The Amazon workers who voted for a union in Bessemer are already winners. This is just the first round. Amazon did things to intimidate & suppress the vote. The workers are filing complaints, & they will continue to stand up.
They have set a fresh trend in the South, and the echoes of their bold action will reverberate for years.
In North Carolina, it took several years for us to unionize the Smithfield plant, the world's largest hog processing plant. Like them, the Bessemer workers will eventually win the vote.
Jeff Bezos & Amazon, who fought the union & cut workers’ hazard pay, have already lost because they have revealed their contempt for the people their wealth depends on.
If we want corporations to step up, every civil rights organization that has received donations from corporations must now ask the same corporations, "Are you supporting the U.S. Senators who have blocked restoration of the Voting Rights Act for over 7 years and 9 months?
Have you given to ALEC, the group that is promoting voter suppression bills in state houses across the U.S.?”
If corporations speak out against voting laws and give social contributions to civil rights organizations but still invest in the Senators who are blocking the restoration of federal voting rights protections, then their public statements are just image management.
WATCH NOW: 30 Pieces of Silver or the Savior | A Sermon by Rev. Dr. William J. Barber, II pscp.tv/w/cy8yNzFvTlFs…
Will you choose 30 pieces of silver or the Savior? #PalmSunday
"What will you give me?" is the question too many politicians ask, and they'll sell out the people they were elected to serve for some corporate money. #PalmSunday
If they have to, Democrats must call Sinema & Manchin's bluff. Even if they go over & join Republicans, Democrats have the House & the WH. Their coalition can’t get anything passed. Let them be fully exposed. Force them out in the open for betraying the people who elected them.
And then use their exposure to push for everyone to vote in 2022 to get enough Senate seats to break the filibuster & immediately pass living wages, massive infrastructure bill, addressing poverty, healthcare, & fill all vacancies.
Don’t let Manchin & Sinema stop voting rights & living wages. These are not just "Black issues." We shouldn't be talking about the fight to expand voting rights as only a Black racial issue. Dr. King & the marchers from Selma-to-Montgomery didn’t then & we shouldn’t now.
We need more than a narrow exception to the filibuster. We need a Senate that functions. The filibuster is not an original part of the Constitution. It is a tool created by an all-white male Senate that cared more about pats on the back than people.
The filibuster has been used against civil rights & economic justice & labor rights, impacting poor & low-wealth Black, brown, native, white & Asian people.
Democrats who claim they want to protect “minority rights” in the Senate must be asked why they insist on catering to the extremist minority that has taken over the Republican Party.
I am going to Atlanta this weekend to preach at the church where MLK pastored when he called for a “revolution of values.” Georgia is showing the nation how desperately this message is needed.
Since King’s assassination, Republicans have used the language of “biblical values” to pit white Christians against non-white neighbors, betting that they could hold onto power by building a white voting bloc.
But demographics & expanded voting rights changed the balance of power. Lies that were told to white Christians are exploding in violence like we saw in the young white man’s attack against Asian women this week. But the same extremism drives voter suppression in GA statehouse.
The American Rescue Plan that President Biden will sign tomorrow could increase income for some of America’s poor & low-income families by 20% this year. This is part of the bold action Biden promised the #PoorPeoplesCampaign last September.
While we have more work to do to make these changes permanent & address longterm inequality, President Biden & Vice President Harris have already helped shift the conversation about what is possible.
Not a single Republican was willing to join Democrats to pass this legislation, but what VP Harris said to our PPC Assembly 2 years ago is still true: ending poverty is a moral issue that can unite Americans & lift us all.