May 22, 2014

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Working People Don't Need Boehner Trade

COHEN: Worldwide Labor Alliance Must Confront Virulent Anti-Union Efforts in U.S.

In Berlin: ver.di Members, International Union Activists Protest atDeutsche Telekom

U.S. Added to Watch List of the World's Worst Labor Violators

Truth to Power: Fired T-Mobile Workers Question CEO About ItsU.S. Labor Practices

CWA Sues Christie on Pension Fund Grab

Movement Building Update

What Happened in the Basement?

CWA Statement on Proposed AT&T Acquisition of DirecTV

Macklemore. Really?

CWA – There's An App For That

Working People Don't Need Boehner Trade

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CWA President Larry Cohen talked about the Trans-Pacific Partnership withMSNBC host Ed Schultz, calling the deal negotiated by and for multinationalcorporations "Boehner Trade" that American workers don't need or want.

Watch the video here.

COHEN: Worldwide Labor Alliance Must Confront Virulent Anti-Union Effortsin U.S.

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CWA President Larry Cohen urged a worldwide conference of trade unionistsin Germany this week to join efforts to revive and sustain the American labormovement under relentless assault from corporations and reactionary politicalforces.

"Without the world's attention to the crisis of labor in the U.S., anti-unioncorporate and conservative government policies will be exported," Cohenwarned. "The consequences are dire for the rest of the world."

In a forceful speech this week at the International Trade Union Confederation(ITUC) in Berlin, he recited the now familiar but depressing data on how theU.S. trade union movement has been brought low from its peak 50 years agoof 35% private sector coverage to just 6% today. ITUC General SecretarySharan Burrow has been a strong ally in the campaign for T-Mobile workers'rights, including coming to Charleston, S.C., last year to support call centerworkers.

"Our political and business leaders have for the most part adopted anideology of greed, not partnership," Cohen said. "As a result of these types ofU.S. labor polices, for the last 25 years, income and wealth in the U.S. haveshifted to the wealthiest Americans. While workers' wages have stagnated,the wealth of the 1% grew. Top executives of large U.S. companies now earn350 times more than workers."

CWA President Larry Cohen and Josh Coleman, now a TU activist, addressITUC delegates.

U.S. corporations are exporting this economic model, he continued, includingright now behaving one way in Europe, where governments have strongpolicies supporting workers joining unions, but being virulently anti-labor athome. Multi-national corporations like Deutsche Telekom have been morethan happy to respect workers' rights in their home countries while treatingU.S. workers abominably.

T-Mobile is 67% owned by Deutsche Telekom, the largest shareholder ofwhich is the Germany government. DT's German workforce has bargainingrights, and ver.di leader Lothar Schröder is the deputy chairman of thecompany's supervisory board, serving along with other workerrepresentatives. In the U.S., workers who choose to organize are subjectedto repeated captive audience interrogations and harassment.

Meanwhile, corporations continually ply political allies in the U.S. withcampaign cash and push for so-called negotiated trade treaties that putmultinational corporations above national law.

"A global labor movement cannot survive with the elimination of a trade unionmovement inside the USA. We will make collective progress or suffercollective decline," Cohen said.

A positive development has been partnerships like the one formed by CWAand ver.di, the 2 million member German union that represents telecomworkers at Deutsche Telekom and T-Mobile. CWA and ver.di togethercreated TU, a joint organization to represent U.S. workers at T-Mobile US.ver.di is pressuring Deutsche Telekom management to take responsibility forU.S. managers who violate workers' rights by interrogating union activists,illegally firing and disciplining them and allowing supervisors to lie about theunion.

As part of that effort, Josh Coleman, a Wichita, KS, T-Mobile call centerworker fired last year for organizing his co-workers, also joined the Berlinmeeting. In an earlier trip to Germany last August, Coleman had the surrealexperience of seeing his own face everywhere he turned as German telecomworkers wore T-shirts with the words "Wir sind alles Josh!" or "We are allJosh."

"Each of us needs to take on this challenge to create conditions where unionrepresentation can be tolerated in the USA, so that the cancer of trade unionelimination is stopped," Cohen said.

Working together, U.S. unions and the AFL-CIO and international allies,including the ITUC and UNI, are building global partnerships to ensureworkers' rights in the global economy.

In Berlin: ver.di Members, International Union Activists Protest at DeutscheTelekom

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German giant Deutsche Telekom got a big surprise this week when over athousand international trade unionists and activists from the German unionver.di, employees of DT, rallied outside its Berlin offices to protest the virulentanti-labor practices of its U.S. subsidiary T-Mobile US.

ver.di members and union activists from around the globe demonstrateoutside Deutsche Telekom in Berlin.

"This is a message of resistance from America," CWA President Larry Cohensaid, in a challenge to DT's Chief Executive Officer Timotheus Hoettges."When you attack, we stand up and we fight back."

T-Mobile supervisors have been harassing workers in the United States fordaring to organize their workplaces, including subjecting some, like a group ofHarlem, NY, retail store workers, to repeated captive audience interrogations.T-Mobile has illegally disciplined and fired other activist workers, includingJosh Coleman, who participated in this week's Berlin rally.

ver.di, the union representing DT's German workers, organized this week'srally as part of its continuing efforts to pressure DT into stopping T-Mobile's

U.S. labor abuses.

Union activists from dozens of countries join Deutsche Telekom protest.

Below: At the rally, Ado Wilhelm, Lothar Schröder, CWA President Cohen,Mike Döding, ver.di staff rep, and Josh Coleman.

Cohen said the rally grew out of frustration with DT's stubbornness inresponding to ver.di's efforts to help U.S. workers exercise their rights.Hundreds of trade unionists from all over the world, attending the weeklongInternational Trade Union Confederation conference in Berlin, joined morethan 1,000 ver.di members protesting in support of T-Mobile US workers whoare fighting for their right to form a union.

Messages of solidarity from Arab unions, activists in the Indian trade unionmovement, British union leaders, U.S. and European activists and manyothers from around the globe lit up Twitter with support for T-Mobile USworkers. Members of the German Parliament also joined the protest, callingon DT to follow its social compact, which calls for full recognition of workers'rights to union representation, and stop T-Mobile's abusive labor practices in

the U.S.

Cohen said that T-Mobile US workers will be in this fight "one day longer andeach day stronger."

U.S. Added to Watch List of the World's Worst Labor Violators

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At the International Trade Union Confederation conference in Berlin thisweek, the organization's General Secretary Sharan Burrow made anannouncement that would have been unthinkable a generation ago. Workersin the U.S. face systematic violation of their rights by some governmentofficials and/or corporations that are engaged in serious efforts to threatenand crush workers' rights, according to the ITUC.

Sharan Burrow (right), general secretary of the ITUC, opens the "globalworkers' Parliament."

The United States of America once built a middle class that was the envy ofthe world largely on the strength of how many of its people belonged tounions. The U.S. grew to be the world's leading economy as membership inunions grew. Now, with systematic abuse of workers' rights and the speedwith which it is eliminating private sector unions, the U.S. will be keepingdifferent company.

Read the full report here.

"Countries such as Denmark and Uruguay led the way through their stronglabor laws," Burrow said. "A country's level of development proved to be apoor indicator of whether it respected basic rights to bargain collectively,strike for decent conditions, or simply join a union at all."

Truth to Power: Fired T-Mobile Workers Question CEO About Its U.S. LaborPractices

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How is it that Deutsche Telekom manages to ignore criticisms from home andabroad of subsidiary T-Mobile US for violating the rights of workers, JoshColeman wanted to know?

Coleman asked DT's CEO Timotheus Hoettges and the other board membersat the May 15 annual meeting of the Deutsche Telekom board in Colognewhy the corporation is avoiding or ignoring the T-Mobile problem. Germanmembers of parliament have criticized DT for its reluctance to deal with T-Mobile's anti-labor practices. The German government is a large shareholderin DT.

"Do you influence the American management in order to stop these anti-employee practices?" Coleman asked. "I am aware that many organizations,politicians, customers and investors criticize Deutsche Telekom's behaviorand have addressed this in letters. The allegations are diverse and evenmore serious."

Coleman, in his work for T-Mobile's Wichita, KS, call center, won manyawards and was well regarded by supervisors. That is, until they becameaware of his efforts to organize coworkers into a union. Overnight, theychanged their assessment of him, telling him his work no longer measuredup.

"That is a lie," Coleman said.

Kornelia Dubbel spreads the TU message at the ITUC meeting. Dubbel,along with Josh Coleman, spoke at the Deutsche Telekom annual meeting inCologne.

He sought to create a bargaining unit because he felt his coworkers needed astructure for their future and to protect them against the arbitrary manner inwhich they were supervised. T-Mobile instead mounted a campaign ofharassment and intimidation against worker activists. Supervisors heldcaptive audience interrogations of workers and illegally fired others.

DT's workforce in Germany and the rest of Europe have bargaining rights andworker representatives serve on corporations' supervisory boards. KorneliaDubbel, a ver.di member and member of the T-Mobile supervisory board,also spoke at the annual meeting. Dubbel has been a strong advocate for therights of T-Mobile US workers to have union representation, just as telecomworkers in Germany do.

"Unfortunately, the employees have no voice in the company, no workscouncil like in Germany, no union," Coleman said. "Deutsche Telekom andother German companies publicly praise the 'social partnership' practice andthe German system of co-determination. Why do you allow practices that T-Mobile is fighting and preventing, often coupled with high costs of unionavoidance lawyers?"

CWA Sues Christie on Pension Fund Grab

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CWA and the National Education Association are filing a lawsuit to block NJGovernor Chris Christie's plan to grab nearly $2.5 billion that should be goingto the state's pension system. Christie wants to use those funds to reduce hisbudget's shortfall instead of making the required payment to the pensionsystem. CWA and NEA are the two biggest unions in the state.

CWAers and union activists meet outside the statehouse in Trenton, N.J.,ready to lobby elected officials about the damage being done to workers'pensions.

"Governor Christie is not only breaking his word, but he's also breaking thelaw in failing to make these pension payments," said Hetty Rosenstein, CWANew Jersey Director. "Put aside how Christie's actions are immoral. If thepension payments are not made, the plan will go bankrupt. Retirees andactive workers will spend their retirement in poverty through no fault of theirown. For these reasons, and more, we are taking the governor to court. Andwe will be mobilizing our members and allies in protest of Christie'soutrageous, illegal actions."

In 2011, Christie and some legislators pushed through big cuts in publicworkers' pension benefits. Workers' pension contributions were increased,the retirement age was raised and cost-of-living adjustments were eliminated.Christie and the lawmakers who supported him claimed that the changes

were necessary to restore the security of the pension system and they alsopledged that the state would begin to make bigger payments each year to thepension system, to make up for the complete lack of contributions by thestate for most of the past 17 years. Workers continued to make theircontributions.

Now Christie is reneging on the state's obligation and putting public workers'pensions at risk. The state estimates that it's unfunded pension liability is $52billion.

Thousands of activists, from CWA, other unions and allies, held a "LobbyDay" today in Trenton, to focus attention on the governor's power and moneygrab.

Movement Building Update

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Maybe the North Carolina legislature is channeling North Korea.

Legislators are trying to stop the message of "Moral Mondays" by passing arule that calls for the arrest of anyone who "might pose an imminent threat ofa disturbance," even if that person hasn't done anything. The LegislativeServices Commission, which hasn't changed its rules in 27 years, and in facthasn't even met in the last 15 years, decided it had to act to keep MoralMonday supporters out of the building as the new legislative session was setto begin.

That means in the state legislative building, where in theory elected officialsare supposed to meet with and serve their constituents, some constituentsaren't welcome. What does the commission consider a disturbance? Anynoise at a level beyond ordinary conversation. And any staff member canorder a constituent to leave, or face arrest. Read more here.

This attack on democracy hasn't discouraged the thousands of activistscommitted to "Moral Mondays" and to restoring fairness to North Carolina.

This week, thousands of activists entered the legislative building andmarched in a silent protest, with tape over their mouths.

Moral Monday activists are members of unions, faith groups, the NAACP andother civil rights organizations, students, community groups and more. They

are protesting the legislature's radical right actions to suppress citizens' rightsto vote, restrict unemployment insurance, attack women's rights and leavehundreds of thousands of working and poor people without medicalassistance by refusing to expand Medicaid.

Thousands of "Moral Monday" activists carry out their silent protest at theNorth Carolina legislative building.

Photo credit: RaleighNewsObserver.com.

What Happened in the Basement?

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When most workers in the U.S. want a union, they face harassment bysupervisors and intimidation by corporate executives. That's standardoperating procedure for companies like T-Mobile US and Verizon Wireless. Inrecent campaigns by workers at retail stores in Harlem and Brooklyn, N.Y.,management went all out to stop workers from making their own choice abouthaving a union. Both corporations even brought in high level executives,including T-Mobile US CEO John Legere, who you might think had other workto do, to intimidate workers about their jobs.

This video offers a good look at what happens in the basement, for too manyU.S. workers.

CWA Statement on Proposed AT&T Acquisition of DirecTV

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CWA issued this comment on the announcement by AT&T that it plans toacquire DirecTV:

"CWA is optimistic that this deal will improve services and make evenmore content available for millions of customers. We also believe that itwill provide better employment opportunities for tens of thousands ofemployees at both companies. We look forward to learning more aboutthe details in the days ahead.

"The industry is constantly transforming itself as wireless, wireline,cable and satellite converge, and as voice data and video increasinglydemand expanded high speed networks. AT&T's commitment toprovide high speed Internet services to 15 million non-urban locations isa positive move toward expanding Internet access and availability tomore Americans."

Macklemore. Really?

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United Students Against Sweatshops is pushing rapper Macklemore andRyan Lewis to break up with union-busting T-Mobile US CEO John Legere,and instead stand up for workers at T-Mobile who are been harassed,disciplined and fired just because they want a union.

USAS launched a "Justice for T-Mobile Workers" campaign last fall, and isturning up the heat on Macklemore. Read more here.

Check out MacklemoreSucks.com for more info.

CWA – There's An App For That

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Have you downloaded the new CWA App?

Four years ago, CWA was the first union, and one of the first progressiveorganizations, to create an app. Now, we've taken that app to a new levelwith our Movement Builder app. Word is already out, and we've already hadother unions and progressive organizations asking us about it.

You'll want to make sure you're connected. To get the app, text APP to 69866to get the links to download it from the Apple App Store or the Google Playstore. You can also search for CWA in the App Store.

Once you download the app you need to set up your Profile. This allows youto RSVP to and check in at events. You'll also be able to send photos fromactions from the app.

This app will enable you to be connected in real time to events andinformation that you care about, using the latest technologies available on theiPhone and Android devices.

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