Posts tagged Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez
Op-ed: Can Zohran Make NYC a Union Town Again?
September 9, 2025 // The new mayor could host big online unionization trainings with the Emergency Workplace Organizing Committee, as Bernie Sanders and Alexandria Ocasio Cortez have already done. If this led even a small fraction of Zohran’s 60,000-plus volunteers and over 6 million social media followers to start organizing their own workplaces—or to take a strategic job to unionize it—this could potentially generate thousands of new unionization campaigns. And were Mamdani to act upon our proposal to launch a broad Movement for an Affordable New York (MANY), then the pool of new potential workplace organizers would grow significantly.
Democrats boycott DC restaurant hotspots on behalf of union workers
June 10, 2025 // More than 50 congressional Democrats signed a union pledge to boycott a half dozen Washington, D.C., restaurants. The Democratic lawmakers signed Unite Here Local 25's pledge to boycott restaurants, including Le Diplomate, Osteria Mozza, The Occidental, Rasika, Modena, and Bombay Club. Many are favorites of the Democrats' power elite — Le Diplomate was one of former President Joe Biden's favorite spots during his presidency.
Anti-Israel radical socialists who’ve backed Luigi Mangione plotting to take over United Federation of Teachers
April 9, 2025 // Radical socialists who back anti-Israel groups and alleged CEO killer Luigi Mangione are steadily making inroads into one of the city’s most powerful labor unions, sources warn The Post. Candidates backed by the Democratic Socialists of America are polling strongly in elections to lead the United Federation of Teachers — who represent nearly 200,000 educators and manage a welfare fund with $1 billion in assets — which take place next month, according to a source. The progressive political movement, which backed Vermont governor Bernie Sanders during his presidential campaign in 2016 and was behind New York Democratic congresswoman Alexandria Ocasio Cortez’s insurgent victory two years later, set up a strategy to infiltrate labor unions in 2018, according to a report in Politico, citing an internal DSA memo.
Can Distributed Organizing Unionize Millions?
September 17, 2024 // Together with similarly bottom-up union campaigns like Starbucks Workers United (SBWU) and the reformed UAW’s organizing across Southern automakers, EWOC has demonstrated the viability of a new strategy of seeding unionization efforts, rather than passively waiting for workers to reach out (“hot-shopping”) or exclusively organizing pre-chosen workplaces (“strategic targeting”). Along these lines, Svoboda describes EWOC’s proactive efforts to provide organizing tools to as many workers as possible as “planting seeds of worker power.”
Senate Democrats offer resolution to let staff organize
June 26, 2023 // Sen. Sherrod Brown and 19 of his Senate colleagues introduced a resolution Thursday that would extend legal protections to staffers who unionize. The group of pro-labor Democrats, plus Vermont independent Sen. Bernie Sanders, comes a year after the House adopted a resolution allowing its employees to organize. “Every worker should have a right to organize and have a voice in their workplace — and that is why I have spent my career fighting for the dignity of work,” Brown said in a statement. “With this resolution, we can finally secure the fundamental legal right of U.S. Senate staff to join together as union members to advocate for themselves and have a voice on the job.”
Philadelphia: Helen Gym’s campaign resolves dispute with union over Bernie Sanders rally
May 15, 2023 // On Saturday morning, the regional carpenters’ union and the Service Employees International Union 32BJ released a joint statement “condemning” Gym for not moving the rally to a venue that has a unionized workforce. Both unions are backing Cherelle Parker for mayor. SEIU 32BJ’s involvement was notable because it often backs candidates from the left wing of the Democratic Party who are politically aligned with Gym and Sanders. ADVERTISEMENT A spokesperson for the carpenters said Saturday morning that the union was considering picketing. But the plans were scuttled once Barnes said IATSE was satisfied.
House Republicans’ attempt to block staffer unions may have missed mark
March 13, 2023 // The House began allowing members’ staff to form unions last year by adopting a resolution that authorized regulations from the Office of Congressional Workplace Rights. Republicans opposed the measure at the time, and after taking control of the House, they adopted a rule that said the “regulations adopted pursuant to [last year’s resolution] shall have no force or effect” during the current Congress. While that might seem to nullify aides’ ability to form new unions, the language is actually ineffective, said Kevin Mulshine, author of the Demand Progress Education Fund report and a former senior adviser and counsel at OCWR.
Progressives Push Congress to Shore Up Agency that Protects Workers’ Rights Before it’s Too Late
December 15, 2022 // “The fact that we have to have a press conference and draw attention to this issue shows what’s fundamentally wrong,” says Joseph Geevarghese, the executive director of Our Revolution, whose members held pro-union signs as lawmakers spoke outside the Capitol. “The Democratic Party is not in touch with its roots.” It’s illegal to retaliate against workers for starting or joining a union. The NLRB is responsible for holding employers who violate labor law accountable and help parties in labor disputes reach settlements. But resolving complaints has often been slow, a situation that labor activists say deters efforts to organize workers.
Dems’ rail-strike challenge: Save the economy and your ties to unions
December 2, 2022 // Progressives pushed for paid sick leave in any agreement, and party leaders glided a two-step solution through the House. It may not survive the Senate buzzsaw.
Unanswered questions surround unionizing effort by congressional staffers
July 26, 2022 // For starters, congressional offices have different budgets from which to draw salaries for staff — and those amounts are fixed once decided annually. That makes bargaining across multiple personal member offices difficult, as even ideologically aligned members of Congress may have differences in their personnel budget and staffing structure. Rep. Barry Loudermilk, House Compensation and Diversity Study, Census Bureau, Massachusetts Institute of Technology