Every week, we bring you a roundup of the top news and commentary about issues and events important to working families. Here’s the latest edition of the Working People Weekly List.
TWU Local 100’s New Union President Vows to ‘Take No Crap’ from MTA Management: “John Chiarello—the new president of Transport Workers Union (TWU) Local 100, which represents over 40,000 transit workers in NYC—bluntly warned the MTA that he wouldn’t be pushed around in fighting for his workers’ best interests.”
‘It’s an Attack on Public Service’ | Union Representing Postal Workers Fires Back After Trump Hints at Taking Control of USPS: “At Friday’s swearing in of Howard Lutnick, President Trump hinted at handing the United States Postal Service over to the new Secretary of Commerce. ‘He’s going to look at it,’ said President Trump of Lutnick. ‘He’s got a great business instinct which is what we need, and he’ll be looking at it and we think we can turn it around.’ Brian Renfroe is the president of the National Association of Letter Carriers, the largest postal union that represents more than 200,000 letter carriers. ‘It’s an attack on working people, it’s an attack on public service. It’s literally an attack on the Constitution.’”
271,500 Workers Went on Strike in 2024: “Hundreds of thousands of workers across the United States went on strike in 2024—from health care workers in California to public school teachers in Massachusetts to telecommunications workers in the South. The most recent data from the Bureau of Labor Statistics (BLS) show that 271,500 workers were involved in ‘major work stoppages’ in 2024. The number of workers involved in these stoppages decreased by 41% compared with 2023 but remained elevated compared with strike activity in the early 2000s and 2010s.”
It’s (Past) Time for Oregon to Level the Playing Field: “When talk of the world’s first trillionaire takes center stage in our nation’s news cycles, you know there’s something wrong in our society. When the world’s five richest men have more than doubled their fortunes since 2020 while five billion people around the world have become poorer, it’s clear that there’s an imbalance in the economy. Even when workers use their most powerful—yet risky—tool to fight for fairness by withholding their labor in a strike, corporations often intentionally prolong the strike, starve them out, and cancel healthcare coverage to force them to accept an unfair contract settlement. Unfortunately, this can often perpetuate the ills of our society at large: corporate greed, unsafe jobs, and a culture where we are not respecting working people for their labor; the glue that makes our communities run.”
Federal Workers to Hold Public Actions in Multiple U.S. Cities on Wednesday: “Three weeks after a January 28 memo titled ‘Fork in the Road’ encouraged federal workers to accept ‘deferred resignation’ and leave their positions—and one week after a union-backed demonstration held at the Capitol—federal government union members are gearing up to hold demonstrations in cities across the country on Wednesday, February 19. Organizers are calling the coordinated events Save Our Services Day of Action.”
New DNC chair: Union Workers, Labor Leaders Will Be ‘Core to My Decision-Making’: “New Democratic National Committee (DNC) Chair Ken Martin said Tuesday that union workers and labor leaders will be ‘core to my decision-making.’ ‘As Trump wages his war on working families, Democrats will fiercely answer the call to my favorite old union song, "Which Side Are You On?" I’ll tell you what: Democrats are on the side of the worker,’ he said. ‘We will show Americans every day that workers in fact do have more power than any billionaire.’”
Want to Defeat Trump? Support Unions: “But there’s no need to despair. A powerful force in our society has the legitimacy, resources and leverage to turn things around: organized labor. Unions can beat back Donald Trump’s attacks, expose his sham populism, and—by uniting workers around their shared economic interests—help isolate his xenophobic scapegoating. Rather than hibernate for the next four years, or limit ourselves to posting online about the president’s latest outrages, each of us can lend support to workers organizing at federal agencies, schools, Starbucks, Amazon, auto plants and beyond. Just as importantly, we can expand the labor movement’s reach by unionizing our own workplaces. It won’t be easy to counter Trump’s shock-and-awe offensive, or to fill the void left by the Democrats’ disarray. But it’s both necessary and possible.”
Delaware State AFL-CIO Announces New President: “The Delaware State AFL-CIO recently announced Nelson Hill has been elected as its new president. A dedicated labor leader with 20 years of experience fighting for the rights of working families, Hill will now lead the state federation in its mission to protect and empower union members across Delaware. Hill also serves as vice president and executive assistant to the president of UFCW Local 27, one of the largest and most influential unions in the region. His extensive experience in organizing, collective bargaining and worker advocacy has made a profound impact on the labor movement, improving conditions and securing stronger protections for thousands of workers.”