Meteorologist Sam Kuffel was fired by CBS 58 on Wednesday (January 22) for posting a criticism of Elon Musk's nazi salute on her private social media. The Young Workers Committee of the Milwaukee Area Labor Council stands with Sam Kuffel and demands her reinstatement with back pay.

Further, we condemn the use of discipline by employers to chill free speech of employees, in particular speech opposing white supremacist and fascist ideology.

We encourage all workers to join or organize a union to protect themselves from unjust discipline, and to help build an alternative to Trump and Musk's racist and anti-worker agenda. If you are interested in organizing your workplace or finding a union job, please reach out to us.

Young Workers Committee

Milwaukee Area Labor Council

#MilwaukeeMN #LaborPower #YoungWorkersCommittee #YWC #MALC #YWCMALC

Represented in this panel were Kellie Lutz, an organizer from the drive to unionize Stone Creek Coffee in the spring of 2019; Molly Kiefer, an employee at Wonderstate Coffee and new member of Teamsters Local 344; Ryan Jann and Brittany Walker, both new members of the International Association of Machinists at the Milwaukee Art Museum (IAM MAM); and Idalia Cervantes and Tommy Molina, workers with Voces de la Frontera seeking to wrap up their own organizing drive in a couple of weeks.

The Young Workers Committee closely followed each of these campaigns, often getting involved in spreading the word and showing up to events in solidarity with the workers. Together with the full support of Milwaukee Area Labor Council, members of Young Workers Committee wanted to provide a platform to these workers to share stories about their efforts. The organizers shared their experiences about what sparked the drives, how management responded, how they approached their co-workers, what things they would change, and many other topics.

The processes looked different in the different workplaces. Molly Kiefer, a worker at Wonderstate Coffee, said her and her co-workers tried to give their employers an opportunity to fix the problems, but they weren’t satisfied with the answers ownership gave.

“While they recognized that our list of concerns were all definitely issues, they didn’t have a good timeline for addressing them, and they didn’t want the workers involved in the decision-making process,” Kiefer said in explanation of what prompted the ultimately successful union drive with IBT Local 344.

Ownership decided to temporarily close down shop at Wonderstate, conveniently right after the union vote passed, but the new Teamsters remain hard at work. Kiefer spoke about the shift from winning the union to negotiating their first contract.

“It’s been fun because we’re really getting to imagine what we want our workplace to look like,” she said. “We can talk about the break policy, our wages, holiday time, paid time off, and other things like dress code and how many days in a row you work.”

Tommy Molina, the chapter organizer for immigrant and worker rights non-profit Voces de la Frontera in Milwaukee, mentioned that there wasn’t really a single moment or incident that he could pinpoint for why the workers felt the need to organize.

“In many ways, it was little issues that were compounding over months and going unaddressed,” Molina said. “There are expectations [in the nonprofit industry] during certain periods to work 50-60 hours and not complain or say anything because that’s the culture. You’re there because you ‘love what you do.’”

Brittany Walker, a vital piece of the winning effort at the Milwaukee Art Museum, discussed how the struggle at her workplace revealed a part of herself and what her vision is going forward.

“It brought out a sense of fight in me I didn’t know I had, and I’m so grateful for it now because I don’t know how to stop fighting. Put me in the ring for any cause and I’m ready to fight. And that’s what we need, honestly,” Walker said.

She went on, “Like, let’s organize America. It seems very ambitious, but it’s totally necessary. These big corporations are eating folks alive.”

Kelly Lutz, the main organizer of the 2019 union effort at Stone Creek Coffee, said she was proud of what her and her team did even if they were ultimately unsuccessful in winning a union.

“The workers involved left a mark on the company that significantly changed the relationship between ownership and workers at Stone Creek. We laid a foundation and an example that it is possible to organize in the service industry,” Lutz said. “The issues workers face at Stone Creek are not specific to that particular company. These are issues you face all across the service industry. We combatted that by trying to organize a union.”

After moving on from Stone Creek, Lutz found work at St. Francis Hospital in Milwaukee and is now a rank-and-file steward as a certified nursing assistant. She said that her experiences during the Stone Creek drive better prepared her to be the workplace leader she is now. She had many lessons to offer other workers who may be seeking to organize their workplaces in the future.

“Make sure to examine management and always prepare for retaliation. Hear workers’ stories about how they’ve been disciplined or witnessed others being disciplined. Always take the workers word over what management has to say,” Lutz said. “Make solid assessments of who is close to management. See who is a voice for workers on the floor. Identify issues which are widely and deeply felt.”

She continued, “The odds are always in your favor as long as you have a team and a strategy and are ready to move and build.”

The Young Workers Committee, together with the Milwaukee Area Labor Council, hopes to build off of this successful web event and contribute to a resurgence of organizing the unorganized in Milwaukee and the surrounding area. When workers stand up for our rights and fight back, we can win! Working class, unite and fight!

#MilwaukeeWI #PeoplesStruggles #YoungWorkersCommittee

Milwaukee, WI – Fifty Veterans Affairs workers and supporters rallied outside the Zablocki VA hospital August 12 to protest union-busting, attacks on high-quality public veteran healthcare, and bad faith bargaining by the VA administration.

The rally was organized by the American Federation of Government Employees (AFGE) Local 3 and supported by the Wisconsin State AFL-CIO, Milwaukee Area Labor Council, Veterans for Peace and elected leaders including Milwaukee Mayor Tom Barrett, U.S. Congresswoman Gwen Moore and U.S. Senator Tammy Baldwin.

AFGE members and representatives detailed shocking accounts of the extreme measures that the VA administration is taking to strip union rights. VA negotiators are intentionally obstructing contract negotiations with the union, trying to force an impasse after only ten days of bargaining. VA negotiators proposed scrapping 63% of the current contract, which would effectively gut many basic union rights.

“We have to stand up and fight!” said AFGE district organizer Don Evans as he railed against the anti-union tactics of the VA and Trump administration. “You want to make America great? No more shutdowns, stop balancing the budget with our paychecks,” continued Evans, “You want to make America great? Restore the integrity of the VA hospital and bargain in good faith!”

Under the Trump administration, federal agencies including the Department of Veterans Affairs have essentially declared war on federal government workers and their unions. VA employees who are active in their union, enforcing the contract and defending workplace rights, are being singled out and targeted for discipline and harassment by management. The assault on union rights at the VA is part of a much larger effort by the Trump administration and employer-funded groups to weaken unions and disenfranchise working class people generally.

Milwaukee VA workers say bargaining had been scheduled to continue until December, and they will not back down in the face of harassment and bad faith bargaining.

#MilwaukeeWI #US #PeoplesStruggles #PublicSectorUnions #DonaldTrump #YoungWorkersCommittee #AFGE #VeteranAffairs

Milwaukee, WI – The Young Workers Committee of the Milwaukee Area Labor Council welcomed Raymond “Mong” Palatino from Bayan, an alliance of progressive organizations in the Philippines, and Ed Cubelo from the Kilusang Mayo Uno (KMU) or May First Labor Movement, to Milwaukee for a very successful International Workers' Day event at the Milwaukee Area Labor Council on April 30.

Cubelo and Palatino spoke to a room full of labor, anti-war, environment and student activists about the political situation in the Philippines, where President Rodrigo Duterte is using widespread repression against the poor and working class people's movements as they oppose his Trump-like policies. Since Duterte took office, 42 labor leaders in the Philippines have been killed by extra-judicial means.

Over 200 labor strikes have been waged in opposition to neo-liberal policies like the expansion of temp work to 70% of the workforce, the use of ‘company unions’ and aggressive attacks on working conditions and labor rights.

Unionists, environmental activists, women's rights activists, human rights activists and Catholic priests have been the victims of illegal arrest and detention, arsons, torture, killings and political repression from Duterte's military and police forces.

In his speech to the labor council, Cubelo noted that despite all this, the people's movements in the Philippines are growing, and KMU is organizing the “difficult to organize” industries, like temp workers and call centers, with incredible speed and success. Because of their effectiveness, Duterte has slandered the KMU as “terrorists” in order to justify violent attacks on labor leaders and activists.

The atrocities committed by Duterte's military and police have been enabled by support of the U.S. government via the generous financial support of U.S. taxpayers, and of course, the political backing of President Trump.

The Filipino worker leaders also spoke to the Milwaukee Area Labor Council executive board about how the U.S. labor movement could stand in solidarity by calling on legislators to cut U.S. support for the Duterte regime.

A resolution calling for an end to U S. military aid to the Philippines was passed unanimously by the Milwaukee Area Labor Council delegate body on International Workers' Day, May 1.

The resolution condemns the human and labor rights violations committed by the Duterte regime and expresses solidarity with the people's movements in the Philippines. The resolution calls on Southeast Wisconsin's U.S. representatives to be advocates for ending U.S. military aid to the Duterte regime, and to support the House and Senate resolutions that could enact this change. The resolution will be used by activists to support the case against Duterte which is currently before the International Criminal Court.

#MilwaukeeWI #Philippines #PeoplesStruggles #KMU #YoungWorkersCommittee

Milwaukee, WI – On Dec. 11, the Milwaukee Area Labor Council, led by its Young Workers Committee, held a press conference along with allies in response to a construction worker displaying a Ku Klux Klan sticker in a predominantly Black neighborhood.

Carrying the banner, “No Nazis in the house of labor,” 75 people gathered in celebration after American Sewer Services agreed to fire the employee for his show of support for the terrorist organization.

“As trade unionists, we don’t usually like to see a union brother get fired,” said Jacob Flom, vice president of AFSCME Local 526, and Chairperson of the Young Workers Committee of the Milwaukee Area Labor Council, “But, if you’re a Klansman and you’re a threat to our fellow workers, you’re not our union brother.”

The Young Workers Committee offered this further statement, “No worker can be both a unionist and a fascist; white supremacists are the enemy of organized labor and the entire multinational working class. The KKK is a white supremacist terrorist group responsible for killing African Americans, LBGTQ people, trade unionists, and others.”

As a result of this action and public outcry, the owner of American Sewer Services is being called to appear before Milwaukee's Common Council's Steering and Rules Committee to answer questions regarding their employee's terrible behavior. This hearing will take place Dec. 14.

The event was cosponsored by the Young Workers Committee of the Milwaukee Area Labor Council, Coalition of Black Trade Unionists, NAACP, AFL-CIO, Voces de la Frontera, LULAC, Jewish Community Relations Council, the Milwaukee Dr. Martin Luther King Justice Coalition, Citizen Action of Wisconsin, and the Young People's Resistance Committee.

#MilwaukeeWI #Antiracism #Antifascism #YoungWorkersCommittee #MilwaukeeAreaLaborCouncil #AFSCMELocal526