Thread by @astuesse

Essentially, the meat/poultry industry took no action to protect workers from #COVID, churning through them as though they’re disposable. Now that plants are shuttering due illness and death, Trump issues an order forcing workers back on the job.
nytimes.com/2020/04/28/bus…

Trump’s invocation of the Defense Production Act doesn’t “force” producers to stay open. It gives them cover for what they were doing anyway until local and state officials stepped in to protect these #EssentialWorkers—keep the line running at all costs.

It’s what the meat and poultry industries have always done—put profits over people. It’s why workers aren’t paid a living wage, have no paid sick leave, and are often fired when they have to miss work due to illness or taking care of a loved one.

In @greenhousenyt latest he says the Trump admin is virtually sending workers in for the slaughter. He’s right. There is no safety net for #FoodChain workers, just for the corporate giants that exploit them.

It’s no coincidence that OSHA & DOL issued voluntary “guidance” to the meat and poultry industry at the same time Trump invokes the Defense Production Act. This is NOT to protect workers, but to protect corporations from potential lawsuits when workers become disabled and die.

Make no mistake, this amounts to a bailout of the meat and poultry industries using precarious low wage workers, many of them women, people of color, immigrants, and refugees, as currency.

Many meat/poultry workers don’t qualify for #CARESAct stimulus payments, while their employers are largely exempt from legislation requiring paid sick leave for #COVID-related illness. Corporate socialism is the only kind of socialism tolerated in the U.S.

I think I may feel an op ed taking shape here, @car1ygoodman — whether I can eke our the time or mental space amid day 7,536,201 of #COVID homeschool is another thing altogether.

Keeping workers on the job at all costs is what this industry does. They kept the processing lines running on 9/11, in the immediate aftermath of Hurricane Katrina, and when ICE raided chicken plants across Mississippi last summer. Workers fall ill and die, they find more.

“When they’re done with you,” a longtime poultry worker organizer told me 15 years ago, “they’ll crumple you up like a piece of paper, throw you out, and reach back for your kids.” Or your neighbor, or the immigrant/refugee family next door. #ScratchingOutALiving