicted, Arpaio could spend up to six months in jail. The move has few precedents in U.S. history, as prosecutors endorsed a federal judge’s findings that the lawman intentionally violated the judge’s orders…

Aside from a Few Issues, Gary Johnson Is as Rabidly Right-Wing as You Could Possibly Imagine  Alternet  …Libertarian candidate Gary Johnson is the Republican we’ve been waiting for, including those die-hard Sanders supporters, right? Not exactly. The former governor of New Mexico has some hard-right views, which have largely gone unnoticed due to the media’s fascination with his recent gaffes…

Donald Trump: American-Made Fraud  (opinion) Daily Kos  …A Newsweek investigation by reporter Kurt Eichenwald revealed last week that in at least two of Trump’s last three projects, he chose to use Chinese steel and aluminum. Not only did Trump use foreign materials, but he also tried to conceal that fact by making the purchases through a series of shell and holding companies…