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28 Jul, 5 tweets, 3 min read
More than one thousand @mineworkers are taking their strike from Alabama to NYC today and picketing in front of the offices of BlackRock — the largest shareholder in Warrior Met Coal. They’re joined by union allies from across the country, including @SusanSarandon.
.@KooperCaraway: “I’ll tell you this — young workers... South Dakotans, Californians, workers all over the world are going to stand with you and support you and there’s nothing BlackRock or any other rich asshole can do about it.”
.@WillAttig: "I'm not just fighting for you, the individual coal miners. I'm trying to show an example for a generation of workers to begin to use their collective power... and take the power back."
The @mineworkers set up a picket line in front of BlackRock’s offices. Their message for the executives bankrolling Warrior Met:

“I know you see this. I know you see what’s going on... You can’t ignore this.”

Warrior Met refuses to pay the miners a fair wage.
Labor reporter @GrimKim has been following the Warrior Met Coal miners strike since it began on April 1. She travelled to NYC to cover the protests for More Perfect Union.

Follow her account for more updates.

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More from @MorePerfectUS

More Perfect Union Profile picture
27 Jul
NEW: Moments ago, we sent @FritoLay the questions below.

They are simple, factual questions about the extent to which they abuse workers in this country.

We hope they answer. If they refuse, it will be a damning admission. What are they hiding?

Here's what we want to know:
1. How many Frito-Lay facilities in the U.S. currently force people to work suicide shifts?

(Suicide/"squeeze" shifts are back-to-back 12-hour shifts with only 8 hours off in between.)
2. How many Frito-Lay facilities use forced overtime (aka “overtime requirements”) to compel people to work more than 40 hours/week under threat of termination?
Read 8 tweets
More Perfect Union Profile picture
19 Jul
Frito-Lay factory workers are penalized or even fired for taking time off.

The company makes workers earn “points” to get time off. Earning one point requires working 31 days in a row and points are docked for opting out of overtime.

Workers regularly do 84-hour weeks.
Workers in Topeka reveal they’ve worked up to 5 months without a single day off.

They say that forced overtime is destroying families, ruining marriages, and even costing lives. Multiple coworkers, driven to exhaustion, have died by suicide.
In response to the striking workers’ demands to end forced overtime, “suicide shifts,” and 84-hour weeks, Frito-Lay management offered this:

“There will be no more working 12 hours a day, 7 days a week (84 hours), unless an employee volunteers to work that much.”
Read 4 tweets
More Perfect Union Profile picture
9 Jul
NEW: Texas Republicans have a new voter suppression bill that's even worse than the one Democrats stopped in May.

This time, Republicans want *monthly* voter purges and a ban on drive-thru voting.

They've just launched a special legislative session to ram it through. Image
The ban on drive-thru voting and the voter purges would disproportionately impact disabled voters and Latino voters.

“They’re actually going backward because of these discriminatory acts, and frankly, it just pisses me off," one disabled voter said. texastribune.org/2021/07/05/tex…
Democrats & activists rallied in Austin on Thursday, promising to do whatever was necessary to block a new voter suppression bill.

They also called for the Senate to drop the filibuster and pass the #ForThePeopleAct to end the GOP attack on voting rights.
Read 5 tweets
More Perfect Union Profile picture
8 Jul
NEW: Half of all stores opening in the U.S. this year are dollar stores. These chains prey on low-income communities, shut down local businesses, and attract violent crime.

But cities like Fort Worth are fighting back and showing how working people can defeat corporate greed.
In 2019, there were at least 75 dollar stores clustered on the majority-minority east side of Fort Worth, a city divided by a highway.

When another dollar store moved in, residents took action. First, they protested. Then, they fought to change the law.
Fort Worth ultimately passed a new ordinance that limits the spread of dollar stores.

It also requires that many new stores carry fresh produce instead of just peddling junk in a food desert.

Similar laws have also been passed in Oklahoma City, New Orleans, and Birmingham.
Read 5 tweets
More Perfect Union Profile picture
7 Jul
NEW: Frito-Lay workers in Kansas are being forced to work 12-hour days, 7 days a week, in a dangerous factory. Their stories are shocking.

Now nearly 600 workers have gone on strike in Topeka to demand better pay and treatment.
Frito-Lay workers say they're required to take “suicide shifts” — two 12-hour shifts in a row, with just 8 hours of rest in between.

They told us they can't get decent sleep & they miss their kids.

“You leave at 7PM and they want you back in here at 3 o’clock in the morning.”
Workers are also protesting unsafe conditions like extreme temperatures.

According to workers, Frito-Lay refused to heat the warehouse during an ice storm, only providing small kerosene lamps.

During a heat wave, management made workers keep going despite heat exhaustion.
Read 5 tweets
More Perfect Union Profile picture
25 Jun
EXCLUSIVE: A veteran Tesla worker has come forward to detail extraordinarily dangerous conditions at @ElonMusk's auto factory.

"It was like a modern-day industrial sweatshop," said Dennis Duran, who worked at Tesla’s Bay Area plant for 5 years.
Duran’s Tesla stories are harrowing:

"Someone got their leg run over. People were sent home for exhaustion. They were throwing up at random because they didn't have enough water.”

"Management never really cared. All they care about is hitting numbers and pleasing @ElonMusk."
For years, Tesla had injury rates far higher than other carmakers.

In 2019, Tesla claimed its rate dropped. But a damning report later found Tesla under-reported worker injuries that year.

Duran says people often worked while hurt and even bleeding. revealnews.org/article/tesla-…
Read 5 tweets

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