Working people continue to face daily assault. The economic and political attacks and repression against working-class and oppressed communities and organizations have intensified. Organized labor — barely one tenth of the workforce today — is the last defensive bastion. Corporate executives and Republican leaders know that if they destroy the union movement they eliminate the last substantial obstacle to their greedy agenda. Workers are responding with strikes, new political insurgencies, and many other forms of mass fightback. 

President Trump, while posturing as a populist, has actually governed like past Republicans. He has pursued an agenda of deregulation and tax cuts for the wealthy. He has stacked the courts with right-wing, anti-worker judges and appointed union busters to head the Labor Board and the Department of Labor, industry lobbyists to head the Environmental Protection Agency (EPA), and a pharmaceutical lobbyist to head the Department of Health and Human Services (DHHS). He has differed from more recent Republican presidents mostly in his willingness to engage in overtly racist language and policies. 

The 2018 midterms provided some reprieve. The Democrats regained the U.S. House of Representatives and made significant gains on the state level across the country, stopping the ability of the American Legislative Exchange Council (ALEC) to further the extreme anti-worker agenda in states like Wisconsin. Many progressive ballot initiatives were passed as well, including the overturning of right-to-work in Missouri and expansion of Medicaid in “conservative” states such as Idaho, Nebraska, and Utah — showing yet again that when given a chance to vote directly on issues, a majority of Americans in all states support progressive policies which help working people. 

But although there were some victories in 2018 for progressives, there were disappointments as well. In Iowa, despite hopes by many, including UE members, for a Democratic victory and a return to divided government, another Republican governor was elected and the GOP retained their total control of state government. As a result, the 2017 Iowa law all but outlawing collective bargaining and barring public-sector unions from using dues deduction remains in force. Elections have consequences. 

Where the Democrats have failed, it has often been because of the inability of that party to provide inspirational action or a clear contrast with the Republican Party, which is nothing if not strident in sticking up for its “beliefs.” For example, in the Iowa Gubernatorial election, the Democratic candidate was an insurance executive who made over $3 million in the prior year — hardly the correct standard-bearer needed to appeal to many disaffected working-class voters across the state. 

The Democratic Party, after years of being largely dominated by corporate interests, is now facing an internal battle as unabashedly pro-worker, anti-corporate candidates are running and winning at the congressional, state, and local levels. This, combined with campaigns like Fight for $15, teachers’ strikes and other pushbacks against economic inequality has put pressure on Democratic politicians to stand up for working people. Hence, the House of Representatives passed a $15 minimum wage bill with support from virtually every Democrat. This is a symbolic move given the current occupant of the White House, but a good first step. 

However, much of the Democratic Party establishment remains quietly indifferent or even hostile to our agenda. We have no choice except to fight even harder to push candidates from all parties to address working-class issues. Fortunately, the presidential campaign of longtime UE ally Bernie Sanders offers many opportunities to amplify our issues during the current election season.

Bernie Sanders and UE have a relationship going back to his time as mayor of Burlington, Vermont. UE, the most progressive union in the state, and Bernie, an independent democratic socialist, have always been natural allies on everything from labor rights to single-payer health insurance to free public higher education. Bernie has consistently come to UE strike lines and workplace actions. He has assisted locals in contract fights. He has always had an open-door policy with UE, asking how he can use his power as a legislator to help us achieve a measure of justice in the workplace. Most recently, Bernie was an outspoken supporter of UE Locals 506 and 618 in their first contract struggle with their new employer, Wabtec, in early 2019. Bernie reached out to UE to offer whatever assistance that members needed and he could provide. He assigned staff to work with local leadership, offered his social media platforms for exposure and publicity, and featured Local 506 President Scott Slawson as the lead speaker at his nationally-televised kickoff rally during the strike. His support for UE members during the nine-day strike gave us needed national recognition and was instrumental in achieving a just settlement. We have every reason to believe this sort of open-door relationship would remain during a Bernie presidency.

What also sets Bernie apart from all other primary candidates is both his willingness and desire to use his campaign infrastructure to support workplace struggles. His campaign staff stand ready to use their massive email list and other methods to mobilize support for workers in contract or organizing fights, as they did for UE Locals 506 and 618. This is not something that just developed at election time — it has been part of his Our Revolution organization and keeps with Bernie’s understanding that needed change won’t come about unless broad sections of the working class are organized to take on the corporate powers who currently dominate politics.

During the 2016 primaries, UE endorsed Bernie in a “bottom up” manner, with a number of locals and the delegates at each of the three UE regional councils voting to endorse him prior to the vote of the General Executive Board. Since that time, UE members and locals have continued to be engaged with Bernie through Labor for Our Revolution, the fight for Medicare for All, and workplace struggles. Based on ongoing discussions and activities throughout the union, it is clear that Bernie is the candidate with the broadest and most enthusiastic support among our membership. For all these reasons, we support his candidacy. 

While the outcome of the 2020 elections will have major consequences for working people in this country, and it is critical that working people remove the anti-labor and racist Trump from office, we continue to believe that until American workers have an independent political voice and our own political party we will be forced to struggle on an unlevel playing field. UE follows the path of independent political action. We support or oppose candidates based upon their actions, not their words or party label. We do so with confidence that many millions of working people support our cause.

THEREFORE, BE IT RESOLVED THAT THIS 76^th UE CONVENTION:

1. Calls on the union at all levels to:
   1. Educate and mobilize the membership to defeat the war against the working class;
   2. Support only lawmakers and candidates who consistently take concrete actions to defend working people;
   3. Mobilize the membership and work with allies to promote worker issues, including full collective bargaining rights for all workers, and to elect pro-worker candidates;
2. Calls on locals and regions to contact lawmakers on key issues through petitions, letters, phone calls, emails, lobby visits, annual political action days, town hall meetings, rallies, marches, civil disobedience, and other means to gain positive political action;
3. Urges all locals to undertake workplace campaigns to register members and their families to vote;
4. Encourages UE regions, locals, and members to become involved in Our Revolution, Labor for Our Revolution, Black Lives Matter, Fight for $15, the Poor Peoples’ Campaign, and other working-class movements for defense and justice;
5. Reaffirms our historical support for the formation of an independent working-class political party;
6. Endorses the candidacy of Senator Bernie Sanders to be the 46^th President of the United States and encourages every level of our union to work on his campaign.

The U.S. employer-based private health insurance system is a disaster. It treats healthcare as a profit-making enterprise rather than a fundamental human right. In 2018, twenty-eight percent of U.S. adults who have health insurance through their employer were underinsured, up from 20 percent just four years earlier. Despite spending more on per-capita annual medical costs ($11,212 in 2018) than any other country and twice as much of its gross domestic product (17.8 percent) than any other industrialized nation, the U.S. infant mortality rate remains among the highest of all prosperous countries. 

Employers decrease their healthcare bill by shifting costs onto workers. Healthcare costs take away other economic gains union members negotiate at the bargaining table. The Affordable Care Act (ACA) did not address containing costs for workers, leaving most Americans vulnerable to financial disaster. Economists estimate that over 60 percent of all personal bankruptcies in the U.S. are caused by medical expenses and nearly 80 percent of these people are insured. 

Healthcare reform is at the forefront of the 2020 Democratic primary. Bernie Sanders has made Medicare for All, a longtime demand of UE, a primary platform of his campaign, which has forced the other candidates to address the issue. The Medicare for All Act of 2019 has been introduced in the Senate by Sanders (S. 1129) and in the House by Rep. Pramila Jayapal (H.R. 1384), where it has garnered the support of the majority of the Democratic caucus.

The public now recognizes the U.S. healthcare system needs a complete overhaul. Polling shows that a majority of the public — and a majority of doctors — support Medicare for All. This type of system has been used successfully in Canada for decades, where polls show over 85 percent of the public approves. 

While a propaganda campaign funded by health care corporations is trying to spread the myth that Americans love their private health insurance plans, the reality is that most workers are paying increasingly burdensome amounts for their coverage and are facing ever-greater limits on when and where they can use their benefits. This has been well-demonstrated by UE’s Healthcare Cost Calculator, available on the UE website, which has been used in conjunction with the UE workshop “How to Fix Healthcare.” Among those workers who have used it so far, the overwhelming majority are finding that they are spending over 15 percent of their income on health care and typically closer to 25 percent with some workers reporting more than 50 percent! 

Workshop participants in many states have followed up by making calls urging their congresspeople to sign on to H.R. 1384. Members of Locals 1135 and 1172 in Milwaukee and Locals 1107, 1121 and 1161 in northern Wisconsin made in-person visits to the congressional offices of Gwen Moore and Ron Kind respectively, urging them to cosponsor the bill.

While we fight to enact the single-payer system this country needs, we must also resist any attempts to roll back beneficial provisions of the ACA and slash Medicaid. We should push for further Medicaid expansion and restoring federal funding to Planned Parenthood. We need to mobilize to claim the basic human right to healthcare for all. 

THEREFORE, BE IT RESOLVED THAT THIS 76^th UE CONVENTION:  

1. Demands Congress enact the Medicare for All Act (H.R. 1384/S. 1129);
2. Supports efforts to institute similar programs at the state level;
3. Encourages locals and regions make use of UE’s “How to Fix Healthcare” workshop and to follow the action steps outlined in the workshop, including: 
   1. Use UE’s Healthcare Cost Calculator, including with members in the shop;
   2. Educate members about the real cost of their existing healthcare and organize members to call and visit their congresspeople in support of H.R. 1384;
   3. Collaborate with their employer on a mutually-agreed-upon public statement in support of Medicare for All;
4. Opposes all efforts to undermine the ACA, Medicare, Medicaid, and Veterans’ Administration (VA) health benefits; 
5. Demands the reversal of the Trump administration’s defunding of Planned Parenthood;
6. Encourages the union at all levels to participate in coalitions for universal healthcare, including Labor Campaign for Single Payer, Physicians for a National Healthcare Program (PNHP), and Healthcare NOW!; 
7. Urges locals to contact their local VA to learn what medical benefits are available to our veteran members, and to lobby for restoration of fully-funded medical benefits for veterans and their families and preventive testing and screening of all veterans potentially exposed to depleted uranium or other toxins; 
8. Encourages locals to support the growing campaign for paid sick days and family leave in cities and states across the country.

Climate change poses an existential threat to humanity. The science is unquestionable: 97 percent of peer-reviewed scientific literature affirms that human activity is causing global warming. The Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) reported last year that the human race has twelve years to reduce carbon emissions, or the dramatic environmental impacts we are experiencing will get even worse. More recent studies have suggested that the timeframe we have for action may be even shorter.

Since UE's last convention, we have seen the destruction wreaked upon people and the economy by hurricanes Irma, Maria, Michael, Florence, and Harvey, by flooding in the Midwest, and by record summer heatwaves. Global temperatures will continue to rise unless we massively reduce our use of fossil fuels.

The labor movement has a leading role to play in ensuring that this transition is just, humane, and based on solidarity and valuing people over profit.

In the 1930s and 1940s, faced with the economic devastation of the Great Depression and the existential threat of Nazism and fascism, working people played a leadership role in the political and economic movement known as the “New Deal.” The New Deal helped our country recover from the Great Depression, facilitated the establishment of the industrial unions (including UE) that brought a decent standard of life to tens of millions of working-class people, and positioned our economy to be able to transition to defeating Nazism and fascism in World War II. 

The Green New Deal proposed by the youth-led Sunrise Movement, Congresswoman Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez, and others offers our best hope to meet the challenge of climate change while creating millions of good union jobs.

Like the transformation of our manufacturing infrastructure and economy that took place during World War II, a just and successful transition to a sustainable industrial and manufacturing base will require massive infusion of federal and state resources, coordination between government, industry and labor, and democratic participation of workers through widespread unionization. Millions of workers could be employed strengthening our infrastructure, rebuilding our rail and transit systems, converting to renewable energy sources, protecting against the effects of rising temperatures, and in many other areas.

A just transition also requires a real commitment to guaranteed income, benefits, and direct assistance for workers and communities. Workers who lose fossil-fuel jobs should retain their pay and compensation as they transition into new types of work, and should be provided with education and retraining opportunities well before they get laid off, and guaranteed jobs when their facilities close. Communities that have been devastated by pollution or damaged by the effects of rising global temperatures, which are disproportionately low income communities of color, should receive massive investments which ensure good union jobs and a healthy future.

It is also time to renew the demand raised by our union in the 1970s in response to the energy crisis: bring the energy industry under democratic control through public and social ownership. Public and cooperative utilities have a long and shared history in this country and the conversion to renewables provides us with an opportunity to provide power for the many — not the few.

THEREFORE, BE IT RESOLVED THAT THIS 76^th UE CONVENTION:

1. Endorses the Green New Deal legislation introduced by Representative Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez and Senator Ed Markey;
2. Commends the Sunrise Movement on their bold campaign of organizing young people to take direct action to force our elected representatives to address the pressing issue of climate change;
3. Endorses the Global Climate Strike scheduled for September 20-27, 2019, and encourages UE members to find creative ways to participate, and do so without violating collective bargaining agreements if applicable;
4. Encourages the union at all levels to educate members about: 
   1. Climate change and creative solutions that reduce carbon output while creating good union jobs;
   2. Environmental justice struggles, including the struggle of UE Local 150 members and Butner, NC residents for clean and safe drinking water in their community and workplace, as well as communities in West Virginia and eastern North Carolina threatened by pipeline projects in their areas;
5. Urges all UE members to become involved in environmental justice organizations and struggles;
6. Calls on environmental organizations to incorporate just transition into their platforms; 
7. Demands Congress hold fossil fuel corporations accountable for the damage they created, including but not limited to criminal liability and punitive fines;
8. Demands that all environmental policies, including those targeting climate change, incorporate a just transition for workers and communities affected;
9. Supports UE’s participation in worker-oriented efforts to address climate change such as Trade Unions for Energy Democracy (TUED), Labor Network for Sustainability, the Blue-Green Alliance, and the Just Transition Alliance;
10. Reaffirms the solution UE proposed to the energy crisis in the 1970s: public ownership of the energy industry and increased investment in rail transportation;
11. Supports the continuing efforts of the UE to build alliances with environmental and community organizations and in developing organizing strategies for renewable energy workers;
12. Calls for a moratorium on the construction of any additional nuclear fission power plants.

In UE, we go into bargaining ready to fight for the best contract we can get. We must rely on the unity and mobilization of our members. 

The slow-growth economic recovery has gone on for a decade, resulting in an official unemployment rate at the lowest level in almost 50 years. This has translated into more substantive real wage gains for American workers, with annualized pay increases finally over three percent. However, this in no way fully makes up for the losses that American workers suffered during the Great Recession and the years of stagnation which followed. American workers deserve much more than what bosses have yet to provide at the table. 

Over the past two years, UE members have won an average wage increase of about three percent, with slightly higher increases in the private sector. These increases significantly outpace the current low rate of inflation. A militant, engaged union can bring real wage growth to its members.

Bosses continue to shift healthcare costs to workers. In nearly every negotiation we see employers push for higher premium shares, higher deductibles, coinsurance, and copays, more restrictive provider networks and pharmaceutical formularies, or some combination of all of these. Although Congress has once again pushed back implementation of the Affordable Care Act excise tax on high-premium health plans, this time to 2022, employers continue to use the excise tax as a cudgel to reduce our benefit levels. 

The right to retire remains in crisis. Private and public employers continue to attack defined-benefit pension plans. All too many politicians support slashing Social Security benefits and raising the retirement age. UE continues to prioritize the protection of members’ retirement benefits.

Even in a tough bargaining climate, UE members have minimized losses and made gains. It’s a testament to what a rank-and-file union can accomplish.

THEREFORE, BE IT RESOLVED THAT THIS 76^th UE CONVENTION:

1. Calls for education and mobilization of members in preparation for the aggressive campaigns that are necessary for favorable contract settlements;
2. Calls for broadening contract struggles beyond the bargaining table by including strategic campaigns, shareholder actions, and labor-community alliances;
3. Calls for building solidarity with other unions, especially those of the same employer, engaged in contract fights;
4. Calls on locals to keep members informed and mobilized at every stage of negotiations;
5. Directs the national union to provide to locals a list of bargaining goals based on best practices of UE locals developed through years of struggle, along with the research information needed for negotiations.

The power of working people to advance our interests, resist employer attacks on our conditions, and reshape our society to serve the many, not only the few, can only be realized when we are united in purpose and action. For this reason, organizing the unorganized has always been our union’s primary task. 

Even in the face of the attacks on labor unions, working people, immigrants, people of color, and women waged by the Trump administration, we come to our 76^th National Convention able to report significant progress on the organizing front. With help from dozens of volunteers from UE locals we organized bargaining units consisting of approximately 1,000 workers across 16 states.

But we did so despite a worsening environment for working people and their unions. The Trump labor board, now populated by union-busting lawyers, has moved to completely reverse even the small pro-worker gains made during prior administrations. The internment of immigrant families on our southern border, support for white supremacists in Charlottesville and beyond have only intensified the attacks on working people.

Meanwhile, the percentage of American workers represented by unions fell to 10.5 percent, its lowest point in a century. A weaker labor movement, combined with the huge corporate tax cuts passed by the Trump administration in 2017, has resulted in unprecedented income inequality. Already-weak labor laws are further undermined by employer efforts to evade compliance through the use of temporary staffing agencies, subcontracting and independent contractor schemes. Privatization continues apace, decimating good public sector jobs. 

Workers are fighting back and UE is leading the way. Since our last national convention, hundreds of thousands of workers across the economy have hit the picket line, using the strike tactic to win their demands. 2018 saw the largest strike participation in many years, and 2019 looks to be even higher. The 1,700 members of UE Locals 506 and 618 in Erie, PA led the way by waging a successful nine-day strike that led to a first contract with Wabtec Corp. It was the largest manufacturing strike of the Trump presidency and proof that a united and determined membership can win even during the midst of a right-wing, pro-corporate environment. From teachers in West Virginia, Oklahoma and Arizona waging illegal strikes, to tech workers at Google, Wayfair and Amazon striking to protest sexual harassment and anti-immigrant polices, to hotel workers across four states, workers across the country issued a powerful reminder that the strike is our most powerful weapon.

But even in light of this renewed militancy, workers continue to face tremendous obstacles to organizing, from a legal regime stacked against workers, to intense union-busting by employers, to a constant propaganda barrage from the corporate media. Facing these challenges means that our organizing work needs to be stronger and smarter. To meet the challenges, last year UE formed a larger team of dedicated organizing staff. We’ve developed new tools that allow workers to contact us when they are looking for a union. We’ve employed new technology to track and analyze our work, and developed new strategies to more effectively generate organizing leads.

As the “Union for Everyone,” we have brought UE’s style of aggressive, rank-and-file unionism to new sectors of the economy where workers are hungry for a fighting, democratic organization. At the same time, we have doubled down on organizing efforts in industries where we have developed a strong track record, such as rail crew transportation, government contractors, the rail manufacturing sector and consumer grocery cooperatives. 

Our innovative organizing work and use of militant tactics should continue. Plant occupations, strategic organizing strikes, and the establishment of pre-majority unions and civil disobedience should be selectively used where warranted by conditions in the workplace.

We will need more trailblazing, along with new ideas and new approaches, if we are to turn the tide for working people on the organizing front. In searching for these new approaches and tactics, our union needs the ongoing involvement of UE Young Activists and rank-and-file volunteers who have assisted in recent organizing struggles. UE should also continue to involve allies in labor and community groups who are willing to join us in our organizing work.

Workers’ rights to organize and take collective action are human rights. They are fundamental to all democratic societies and therefore we demand that the rights to organize and bargain with employers be restored for all working people.

THEREFORE, BE IT RESOLVED THAT THIS 76^th UE CONVENTION ADOPTS THE FOLLOWING ORGANIZING PLAN TO BUILD OUR UNION:

1. UE will continue to serve as the “Union for Everyone” and will organize across the industrial, service and public sectors of our nation’s economy, uniting workers from a wide range of occupations in the common pursuit of improving the working class through the practice of democratic, rank-and-file unionism;
2. UE will provide a home to workers across the economy, and in the private sector will place special emphasis on waging campaigns at UE sister shops and in industries where UE has an existing presence, building our bargaining strength in order to defend past gains and improve our conditions. These sectors include government contractors, rail manufacturing, rail crew transportation, consumer grocery cooperatives and private nonprofits;
3. UE will build its ranks primarily in existing UE base areas, giving top priority to areas where the existence of viable organizing targets, the availability of staff, the active support of member volunteers and community allies, and other key strategic factors enhance our prospects for success;
4. UE will continue to develop the UE-Unifor North American Solidarity Project through cross-border organizing work among Canadian and U.S. transnationals at companies like Hallcon and Bombardier, as well as in other specific sectors and employers. Through this alliance Unifor and UE will continue to share organizing expertise and strategic approaches to building worker power. UE and Unifor local union members and staff will continue to play a vital role in this cross-border organizing project;
5. UE will build rank-and-file unions among state, county and municipal employees in states where UE currently has public workers under contract, as well as in states where our public employee members are denied the right to collective bargaining, and we will fight to win full bargaining rights for public workers in states where those rights are abridged;
6. UE will defend and support our public-sector locals in states like Iowa as they build organizing campaigns to win recertification elections and maintain representational rights;
7. UE will test new models and methods of organizing in all sectors, including alternative strategies for gaining recognition of the union, as well as strategies for building pre-majority unions in workplaces where formal recognition cannot be achieved in the short term; we will make use of new technologies for data management and communications to strengthen our organizing; we will look for opportunities for joint organizing with other unions and workers’ centers; and we will revive past organizing methods, including recognition strikes and other militant organizing tactics;
8. UE will invite independent unions to join us as the national home of independent, member-run unionism, and we will offer refuge to workers in other unions who are seeking to escape corrupt, undemocratic conditions;
9. UE will build its ranks through internal organizing wherever open-shop conditions exist and will develop new plans and materials to assist locals in states that have adopted Right-to-Work-for-Less Laws or other measures to undermine union strength and security;
10. UE will involve its rank-and-file members in organizing whenever possible and will take the following steps to encourage more members to help organize the unorganized: 
    • We will provide training and support for members who wish to become involved in organizing and we will provide members with the tools for reaching out to nonunion workers in their communities to find the next organizing campaign;
    • We will continue joint sponsorship with regions and locals of organizing trainings, blitzes and other special programs for which lost time and other costs are shared by the national and the region or local to make greater member participation possible;
    • We will encourage locals to negotiate for better union leave provisions to enable more members to get time off the job to assist in building the union;
    • We will respect cultural and language differences in our organizing work, and we will continue to reach into our ranks to find more volunteer organizers from diverse backgrounds;
11. UE will continue its successful Young Activist Program to find and develop activists and leaders for the future; we will prioritize young activist involvement in organizing, and we will ask our young activists to occupy the front line in fighting for workers’ rights.

In order to have robust rank-and-file participation in our union at all levels, member education must remain a top priority for UE. We must provide the skills and knowledge to empower our members to take on the boss, to engage in community struggles that advance worker rights, and to run the union. We must prioritize time for this education at every opportunity.

Our union’s educational work provides members with the tools to resist employer attacks on wages, benefits, and working conditions. UE’s geographic structure of regions and subregions enables us to bring a variety of educational workshops to a broader layer of local union leaders, activists, and members. Combined with workshops in regional council meetings, national conventions, and training sessions organized by local unions, this education helps members fight back in an era of increased anti-worker attacks. In areas with significant Spanish-speaking membership, the union provides materials in Spanish to enable more members to participate.

Educational events help members and local union officers learn about policies on union financial integrity and practices, grievance handling, workplace representation, preparation for bargaining, and other leadership skills. The work of the UE Young Activist Program, the Southern Workers Assembly, our union’s participation in Labor Notes Conferences and Troublemakers Schools, and the North American Solidarity Project Conference held jointly with Unifor at Port Elgin, have contributed to our efforts to bring forward new activists and leaders who will carry the union’s work into the future. UE also advanced member education with new workshops on topics including healthcare for all, preparing for the open shop in the public sector, combatting sexual harassment, and understanding the new tax bill.

The union continues to benefit from its education initiatives of recent decades. The UE Steward Handbook and the UE Leadership Guide — both published in the late 1990s — remain the most thorough and useful training materials for rank-and-file leaders. The UE Steward, a newsletter of useful information and tips for shop leaders, continues to be one of the most sought after publications, and since December 2017 has been distributed via email, website and social media in addition to print. The UE News provides not only reporting on our recent struggles and other activities, but also in-depth analysis of current issues facing union members as well as UE and working-class history helping members understand our legacy.

Our website (ueunion.org [2]) contains information and news helpful to union members and unorganized workers, including dozens of issues of the UE Steward and links to download workshops and to access the UE News archives maintained by the University of Pittsburgh. Our Facebook and Twitter accounts regularly publicize UE educational materials, and many UE locals also have an interactive web presence through Facebook.

A strong response and effective fightback depends on an educated, informed leadership, an effective steward system, and an involved membership.

THEREFORE, BE IT RESOLVED THAT THIS 76^th UE CONVENTION:

1. Commits the national union to provide educational materials and workshops to assist members in running effective local unions and successfully waging local, national and international struggles, including:
   1. Democratic operation of a local, including steward training and grievance handling, local union finances and integrity, and preparing for escalating shop floor campaigns, negotiations, and in-shop struggles, with training tailored to the needs of each local;
   2. Sub-regional educational and training conferences;
   3. A day of workshops at the National Convention and workshops for use at regional, sub-regional, and local membership meetings;
   4. The UE Steward and other materials for local officers, stewards, and members;
   5. Political education that counteracts corporate media influence and promotes a working-class consciousness;
   6. Protecting the union in a right-to-work state and implementing strategies to maintain member unity and combat right-to-work laws;
   7. Maintenance and promotion of the UE website and social media;
   8. Continued publication of UE News;
   9. Continued translation of materials into Spanish and/or other languages;
   10. Providing language interpretation of meetings where appropriate;
   11. Utilizing video teleconferencing to conduct educational training, and video record workshops to make them available online;
   12. A revised UE Leadership Guide;
2. Encourages all locals to:
   1. Commit to leadership development of women, people of color, LGBTQ+ members, young workers, members with disabilities, and workers of other nationalities;
   2. Educate members about UE history and principles;
   3. Regularly publish local newsletters;
   4. Conduct classes to introduce new members to the union, explaining policies, structure, and collective bargaining agreements;
   5. Seek the right to conduct union orientation for new hires during work time;
   6. Establish websites, use social media, and regularly update union bulletin boards;
   7. Negotiate employer-paid lost time for members to attend training and educational events;
   8. Hold regular steward trainings and membership involvement classes.

Workers around the world face the same conditions: bosses who maximize their profit by moving their investments without regard to their impacts on communities or the environment. As long as there are places where workers toil for starvation wages without health and safety protections, it’s hard to achieve or maintain good wages or conditions anywhere. We must work collaboratively across borders in order to effectively fight back against the multinational corporations that dominate our economy.

Because of the relationships that UE has built with so many unions in the past, we were able to call on our international allies, with the cooperation of the global labor federation IndustriALL, to support UE Locals 506 and 618 during their 2019 strike against corporate greed. Unions in Canada, the United Kingdom, Italy, France, Turkey, Mexico and Brazil — all countries where the new employer, Wabtec, has operations — sent letters to the new corporate owners, demanding they maintain the good jobs that union members have fought for in Erie. Solidarity photos and greetings from Tokyo, Florence, Mexico City, Montreal, and beyond warmed the spirits of our members standing on freezing cold picket lines. 

UE encourages our members to build relationships with workers in other countries through international travel and other exchanges. In the recent period one member participated in a conference on the privatization of public work in Japan; another visited South Korea as part of a peace delegation organized by US Labor Against the War. Numerous members met international allies at the 2018 Labor Notes conference, and others strengthened cross-border ties as part of the activities of the North American Solidarity Project. Elected leaders and staff also helped us solidify our contacts by attending conventions and meetings in Mexico, Canada, Quebec, Italy, Japan, and Switzerland.

Our international partnerships inspire our approach to fulfilling other work that demands our attention. UE’s strong stance on the renegotiation of the North American Free Trade Agreement and other trade and tariff changes is informed by our alliances with the FAT in Mexico and Unifor in Canada. Our affinity with Zenroren in Japan solidified our positions on the need for peace for working people. Our network of relationships across North America as part of the Tri-National Solidarity Alliance kept us rooted in the struggles of working people, from farm workers to factory floors.

By remaining unwavering in our commitment to international solidarity in the coming period, we advance our interests in promoting democratic, rank-and-file worker control at home and abroad.

THEREFORE, BE IT RESOLVED THAT THIS 76^th UE CONVENTION:

1. Reaffirms support for the UE-Unifor North American Solidarity Project;
2. Reaffirms support for the Strategic Organizing Alliance with the FAT;
3. Reaffirms the deepening of our relationship with Zenroren;
4. Reaffirms our participation in and support of the global union federation IndustriALL;
5. Reaffirms solidarity with: the CSN of Quebec; FIOM of Italy; Brazilian Central Union of Workers (CUT); CGT of France; New Trade Union Initiative (NTUI) of India; Workers Advice Center (WAC MA’AN) in Israel/Palestine; Kilusang Mayo Uno and Partido ng Manggagawa of the Philippines; Unite the Union of the United Kingdom; the many Canadian, Mexican and U.S. unions that are our partners in the Tri-National Solidarity Alliance; and other democratic worker movements around the world;
6. Stands in full solidarity with the CUT and the working class of Brazil as they resist extreme right-wing President Bolsonaro and his attempts to privatize Brazil’s Social Security system and destroy the Brazilian labor movement; 
7. Commits to building relations with unions abroad through direct contact, progressive forums and networks, and other means, as well as establishing and deepening relationships with workers in sister shops who globally share our employers, including workers in China, Russia, and Cuba;
8. Condemns the murder and persecution of trade unionists, harassment of unions, and union busting anywhere in the world;
9. Encourages locals and members to increase their involvement in our international program and to make contributions to the UE-FAT Solidarity Fund and UE Research and Education Fund;
10. Commits to ongoing worker-to-worker exchanges with our allies and educational work with our members in order to deepen our alliances and understanding of global labor conditions so that we may engage in collective action together;
11. Encourages the participation in global alliances to fight the rise of precarious (part-time, temp, subcontracted, and insecure) job

The North American working class and our combined labor movements face extraordinary challenges that call for bold ideas and new structures. Two years ago, UE’s 75^th Convention committed to building the North American Solidarity Project (NASP) with Unifor, the largest-private sector trade union in Canada, in order to explore the possibility of building a continential labor alliance based upon democratic and militant social unionism and true internationalism. Although this work is still in its infancy, the project has broadened with time, with like-minded North American unions joining in our efforts, including National Nurses United (NNU), Utility Workers Union of America (UWUA), and the International Longshore Workers Union (ILWU) and its affiliate the Inland Boatman’s Union (IBU). 

The list of activities that UE and Unifor have worked together on in the past two years — in some cases with the participation of other NASP unions — is long. There were many productive meetings between NASP unions in North Carolina, California, Tennessee, Ontario, and Manitoba. Topics covered included political action, organizing, Medicare for All, climate change, combating racism, and just transition. The two-day conference in Port Elgin was particularly notable, with over 150 members and staff from NASP unions participating, along with a delegation of Mexican trade unionists from five independent unions, including the Authentic Workers Front (FAT). 

Unifor, with UE assistance, worked to ensure the United States-Mexico-Canada Agreement (USMCA — often termed “NAFTA 2.0”) contained stronger protection for the rights of Mexican workers and expanded union rights. Unifor organizing staff attended an organizing blitz hosted by UE Local 150 in North Carolina. UE and Unifor have regularly supported each other’s contract and plant closing fights across borders. Unifor has also provided critical support to UE organizing campaigns. 

The collective work of UE, Unifor, and the other NASP unions continues. All of the NASP partners have sent representatives to this 76^th UE National Convention. NNU is hosting a general assembly in San Francisco in September, which UE and other NASP unions will attend. Also in September, NASP unions will join Unifor’s climate change meeting in Saskatoon. This November, the NASP will be meeting in Chicago, at UE Hall, to continue our climate change discussion and plan concrete action. 

Our work with Unifor and other NASP partner unions is critical to our future and to building an independent democratic militant labor movement. 

THEREFORE, BE IT RESOLVED THAT THIS 76^th UE CONVENTION:

1. Commits to continuing our work with Unifor developing cooperative working relationships on North American bargaining, organizing, education, communication, and political action initiatives; 
2. Endorses UE’s continued participation in joint study and action with NASP partners in order to build a continental labor alliance based upon democratic and militant social unionism and true internationalism among workers across the continent;
3. Calls upon the union at all levels to educate the membership on the need for the NASP, its role in advancing the interests of working people across the continent, and steps that can be taken to support and strengthen the project locally, regionally, and nationally.

Racism is one of the greatest evils in our nation, and has always been a roadblock to building a strong labor movement. Racism is a specific form of discrimination based upon the false belief that some groups of people are inherently and biologically superior to others. Racism inside the U.S. developed for the purposes of dividing the working class and justifying the brutal system of coerced labor called slavery. 

The persistence of institutional racism affects all peoples of color, and is evident in the economic and social disadvantages experienced by African Americans in particular. African-American unemployment remains disproportionately high. On average, African-American women workers are paid only 61 cents for every dollar a white man is paid, and Latina women workers are paid only 53 cents for every dollar. African Americans make up 13 percent of the U.S. population but make up 27 percent of arrests. They are three times more likely to become prisoners once arrested and serve longer terms. Because of environmental racism, African American and other communities of color often face greater health threats, such as air pollution and water contamination. Racism blames the victims of these conditions, rather than blaming the system that creates these injustices.

Donald Trump has attacked working people and people of color throughout his business and political career. Trump’s racist scapegoating has made our nation a more violent and dangerous place for all working people, especially for Muslims, immigrants, and people of color. He has issued three executive orders banning Muslims from seven countries from entering the U.S., even those with a green card, and refusing entry of refugees from Muslim-majority countries. He has terrorized the Latinx community with threats of aggressive deportation. His administration has placed migrants and asylum-seekers in degrading and inhumane detention centers, which are concentration camps, and it has forcibly separated children from their families. Trump’s immigration policy is clearly intended to reduce the number of non-white people in the U.S.

Since Trump’s election, racist violence has been on the rise. In 2017, murders by white supremacists more than doubled from the previous year. In 2018, every murder in the U.S. that was linked to extremism was committed by a perpetrator with ties to white supremacy. In February 2018, seventeen students and staff members at Marjory Stoneman Douglas High School in Florida were murdered by a former student who held white supremacist beliefs. In October 2018, eleven Jewish worshippers at the Tree of Life Synagogue in Pittsburgh were killed by a white supremacist during a Shabbat service. That same month, two African American shoppers were killed by a white supremacist at a grocery store in Kentucky. In 2019, over 25 people have been killed in mass shootings by white supremacists, including in Gilroy, CA and El Paso, TX. In both cases the shooters explicitly targeted latinxs.

The Ku Klux Klan, Neo-Nazis, and various other organized white supremacist groups operating under the guise of the “alt-right” embraced Trump as their candidate and have been emboldened by his victory. In August 2017, hundreds of these white supremacists descended on Charlottesville for a violent protest which claimed the life of a young woman, Heather Heyer, and injured dozens more. The white supremacists were in Charlottesville to protest the city’s decision to remove a statue of a Confederate leader — a traitor — who believed African-American people should be enslaved, and which was erected in 1924, an era in which the symbolism of the Confederacy was used to promote Jim Crow segregation and Klan violence against African Americans, Jews, Catholics, trade unionists and others. Since Charlottesville, white supremacist groups have felt emboldened to hold more violent rallies across the country to spread their hate.

People of color, especially African Americans, are more likely to be stopped by police, searched, arrested, and become the victims of police and vigilante violence. The murder of countless people of color by police is outrageous, and the police officers who commit these killings are rarely held accountable. This is not merely the result of individual racist police officers but of a widespread, systematic disrespect for the lives of people of color. This disrespect is being further stoked by Trump and his administration. In a speech to police on Long Island in July 2017, Trump openly encouraged law enforcement to be violent with those they arrest, repeatedly referring to people suspected of crimes as “animals.”

In response to police violence against African Americans in recent years, Black Lives Matter has become a mass movement. Since the election of Trump, hundreds of thousands of Americans have taken to the streets to oppose Trump’s so-called “Muslim ban,” his stepped-up war against immigrants, the detention and separation of migrant families, and the racist far-right. UE stands with all of those who have marched and bravely stood up to hatred, racism, and violence.

Working-class unity can never be taken for granted. Winning depends upon our success in the fight against racism. UE and the wider labor movement is not immune from racism. We must consciously work to overcome racism in our diverse working class. 

THEREFORE, BE IT RESOLVED THAT THIS 76^th UE CONVENTION:  

1. Reaffirms UE’s policies of aggressive struggle against racism and in support of equal rights;
2. Calls on locals to defend our members aggressively against on-the-job discrimination;
3. Calls on locals to develop pressure campaigns against any employers that discriminate against people of color in their hiring practices;
4. Declares its support of workers and their communities’ fight against divisive racist terror;
5. Directs the leadership of our union to take affirmative action in the development and election of more leaders of color and the hiring of staff of color;
6. Opposes the assault on affirmative action;
7. Directs the UE Education Department to continue providing workshops on racism and discrimination at all levels of our union;
8. Calls for elimination of racial profiling, police brutality, “stop-and-frisk,” and a repeal of “stand-your-ground” laws;
9. Urges the union at all levels to support and work with local Black Lives Matter groups and other organizations fighting racism and discrimination;
10. Condemns all attacks on the basis of ethnicity and religion, particularly those on Arab-Americans, Muslims and Latinxs;
11. Calls on the union at all levels to make our members and communities aware of the increase of hate groups in our country, to provide information to help them to recognize and combat all forms of hate, and to expose racism in the media;
12. Urges regions and locals to set up unity councils on the model pioneered by Local 506;
13. Demands strict enforcement and just punishment for violation of existing anti-discrimination laws;
14. Urges the union movement to expose and condemn racially biased and selective reporting which blames people of color for the poverty they are suffering as a result of government and corporate policies;
15. Urges locals to study the Freedom Manifesto of the National Assembly for Black Liberation. 

UE has been leading the fight for equity for women workers since the 1940s. In the current political climate women need unions more than ever, as they are the best way to ensure greater earnings, benefits, and protections from discrimination in the workplace. Until women have full and equal rights, all workers are held back. 

Forty-one percent of women are the sole or primary breadwinners for their families. The huge gender income gap makes it even harder for them to provide for their families. Nationally, women earn only 80 cents for every dollar men earn. While this gap is slowly closing, at current rates the gender pay gap will not be erased until some time in the mid 22^nd century. African-American women only make 61 percent of what white men bring home, and Latinas only make 58 percent. 

The U.S. is ranked 100^th in the world in women’s representation in national legislatures; only 23.7 percent of the members of our Congress are women. In Congress and state legislatures, men continue to push bills that eliminate healthcare opportunities for many women, including the defunding of Planned Parenthood, stripping maternity care from mandated health insurance coverage, and gutting Medicaid, the effects of which would fall disproportionately on low-income single mothers. Nearly a dozen states have passed laws in 2019 restricting access to abortion, stripping women of their reproductive rights and flaunting the constitutional status of Roe v. Wade. 

Public revelations brought forward by the #MeToo movement demonstrate the depth of harassment and assault that too many women still face in the workplace. The women's marches of the last two years and the record number of women running for elected office have been a clear and welcome counterpoint.

UE members need to apply ever-greater pressure on politicians and bosses to advance and maintain women’s rights. This war on women’s rights needs to stop and we must remain leaders in this fight. 

THEREFORE, BE IT RESOLVED THAT THIS 76^th UE CONVENTION:  

1. Calls on the union at all levels to: 
   1. Support locals in fighting legislation that negatively impacts women's and families’ rights; 
   2. Bargain for gender equality and to fight women’s oppression in the workplace; 
   3. Demand pay equity, recognize the intersection of race and gender, acknowledge and address the urgent political and safety issues experienced by trans women, and commit to address pay inequities at all levels;
   4. Create a consistent environment to educate and support women to assume positions of leadership within their locals, regions, and the national union; 
   5. Educate members, all officers, and staff on sexual harassment and programs to combat harassment, intimidation and sexist attitudes wherever found, through trainings and developed programs; 
   6. Continue the implementation of the anti-harassment policy for regional councils and national conventions, including continued training of ombuds as needed, at least one of whom will be a woman;
   7. In jobs primarily held by women, demand that employers file timely injury report forms for all worker injuries, as well as report such injuries to all appropriate state agencies, while creating strong health and safety language to be placed in collective bargaining agreements;
   8. Press for employer-paid training programs which allow women to upgrade their skills to enter jobs that have been traditionally reserved for men; 
   9. Renew the fight for employer-funded childcare, both through legislation and within the union; 
   10. Support the candidacy of pro-labor women to public office; 
   11. Provide dedicated time and space for women’s caucuses at regional and national levels within UE; 
   12. Provide quality childcare for meetings and conferences to allow parents and guardians to participate in the activities of the union;
   13. Bargain language providing a safe, clean and private space for nursing parents; 
2. Supports the right of all those seeking reproductive healthcare, regardless of economic status, to choose whether to continue or terminate a pregnancy, to have access to free, confidential, and effective birth control and family planning services, to be protected against forced sterilization, and not be discriminated against because of reproductive health issues; 
3. Demand Congress: 
   1. Improve and expand the Family Medical Leave Act and ensure all workers receive full benefits; 
   2. Enact: 
      1. A federal paid parental leave program and a high-quality federal day care program; 
      2. The Pregnant Workers Fairness Act, calling for stricter and clear mandates for employers to provide accommodations for pregnant workers; 
      3. The Be Heard Act, which would make law some Obama-era executive orders governing federally subcontracted workers, addresses workplace harassment, includes the employment nondiscrimination provisions, and an end to the tipped minimum wage; 
   3. Create a subsidized system which does not penalize individuals for providing homecare and which provides a living wage and quality homecare; 
   4. Enact a new federal law prohibiting employers from asking about pay history in order to reduce pay disparities;
   5. Protect and expand the Women, Infants, and Children (WIC) program, Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program (SNAP), and other programs that assist low-income families and children;
4. Encourage UE members to engage with organizations fighting for women’s rights. 

Immigrants helped build this country and have played a central role in our union since its inception. Employers and the politicians that represent them seek to exploit divisions between immigrant and native-born workers, driving down wages and stripping away hard-won workers’ rights.

The Supreme Court’s Hoffman Plastic Compounds ruling in March 2002 decreed that immigrant workers fired for organizing a union are not entitled to back pay or reinstatement. The court effectively decided that immigrant workers “have no rights that bosses need respect.” Employers now routinely use the Hoffman ruling to fire union activists. But there are examples where immigrant workers have stood up for their rights and have won. Fermin Rodriguez, an undocumented worker fired for his union activity in Los Angeles, was reinstated by the National Labor Relations Board after the evidence showed his employer El Super grossly violated the union rights of Rodriguez and his coworkers. 

Employers use the threat of deportation to scare immigrant workers during organizing drives. The Social Security Administration (SSA) has resumed sending out ‘no-match’ letters which are based on an error-filled database and result in employers improperly firing large numbers of workers. The E-Verify program similarly denies employment to many documented workers because the database, by SSA’s own admission, contains 17 million errors. SSA should be administering retirement benefits, not enforcing immigration laws. I-9 audits can result in the quick discharge of workers with no recourse available to the union.

Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) agents use heavy-handed raids to terrorize communities and workplaces. The ICE workplace raids on August 7, 2019 in Mississippi tore apart families and communities, with many children left stranded at school with both parents detained and over ten percent of the population of one town was either arrested or fired. A study by the Benjamin Cardozo School of Law showed that in 86 percent of ICE cases in Long Island, agents illegally entered people’s homes, used excessive force, threatened unarmed people with weapons, and arrested many legal residents and U.S. citizens. 

Following workplace raids, children who are U.S. citizens remain in the country while parents are jailed and then deported. Our immigration detention system unnecessarily locks up hundreds of thousands of immigrants every year, exposing detainees to brutal and inhumane conditions of confinement at massive costs to American taxpayers. Since the inception of the 287(g) program, which deputizes local law enforcement to enforce federal immigration laws, immigrant communities have been driven further into the shadows. 

Trump is purposefully enacting policies which punish asylum seekers and new immigrants in a twisted, illegal and immoral attempt to deter further migration from war-torn and violent nations. New arrivals are being put in immigrant detention centers that are literal concentration camps. Immigrant children are being taken from their parents and put in cages which is a clear violation of international human rights law. To add insult to injury, many of the asylum seekers are fleeing conditions caused by U.S. foreign and military policy.

Trump's attacks on immigrants serve two purposes. One is to bolster his electoral prospects by pandering to outright racists and others who have been manipulated into blaming their diminishing economic prospects on immigrants. It also benefits many employers, including Trump himself at his many golf courses and hotels, by creating a permanent underclass of workers who are too terrified to stand up for their rights on the job.

Denying immigrant workers decent wages and conditions undermines the wages and conditions of all. All workers, regardless of immigration status, must have the right to form unions, to file complaints against unfair treatment without fear of reprisal, to receive unemployment, disability and workers’ compensation benefits, and to have access for themselves and their families to affordable housing, healthcare, education and transportation.

Attacks on immigrants merit strong resistance by members of our union. UE must work with other unions, faith, and community groups to fight collectively for legalization and against anti-immigrant laws and sentiment.

THEREFORE, BE IT RESOLVED THAT THIS 76^th UE CONVENTION: 

1. Demands an end to the separation of immigrant families, an end to all concentration and/or internment camps for immigrants, and an end to the criminalization of asylum seekers, refugees and those who provide humanitarian aid to them; 
2. Demands the federal government impose an immediate moratorium on all ICE raids, arrests, deportations, harassment, seizures, I-9 audits, Secure Communities, the 287(g) and E-Verify programs, and other abuses of undocumented workers;
3. Calls for an end to all political attacks against the sanctuary city movement and encourages all locals to actively support all efforts in their community to defend immigrants from abuse and harassment;
4. Demands the federal government end their VOICE program, which serves the sole purpose of stirring up anti-immigrant racism, repeal the anti-immigrant so-called “Kate’s Law,” and end all travel bans;
5. Calls for an immediate end to all construction of the border wall between the U.S. and Mexico;
6. Supports the inclusion of immigrants in all current and proposed public healthcare programs, including Medicare for All; 
7. Demands that Congress enact immigration reform legislation that:
   1. Includes a legalization program, allowing all immigrants currently living in the U.S. to remain here permanently and without penalty;
   2. Protects worker rights for both current and future immigrants, including overturning the Hoffman Plastics decision;
   3. Prioritizes family unification;
   4. Liberalizes political asylum procedures;
   5. Rejects guest-worker programs;
   6. Repeals the REAL ID Act;
   7. Ensures immigrants have equal access to higher education, including student loans, financial aid, and in-state tuition;
8. Urges locals to negotiate contract language that:
   1. Protects jobs and contract rights regardless of immigration status;
   2. Allows undocumented workers to update immigration status without loss of rights;
   3. Prevents the employer from taking adverse action in the event of the receipt of a Social Security “no-match” letter;
   4. Prevents the employer from participating in voluntary ICE enforcement programs;
   5. Obligates the employer to refuse entry to ICE agents who do not possess a valid warrant and to notify the union if contacted by ICE;
   6. Requires the employer to supply an independent translator and allow union representation when communicating on important matters with workers not fluent in English;
   7. Makes available copies of the contract in each language spoken by employees;
9. Encourages locals to work with and financially support local immigrant rights coalitions which assist undocumented workers and fight to fix our broken immigration system;
10. Calls on locals with immigrant members to educate employers on the rights of immigrant workers, the employer’s right to resist ICE harassment and intimidation, and the perils of ICE’s voluntary enforcement initiatives;
11. Urges locals to educate themselves about federal laws related to immigrants and refugees, and to assist their immigrant members in attaining documented status and citizenship if they so desire;
12. Demands that state motor vehicle agencies change policies and programs that make it impossible for immigrants to legally own and operate vehicles;
13. Calls upon the union at all levels to continue to provide education and materials for members and the community about the real causes of worker migration to the U.S.

Working class unity is a core belief of our union. Article IV of the Union’s constitution stipulates that all working persons are eligible for membership “regardless of skill, age, sex, nationality, color, race, religious or political belief or affiliation, sexual orientation, disability, or immigration status.” 

While many regard marriage equality as the hallmark win for the LGBTQ+ Community (Lesbian, Gay, Bisexual, Trans, and Queer/Questioning), LGBTQ+ people across the country continue to struggle against housing inequality, workplace violence, and other forms of legal discrimination. 

26 states provide no protections for LGBTQ+ workers against workplace discrimination. At the federal level, the Obama administration attempted to extend nondiscrimination laws to LGBTQ+ individuals, and the Trump administration has now moved to roll that back with a final decision likely to come out of the courts. The majority of states also provide no protections to LGBTQ+ individuals in housing, public amenities, and credit access — all of which disproportionately affect the working class.

“Religious liberty” is increasingly used as a justification for discrimination in employment and other areas. The Trump administration recently issued an executive order explicitly allowing federal contractors to discriminate against LGBTQ+ workers and pregnant unmarried workers based on religious belief. This is a sad repeat of the justifications used by those opposed to interracial marriage in the last century. 

Violence against LGBTQ+ people occurs far too frequently, with 51 percent reporting having experienced violence based on their sexual orientation or gender identity. In 2016, 49 people were gunned down at a gay nightclub in Orlando — the deadliest shooting on record targeting the LGBTQ+ community. The most violent year for trans people was also 2016, with 27 deaths on record. 2018 saw at least 26 deaths. This year has already seen at least eleven trans women murdered, all of whom were African-American. The average life expectancy of a trans woman of color is 35 years, and only six states have banned the use of a “trans panic” defense in murder cases. 

We must unite and fight against all discrimination, whether in our communities, in our government, or in our workplaces. Homophobia and transphobia keep us divided and weaken the labor movement. We must take up the cry that an injury to one is an injury to all. 

THEREFORE, BE IT RESOLVED THAT THIS 76^th UE CONVENTION:  

1. Encourages the formation of LGBTQ+ caucuses at various levels of the union; 
2. Calls on locals to bargain protections against discrimination based on sexual orientation or gender identity, health insurance and pension coverage for couples of all genders and sexual identities, and leave-of-absence language that gives domestic partners the same rights as married employees; 
3. Directs the UE Education Department to develop, in conjunction with LGBTQ+ members, anti-oppression workshops and materials for use at all levels of the union in order to educate our membership and communities on the destructive nature of LGBTQ+ oppression;
4. Supports organizations fighting for the rights of LGBTQ+ people;
5. Urges members to boycott establishments that discriminate against LGBTQ+ people; 
6. Calls on UE negotiating committees to bargain gender-neutral language in their collective bargaining agreements; 
7. Encourages all levels of the union to make use of gender-neutral language.

Concerted action in the workplace is an essential feature of rank-and-file unionism. We do not see the union as an insurance agency to which members pay a fee in exchange for the services of high-paid business union staff who say they'll “take care of it for you” through legalism, lobbying, and backroom deals. A union is a workers’ organization, built by members to improve their conditions through collective action.

In contract negotiations, this means involvement of the members in developing their demands. It also means using tactics that show support for the bargaining committee and keep pressure on management. Too many union leaders believe the best way to negotiate a contract is to keep their members in the dark and keep them quiet. Our approach is to give the members as much information as possible to engage in action to support their proposals and to develop strategies and tactics to maximize membership participation.

The same is true in dealing with violations of workers’ rights that occur between contract negotiations. Stewards often find the chance of resolving a grievance is greater when members collectively express their discontent to management. Many locals have effectively used such tactics as mass grievances signed by every worker in the shop or department, or even delivered to the boss by a mass delegation. Locals find creative ways, while a grievance is going through the formal steps of the grievance procedure, to remind management of rank-and-file support for the union's position. Our reluctance to take our grievances to arbitration grows from our unwillingness to place our fate in the hands of a third party. In some contracts — notably in the Wabtec chain — our members retain the legal right to strike over some grievances after receiving the company's final answer. The existence of this right, even if infrequently exercised, adds a strong incentive for management to settle.

The UE approach to political action — collective action for political change, rather than attempt to buy influence with politicians through campaign contributions or via paid lobbyists — is closely related to our concept of workplace struggle. For our members in the public sector, political action and workplace struggle are frequently inseparable. 

THEREFORE, BE IT RESOLVED THAT THIS 76^th UE CONVENTION:  

1. Directs the union at all levels to educate our members about the necessity, effectiveness, and most useful strategies of workplace struggle, including the purchase and use of books such as the Troublemaker’s Handbook, published by Labor Notes; 
2. Calls on locals to ensure that proper democratic practices are in place to involve members in workplace struggle, including, when appropriate, stewards’ meetings and trainings;
3. Urges greater publicity for gains achieved by our members through workplace struggle in the UE Steward, UE News, local union newsletters, and other union communications;
4. Commits to transparency in all forms of negotiations with the employer.

In the early-21st century U.S. economy, no worker is safe from workplace closing. Manufacturing employers ship production overseas, to the South, or to nonunion plants, where they can pay a fraction of the wages and benefits of union shops. Many tasks can now be performed electronically from outside the U.S., including completing tax returns, reading medical scan results, and customer service calls. Entire occupations are being replaced by automation, ranging from retail checkout, to warehouse worker, to even journalists. Federal, state, and local policies which reward workplace closings and layoffs are a national disgrace. 

U.S. “free trade” policies, like NAFTA, encourage the flight of capital and export of jobs. These policies have contributed to high unemployment, reduced opportunities for young people, and budget deficits at all levels of government, which in turn cause job losses for public-sector workers. As we predicted, the Trump Administration's renegotiation of NAFTA has not and will not reverse decades of job loss. UE insists decisions regarding trade and employment are too important to be left exclusively to big business and their paid-for politicians. Our union demands sweeping legislative solutions, including controls on capital investment and credit, and severe penalties to give companies a strong disincentive to destroy our jobs. 

Since the last convention, several UE-represented workplaces have either closed or announced their intention to close, including NGK-Locke (Local 120), Aetna Bearing (Local 151), O.P. Schumann (Local 155), Kraco (Local 1021), and Graham Packaging (Local 1421). This continued obliteration of well-paid manufacturing jobs means an entire industry has seen its employment standards collapse. 

As a union, we know even when our jobs cannot be saved, the fight is still worth it. Sometimes a workplace is saved in unexpected ways. The members of UE Local 1187 at Load King in South Dakota can attest that even when the plant has closed and the union members have lost their jobs, continuing to fight can ultimately pay off and restore what appeared to be lost forever. But even when it doesn’t, the fight puts the workers in a better position to win a superior severance package. 

UE has been a leader in developing innovative approaches to fighting closings and saving jobs through eminent domain campaigns, workplace sit-ins, building broad alliances, political action, alternative forms of ownership, and other means. While we have not found a surefire formula, we must continue to struggle and explore new solutions. No boss should be allowed to fire or lay off workers without a struggle. 

THEREFORE, BE IT RESOLVED THAT THIS 76^th UE CONVENTION: 

1. Demands when a plant-closing is threatened, the union be given an opportunity to locate new investors to keep the workplace open or to establish a worker-owned cooperative; 
2. Demands the renegotiation of international “free-trade” agreements to make them fair-trade agreements, and encourages the union at all levels to participate in actions to prevent additional “free-trade” agreements; 
3. Demands Congress fully fund and expand the Trade Adjustment Act (TAA) and develop programs to ensure that all affected workers are placed in stable, household-sustaining jobs;
4. Demands Congress require companies pay severance and health benefits to laid-off workers, make payments to affected communities and states to offset lost tax revenues and the cost of retraining displaced workers, and repay any tax breaks and financial incentives; 
5. Demands that states and localities be prohibited from offering any incentives, including tax breaks, to lure corporate facilities from one location to another; 
6. Encourages all locals faced with a closing to analyze the circumstances of the shutdown, and to quickly pursue whatever strategy is necessary to keep the workplace operating, including local government seizure of private-sector workplaces through eminent domain, and compelling the employer to sell the enterprise at a fair market price to people who will keep the workplace operating; 
7. Demands prosecution of corporate leaders whose unjust actions result in the loss of workers’ pay and benefits, such as the successful prosecution of the former owner of Wisconsin Die Casting and the felony charges that led to the conviction and incarceration of the former owner of Republic Windows and Doors;
8. Encourages locals to enlist support from the local community and government to pressure employers to keep members employed; 
9. Pledges full support of the union at all levels to any UE members fighting off job loss;
10. Supports the creation of state and local unemployed councils to support unemployed workers’ basic needs and to fight for their rights.

For many years, business and government have been attempting to move away from the eight-hour day by establishing a ten hour, four-day workweek, or other alternative work schedules, with no overtime premium pay after eight hours.

While workers in some workplaces may prefer alternative schedules, locals should make sure to build protections against abuse into their contracts. Care must be taken to ensure workers’ days off are consecutive. Longer work days mean a worker who is absent will receive a larger dock in pay. Improvements to paid leave, such as vacation and holidays may require a bigger fight because they cost the company more. Numerous studies have shown longer work days result in more accidents and injuries.

Some employers are promoting the ten-hour day for their own benefit, not for the benefit of the workers. They use it as a way to avoid paying overtime on Saturday or Sunday, turning these days into a shifting part of the new regular work week. Small and economically marginal employers save on energy costs by keeping their shop shuttered an extra day but do not share this savings with workers.

The labor movement is the reason the eight-hour day was established. Our union has long supported further shortening the workday and workweek. We should not move backwards and bargain away one of our most fundamental victories.

THEREFORE, BE IT RESOLVED THAT THIS 76^th UE CONVENTION: 

1. Reaffirms our longstanding policy of overtime pay for any hours after eight and our goal of reducing the work week. We call on the labor movement to pursue a shorter work week with no loss in pay;
2. Calls on Congress and state legislatures to improve existing overtime laws and regulations, provide for their vigorous enforcement, and oppose employer-imposed “comp time” and “flex time” schemes;
3. Encourage all shops to incorporate into their contract language requiring an eight-hour day with overtime after eight hours;
4. Encourage all shops to ensure overtime premiums are paid for Saturday and Sunday work, to ensure a consecutive weekend and eliminate the worst exploitation of alternative work schedules.

Privatization continues to decimate public employment. Estimates show there are up to three times as many contract workers as there are federal public employees, with potentially millions more at the state and local levels. Privatization erodes and destroys existing public sector unions, driving down wages, benefits and working conditions. 

Although private contractors sometimes claim to be more cost efficient, contracting out services actually costs the federal government more money in 33 out of 35 occupations surveyed. Neither federal nor state governments have any reliable estimates of how much money is saved or, more likely, wasted through the use of profit-driven contractors, and this potentially corrupt process produces both increased costs to taxpayers and diminished levels of service. 

Corporations benefiting from privatization range from some of the largest global conglomerates to front-group businesses created to take advantage of tax credits and bidding requirements. For example, West Virginia Paving Company turned out to be an out-of-state corporation using out-of-state employees to do jobs formerly done by local state employees. Repairs on West Virginia’s bridges, previously done by local workers in the state’s highway division were awarded to a Florida company banned in New Jersey because of safety violations. The Professional Services Council (PSC) acts as the national lobby group for the industry, bolstered by the ideologically reactionary American Legislative Exchange Council (ALEC), and national, state and local Chambers of Commerce. The privatization agenda has been taken up by both Republicans and Democrats as a way to increase political campaign contributions.

Public sector unions — including UE — have fought for higher wages and better working conditions for their members. These hard-fought gains can be erased overnight through privatization. Contract workers often face poverty wages and harsh working conditions and depend on government benefits such as food stamps to survive. Standards of living for such employees are generally precarious.

The fight against privatization is also a fight for racial justice. African Americans are 30 percent more likely to work in the public sector, and if they do they on average earn 25 percent more than if they worked in the private sector. The corporate attack on public workers has a thinly-disguised racial component in the depiction of public employees as lazy and overpaid. 

UE Local 893 in Iowa has fought off several privatization schemes beginning in the early 1980s, and UE Local 170 in West Virginia has relentlessly, and often successfully, opposed executive and legislative branch privatization initiatives by state government since its founding in 2006.

The contagion of privatization extends to every part of our society: public water systems and assets are being sold, public roads, bridges and other infrastructure are being parceled out to politically connected private interests, and public education is being dismantled as corporations seek to profit by leveraging our nation’s future. The very concepts of the public sector and the public good are under attack in order to increase the already historic level of wealth inequality. A determined and unified response is imperative.

THEREFORE, BE IT RESOLVED THAT THIS 76^th UE CONVENTION:

1. Opposes privatization and contracting out of public services and facilities;
2. Demands Congress: 
   1. Declare a moratorium on all new federal privatization; 
   2. Investigate all current contracts to determine if they result in accountability, quality of services, and savings;
   3. Restore adequate federal support for state and local governments to meet public needs without cutting the wages, benefits and working conditions of workers;
   4. Cut off all funding that promotes privatization globally, namely schemes contained in the work of the World Bank and the International Monetary Fund.
3. Demands state attorneys general investigate all current and proposed state and municipal privatization for conflicts of interest and other forms of corruption and self-dealing;
4. Supports state legislative moratoriums on contracting out public sector work;
5. Supports passage of legislation at all governmental levels which requires work done with public funds provides for a living wage and comprehensive benefits; 
6. Opposes the use of inmate labor, as well as forcing workers on unemployment compensation or welfare to work, in order to replace public service workers;
7. Supports the union’s work to organize private-sector service companies and agencies to improve the lives of these workers by bringing them up to public sector counterparts. 

The right of workers to withhold their labor — to strike — is among the most important of human rights. No society can truly claim to respect liberty and deny workers the right to strike. International law recognizes the right to strike as a fundamental human right.

Rank-and-file control and anti-discrimination are foundational UE principles. Equally important is the call in the preamble to the UE Constitution to “pursue at all times a policy of aggressive struggle to improve our conditions.”

The growth of the labor movement beginning in the 1930s, including UE, was accomplished by significant worker militancy, sit downs, and strikes, which resulted in unprecedented progress for working people. 

Ronald Reagan's busting of the air traffic controllers’ union in 1981 accelerated the modern-day assault on the right to strike. Following the president’s lead, bosses began to “permanently replace” economic strikers. The threat of permanent replacement, high unemployment and the shrinking number of unionized jobs led to a precipitous decline in the number of strikes. Fortunately over the past two years an increasing number of workers have begun to take strike action against their employers, including massive, largely successful, statewide teachers strikes. 

Long-time labor activist Joe Burns did a valuable service to the labor movement when he wrote Reviving the Strike: How Working People Can Regain Power and Transform America (2011), in which he documents the decline of the strike and weakening of the labor movement. He argues many unions have forgotten what an effective strike is. A picket line, for example, is not meant to be “a weak form of moral witness,” but a blockade of the workplace to keep out strikebreakers and prevent the employer from operating. Burns offers useful ideas for beginning to rebuild labor’s power. His follow-up book on the public sector, Strike Back: Using the Militant Tactics of Labor's Past to Reignite Public Sector Unionism Today (2014) is equally important and useful.

The right to strike is vital to maintain and improve our wages, benefits, and working conditions, and to resist the attack on democracy by anti-working class elements. 

When Wabtec took over GE Transportation in February 2019 and attempted to impose unreasonable terms and conditions on the members of UE Locals 506 and 618 in Erie, PA, the locals struck for nine days (which, under Pennsylvania law, was ruled a lockout due to the imposition of terms and conditions). Although members of Locals 506 and 618 have held walkouts, this was the first full-fledged strike since the national GE strike in 1969-70, which lasted 102 days. Strike action forced the company back to the negotiating table, resulting eventually in a new, fair contract which preserved most of the conditions UE members had worked under at GE, including the right to strike over grievances.

Shortly after UE’s last convention, an eight-day strike by members of UE Local 234 in St. Johnsbury, VT backed the company off of draconian concession demands. A one-day strike in March of 2019 was crucial to winning a first contract for Local 1018 at Lanterman Regional Center in Los Angeles, and credible strike threats by many UE locals, including Local 121, Local 243, Local 329, Local 610, and Local 1135, also helped to achieve excellent results at the bargaining table.

In the public sector, workers in 39 states lack the legal right to strike. As UE’s public-employee members can attest, mandatory arbitration disempowers the rank and file in the negotiation of their own contract. Recent legislative attacks on public workers included rollbacks of the right to strike where it existed.

As was the case with the public-sector labor upsurge in the 1970s, just because a strike action is nominally “illegal” doesn’t mean it can’t be successful. The wave of strikes that began when West Virginia teachers walked off the job in February 2018 inspired workers throughout the nation. Teachers have held statewide strikes, sickouts, and other job actions in North Carolina, South Carolina, Virginia, Oklahoma, Arizona, Kentucky, and Colorado to demand not only long overdue and substantive improvements to their pay and conditions, but also greater investment in public education — which benefits all working people.

Recent large-scale strikes by hotel and grocery store workers have also captured the public imagination, and the threat of job actions by federal and airline workers helped end the government shutdown in early 2019.

The strike is far from dead. A broad grassroots campaign by labor and its allies is necessary to reestablish our right to strike without limitation, and without the threat of being replaced. This includes the right to strike over grievances.

THEREFORE BE IT RESOLVED THAT THIS 76^th UE CONVENTION:

1. Calls for the continued use of the strike as the primary weapon against the employer, characterized by careful planning and timing, full membership involvement, and mobilization of community and political support;
2. Directs the national union to provide renewed member education on UE strike policy; 
3. Urges locals to seek the right to strike on grievances as part of their collective bargaining demands;
4. Calls upon locals and regions to include as part of their political action work a demand for the restoration of the right to strike for private and public workers without retaliation or replacement;
5. Encourages UE members and locals to learn more about the need to restore the right to strike by reading Joe Burns’ books Reviving the Strike and Strike Back; and learn about their legal rights and effective tactics in strikes by reading Robert Schwartz’s Strikes, Picketing and Inside Campaigns; and the UE pamphlet Preparing For and Conducting A Strike: A UE Guide.

UE left the Congress of Industrial Organizations (CIO) in 1949, when the CIO had lost its militant and progressive direction. With no national labor federation today supporting UE’s rank-and-file principles, we find ways to interact with trade union and community allies who share our approach. Among those places are Jobs with Justice (JwJ) chapters, Labor Notes conferences, and local alliances such as Pittsburgh United and Erie County United in Western Pennsylvania and the newly-formed Community Labor Assemblies in Vermont.

The birth of JwJ in the late 1980s was a response to the failure of business unionism. JwJ was formed by trade unionists, community activists and other progressives as a way to work together for workers’ rights. There are currently 37 JwJ chapters across the country. Whether walking picket lines, supporting organizing campaigns, or staging town-hall style Workers’ Rights Board hearings, JwJ does the work that the formal labor federations are incapable of or unwilling to do.

Labor Notes and its network of supporters have promoted rank-and-file unionism within the U.S. labor movement for 38 years. It has become an indispensable resource for trade unionists. UE leaders, rank-and-file members, and staff contribute regularly to Labor Notes, sharing our experiences and analyses with other trade unionists worldwide. Labor Notes conferences are now the largest gatherings of rank-and-file union members in the country. UE continues to provide some of the largest union delegations at national Labor Notes conferences and plays an important role in conducting workshops and plenary sessions.

JwJ, Labor Notes, and local community-labor coalitions demonstrate the real meaning of the phrase “labor solidarity.” UE locals throughout the country receive aid from these kinds of alliances. Both Erie County United and Pittsburgh United actively supported UE Locals 506 and 618 in their strike and contract negotiations with Wabtec this past winter, and members of the Burlington, Vermont area Community Labor Assembly have been assisting UE Local 203 with community outreach regarding their contract fight.

The basis for UE’s participation in local, national and international coalitions, organizations and gatherings has always been a desire to build a more vigorous, responsive, and relevant working-class movement, and to work with allies — both trade unions and community organizations — regardless of affiliation status, size, or politics. If another world is possible, a world of justice for working people, we need a rank-and-file movement to make it a reality.

THEREFORE, BE IT RESOLVED THAT THIS 76^th UE CONVENTION:

1. Calls on the union at all levels to: 
   1. Participate in, support, and join Jobs with Justice and other formations that bring together unions and community organizations;
   2. Participate in the next Labor Notes Conference in Chicago on April 17-19, 2020;
2. Encourages members and locals to participate in or assist the formation of Labor Notes Troublemaker schools, subscribe to Labor Notes, purchase bulk subscriptions and books, and submit articles for publication.

The struggle for a healthy and safe workplace is fundamental to the labor movement. It was one of our earliest major demands alongside higher pay and a shorter work week. It is every union’s obligation to encourage and, if necessary, force the boss to correct dangerous situations. But workplace safety cannot be solved through militancy alone.

Prior to the passage of the Occupational Safety and Health Act (OSHA) in 1970, those lacking a union contract containing strong health and safety language had little to no protection. OSHA was a great step forward, but left out many workers, including independent contractors and public-sector employees on the state and local level. While some states have adopted safety and health legislation to cover their public employees, many states have adopted no protections at all and others have very little enforcement of their own rules. This results in situations where public-sector workers have been severely injured or even died on the job with no penalties faced by their employers. In addition, the Act remains broken and underfunded, with infrequent inspections and nominal fines. 

Today most workers and most UE members no longer work on a factory floor. Workers in the service industry have workplace safety issues which are not heavily regulated by OSHA, even if the workers themselves are nominally covered. Office workers often suffer from repetitive stress injuries like carpal tunnel syndrome, yet there are no ergonomics standards established by the federal government. Workers in retail, education, health care, and social services often have to deal with customers, students, or patients who threaten their physical safety, yet OSHA has largely been silent on establishing best-practice procedures to deal with these hazards. Female workers, workers of color, LGBTQ+ workers, and differently-abled workers all have different needs which should be addressed to ensure equity in workplace safety. 

While only some of the jobs our members perform are recognized as being dangerous, all of us can be exposed to situations which threaten our safety and impact our health. Our obligation is to look after the health and well-being of our fellow workers through the collective action of our union. But we also must force legislators to adequately protect working people through a strengthening of our nation's health and safety laws. 

THEREFORE, BE IT RESOLVED THAT THIS 76^th UE CONVENTION:

1. Calls on locals to:
   1. Make health and safety a top priority both during and outside of contract negotiations; 
   2. Set up strong independent health and safety committees; 
   3. Exercise their right to accompany OSHA inspectors on workplace visits;
   4. Contact the national union before becoming involved with Voluntary Protection Programs (VPP);
   5. Engage the membership in aggressive struggle to address hazards in the workplace; 
   6. Support local labor-initiated Committees on Occupational Safety and Health (COSH) groups; 
2. Demands Congress expand OSHA to include:
   1. Coverage for all workers, including those in the public sector and federal contractors;
   2. Significant rulemaking regarding safe working procedures when dealing with risk of attack from patients, students, customers, or other individuals;
   3. A better funded inspection process, which includes unauthorized and unrestricted inspections;
   4. Sharply increased penalties on employers, including punitive damages and blacklisting from government contracting opportunities;
   5. Prosecution of bosses for conditions which lead to death or severe injury on the job.
3. Supports strengthening workers’ compensation laws in all states, with improved provisions on injuries sustained from physical attacks in the workplace;
4. Opposes any attempt to further restrict the rights of workers to sue their employers over job-related injuries, and unsafe conditions.

The Bill of Rights has never been applied in the workplace, where employers are empowered to maintain near-absolute control. With our constitutional rights shredded by our employers, our rights to organize into unions are also ignored by bosses. Our freedom to be protected from unreasonable searches and seizures ends at the entrance to the workplace. Our freedoms of speech and assembly are virtually nonexistent while at work — unless you have a union. 

The National Labor Relations Act (NLRA), passed in 1935, was the closest that labor got to a “bill of rights.” When it was introduced it was immediately attacked by employers and anti-union forces through the legislatures and courts. The NLRA provided labor for the first time the legal right to organize, to bargain, and to strike without interference from the employer. For the first time employers were required to recognize and bargain with a union of the workers’ choice. 

In response to five million workers striking in 1946 — mass action intended to force employers to share their profits with workers who had gone through years of hardship in order to defeat the Nazis — a reactionary Congress voted to amend the NLRA with the 1947 Taft-Hartley Act. The law took away the right of unions to engage in secondary boycotts, made closed union shops illegal, allowed states to pass "right-to-work” laws, allowed the President to interfere in strikes, and gave employers more tools to stop workers from organizing. 

Today, employers brazenly violate the law and victimize working people who dare to challenge their complete control by attempting to unionize. Almost 10 percent of workers who engage in organizing are fired by their employers, amounting to tens of thousands every year. In 92% of union organizing campaigns, workers are subjected to the psychological warfare of captive audience meetings, such as when UE Local 1018 members recently organized at Lanterman Regional Center. Of those union drives that manage to navigate the minefield of employer lawbreaking and win a recognition election, only half will obtain a first union contract. The ranks of those reaching this nearly unattainable pinnacle are then cut in half once again, as only half of those unions winning first union contracts ever win second contracts. The percentage of unionized workers in the U.S. declined from 24 percent in 1979 to 10.5 percent in 2018 (less than seven percent in the private sector). These levels are the lowest since before the great organizing drives of the 1930s. In other industrial countries, union density is many times higher. 

In the public sector, workers in some states are prohibited from bargaining collectively and those who can bargain often lack the right to strike. North Carolina, South Carolina, and Virginia have blanket statutes that prohibit collective bargaining for all public-sector employees. Five states — Georgia, North Carolina, South Carolina, Virginia, and Texas — do not allow collective bargaining for teachers. 

The Trump appointees to the National Labor Relations Board (NLRB) have already largely gutted the limited incremental expansions of labor rights under the Obama Administration — continuing the long practice whereby a Democrat improves the NLRB, but a Republican makes it even worse, leading to longer-term regression in labor rights. 

The most significant recent Supreme Court decision affecting labor is Janus v. AFSCME, which eliminated union security in the public sector, making all state and local workplaces “right to work.” With a 5-4 reactionary majority on the Court and no change likely in the near future, we can expect no relief and more anti-worker decisions in the years to come. 

Senator Bernie Sanders (I-VT) has consistently promoted labor law reform since he first introduced the Workplace Democracy Act, drafted in consultation with UE, in the 1990s. This bill would have improved federal labor law in many ways, including: making it easier for workers to organize free from interference or intimidation, guaranteeing first contracts through an arbitration process, elimination of free riding, preventing employers from misclassifying workers as independent contractors, restoring the free speech of union members, and curbing the power of union busters. Now that the winds of change have elected a number of new pro-worker anti-corporate voices to Congress, Bernie is introducing a new version of the Workplace Democracy Act, adding several more provisions: granting bargaining rights to all public sector workers which would restore them in Iowa and establish them for the first time in states like North Carolina, banning captive audience meetings during organizing drives and the hiring of permanent replacements during strikes, allowing federal workers to strike, requiring corporations to honor existing union contracts after mergers, and cutting off federal contracts to companies that pay poverty wages, outsource jobs overseas, or hire scabs during strikes. In addition, the legislation would require that when union-negotiated healthcare plans are replaced by Medicare for All, the resulting company savings go to workers in the form of increased wages or other benefits.

These same winds of change have led to an additional major labor law reform bill achieving a significant number of cosponsors in Congress for the first time in many years. The Protecting the Right to Organize (PRO) Act would streamline union elections, ban captive audience meetings, increase penalties on employers for breaking the law, and make it harder for employers to delay union recognition through legal challenges. It would remove employers as a “party” to union representation elections — returning union elections to their original purpose. Before the 1947 Taft-Hartley law, union representation elections were for workers to collectively decide for or against representation, rather than an election between the boss and the union. The PRO Act would also make it easier for workers to engage in collective action and solidarity by prohibiting employers from permanently replacing workers during an economic strike and removing all limitations on secondary boycotts.

Now is the time for a law that protects workers and grants all rights and freedoms under the Constitution. In order to really safeguard workers, the right to associate — the right of working people to have the ability to say under what conditions they will or will not labor — must be enshrined in the U.S. Constitution. Workers whose rights were fully protected under the Constitution would be free to assemble, speak and associate anywhere and at all times, to organize without employer intervention, to bargain collectively, to strike, to boycott, or to refuse to handle goods. 

THEREFORE, BE IT RESOLVED THAT THIS 76^th UE CONVENTION:

1. Calls on Congress to: 
   1. Amend the Constitution to include worker rights; and in the meantime pass the Workplace Democracy Act, PRO Act, and any other legislation giving workers the same constitutional rights to organize without restriction or limitation in the workplace that we enjoy outside the workplace, including substantial penalties for employers who violate these rights;
   2. Repeal the Taft-Hartley Act;
2. Urges UE locals to:
   1. Challenge state laws that restrict the rights of workers in the public and private sectors to organize, bargain, and function freely;
   2. Build coalitions with unions and the community to expand the rights of workers;
   3. Meet with their local congressional delegation to get them to sign on to and actively support the PRO Act and the Workplace Democracy Act.

Public employees work for states, cities, and counties, providing vital services such as healthcare, sanitation, and education. In many states, including West Virginia, public employees have no legal framework for collective bargaining. North Carolina and Virginia explicitly ban collective bargaining for public employees. In two states with long-established and comprehensive collective bargaining laws for public sector workers, Republican governments have gutted them, Wisconsin in 2011, and Iowa in 2017. The right of public employees to collectively bargain remains endangered in numerous other states. 

The right to collectively bargain is essential for workers to improve their wages and working conditions. Collective bargaining rights also enable public workers to fight for better services for the communities they serve. Denial of collective bargaining in the southern states is a vestige of slavery and Jim Crow. UE Local 150 brought members of the International Labor Organization, an office of the United Nations, to North Carolina, who ruled that the state’s ban on collective bargaining for public-sector workers violates international human rights standards.

The Southern Workers International Justice Campaign and the Hear Our Public Employees (H.O.P.E.) Coalition, initiated by UE Local 150, are leading the fight to repeal the prohibition of collective bargaining in North Carolina, forging unity and solidarity between the labor movement and the civil rights movement. The work of our statewide unions in North Carolina, Virginia, and West Virginia, with their multi-racial membership and leadership, represents a powerful weapon for social progress. 

While our union fights to repeal the bans on collective bargaining, there are many rights that workers can secure to establish basic standards. State mental health workers and municipal workers in UE Local 150 have developed strong Workers’ Bill of Rights campaigns to elevate basic demands such as safety, adequate staffing levels, proper training and equipment, the right to refuse excessive overtime, family-supporting wages, and more. Many advances have been made establishing standards across the state regarding wages, excessive heat policies, union rights and access, and more, as part of the Workers’ Bill of Rights struggle.

The most vicious recent attack on public sector collective bargaining occurred in 2017 in Iowa. The Republican governor and legislature were ruthless in their attempts to bankrupt and dismantle the public-sector unions. The attack itself was funded by outside sources (the Koch brothers) with a specific aim to rid the state of the unions who are able to organize and mobilize their members and their community. The governor and legislature were successful in banning dues checkoff and eliminating all but one mandatory topic of bargaining, wages, for the non-safety bargaining units.  Even on wages, unions are limited to negotiating a 3 percent increase each year or the current inflation rate, whichever is less.  The law also forces public-sector bargaining units to go through recertification elections every time the contract is up. In a show of support for their union, the vast majority of UE’s bargaining units have voted to recertify by an overwhelming margin.

The Public Service Freedom to Negotiate Act, introduced in late June by a group of Democrats including newly-elected Congresswoman Abby Finkenauer (D-Iowa), would set minimum standards for collective bargaining rights for public sector workers nationwide, ensuring that states such as North Carolina create a legal framework for exercising those rights and restoring those rights in states such as Iowa where they have been curtailed. 

While this is a welcome development, public-sector collective bargaining rights were originally won through struggle.  In the 1970s, a series of strikes happened across the country at federal, state, and local levels. These strikers had no legal protection, and could have been terminated for their participation, but worker unity was strong enough to protect their jobs.  Ultimately, public officials decided to “tame” the ferocity of public employees through the offering of collective bargaining rights — usually in exchange for a ban on strikes and forcing workers through legalistic methods of contract settlement such as arbitration.

In order to restore what rights have been lost, and to bring them to states where they were never won, worker power must be a credible threat to the employer — we must return to a period of widespread workplace agitation. The new round of “illegal” teachers’ strikes sweeping the country could lead to a new expansion of bargaining rights for the public sector. We must develop and revitalize public sector worker unions and unite with allies to establish laws that grant full labor rights to all public-sector workers.

THEREFORE, BE IT RESOLVED THAT THIS 76^th UE CONVENTION:  

1. Calls for the union at all levels to initiate campaigns for public-employee collective bargaining rights, including the right to strike, which will gain these rights in states where we lack them, retain and strengthen them in states where they exist, and restore them where they have been stripped away;
2. Demands that the states of North Carolina and Virginia repeal their bans on collective bargaining;
3. Demands that the state of Iowa reverse its 2017 changes to its collective bargaining law;
4. Demands Congress pass the Public Service Freedom to Negotiate Act;
5. Supports the Southern Workers Assembly in its call to organize the South;
6. Supports the Southern Workers International Justice Campaign;
7. Supports the education of elected officials and the general public regarding the need for collective bargaining for public employees;
8. Supports work at the international level challenging the violation of public workers’ rights;
9. Calls on the union at all levels to support Workers’ Bill of Rights campaigns for public sector workers in states where collective bargaining is currently banned;
10. Calls on locals to mobilize in support of candidates for elected office who will restore and improve collective bargaining rights for public-sector employees.

As record numbers of Americans approach retirement, the right to retire comfortably and with dignity is threatened by attacks on pensions, Social Security, wages and working people’s ability to save.

A shrinking minority of American workers remain covered by defined-benefit pension plans, the most reliable form of employment-based retirement plan. A concerted, decades-long assault by corporations has largely wiped out defined-benefit plans in the private sector. In the past few years, anti-labor politicians have stirred up “pension envy” against public sector workers who still have defined-benefit plans, and these are increasingly disappearing.

Defined-benefit pensions have been largely replaced by defined-contribution plans, which are less costly for employers and more risky to workers. Defined-contribution plans, such as 401(k) and 403(b), were created to supplement defined-benefit pension plans and as a tax shelter for savings by high-salaried managers and professionals, but are instead used by employers to replace pensions. Defined-contribution plans do not provide reliable post-retirement income. Their effectiveness is limited by the workers’ ability to save, which has been hindered by declining wages and unsteady employment. And as we saw during the stock market crash of 2008, these accounts can be decimated by a general economic collapse, as well as by bad investment decisions.

Social Security is the main source of retirement income for most Americans. According to a 2019 report from the Center on Budget and Policy Priorities, Social Security payments comprise at least 50 percent of income for half of all retirees, and 90 percent or more of income for one in four retirees.

Currently Social Security is drawing on the $2.9 trillion surplus in its trust fund, and is projected to fully meet its obligations through 2035. After this time, without a tax increase or other changes, about 77 percent of benefits could be paid using incoming funds. This future shortfall could be largely eliminated by removing the “cap” on income subject to the FICA payroll tax, currently $132,900 per year.

Removing the cap is one simple and fair solution. Over the 80-year history of Social Security, the prospect of shortfalls has appeared before, and each time it’s been addressed through a bipartisan agreement to raise the payroll tax on employers and employees that funds Social Security. Republican presidents, including Ronald Reagan, have supported such increases to keep Social Security solvent. But present-day Republicans will not even consider such increases, and many corporate Democrats and the corporate media subscribe to the Wall Street-Washington consensus that Social Security is an unwarranted “entitlement” that must be cut or privatized. The record of recent Democratic presidents on defending Social Security is not good. Both President Clinton and President Obama sought bipartisan agreements with Republicans that would have undermined Social Security.

Retirement experts advise that, to live in modest comfort, the average worker will need retirement income equaling 75 to 90 percent of pre-retirement income. But Social Security benefits currently replace only about 40 percent of the typical worker’s pre-retirement income. A sensible long-term solution to the retirement income crisis is to expand and improve Social Security, increasing the benefits to ensure that all Americans can look forward to a secure retirement.

The drafters and supporters of the Social Security Act of 1935 hoped eventually to significantly increase the benefits, broaden the groups of Americans covered, and add medical care and other benefits. Retirement security, like healthcare, is a fundamental right for all people. We need an expansion of Social Security into a “single-payer” source of adequate retirement income. Our predecessors in the labor movement fought for the principle that every person should have the right to retire with dignity and security. Working people need to take up the demand of that earlier generation. Social Security must be expanded to fully live up to its name, and provide true retirement security for all.

THEREFORE, BE IT RESOLVED THAT THIS 76^th UE CONVENTION:  

1. Demands Congress address the country's retirement security crisis by expanding Social Security to pay retired workers 75 to 90 percent of their pre-retirement income;
2. Demands that our elected representatives reject all efforts to privatize Social Security, reduce benefits, undermine cost of living adjustments (COLA) or raise the retirement age, and that they return the retirement age for full Social Security to age 65;
3. Calls upon Congress to remove the cap on Social Security taxes so that all contribute the same percentage of earnings to the trust fund, and to tax unearned income (capital gains and investment income) on the same basis as wages and salaries;
4. Demands our elected officials reject all schemes to undermine our existing private and public-sector pension systems;
5. Urges locals and regions to actively support struggles to defend the pensions and retirement benefits of both public and private sector workers that are under attack;
6. Calls for the union at all levels to deepen discussions and coalition building with other unions, senior citizen organizations and allies including Alliance for Retired Americans, Social Security Works, National Committee to Preserve Social Security and Medicare, and other potential allies to build a broad movement for universal retirement security;
7. Calls upon Congress to require that all public-sector workers are covered by Social Security.

Despite the longest economic “recovery” in modern U.S. history, the outrageous income and wealth inequality in our country place us as one of the most unequal societies in the world. 95 percent of all economic growth since the Great Recession of 2008 has gone to the top one percent, with most working people seeing no real wage growth until very recently.

Indeed, mainstream economists have expressed astonishment at how slowly wages have grown even in the current period of sustained low unemployment, despite what the “laws” of the “free market” would predict. They have turned to once-obscure economic concepts like “monopsony” (labor markets dominated by a single employer) and some have even begun to reevaluate mainstream economics’ traditional hostility to labor unions. A 2018 study of historical data by four economists found conclusive evidence that the widespread unionization of the mid-20th century raised wages across the board for working people and was instrumental in creating the period of greatest prosperity and relative economic equality in U.S. history.

In addition to the increasing gap in income over the last few decades, the racial disparity of wealth has also increased. White families have 12 times the wealth of African Americans and 10 times the wealth of Latinxs. The predatory subprime mortgages pushed by banks to African Americans, Latinxs, and many other working-class home buyers in the 2000s resulted in a 48 percent drop in African-American wealth during the Great Recession. Latinx and African-American families also earn significantly less money than their white counterparts, lagging $18,000 and $28,000, respectively, behind the median white family income. 

Women’s income is only 80 percent of men’s income, with women of color receiving even less. The gender wealth gap is even more significant, with single women’s wealth being only 32 percent of single men’s, and women of color again faring even worse.

Fundamental political changes are needed to reverse this massive inequality of wealth.

Senator Bernie Sanders’s 2016 presidential campaign raised economic inequality as an important political issue, calling for a vast overhaul of the political and financial systems. In doing so, he excited a new generation of political activists. The “political revolution” inspired by his campaign has spread, with a wave of unabashedly pro-worker candidates winning election to positions from city council to the U.S. Congress. Sanders’ policy positions dominate the current Democratic presidential primary.

Bills and proposals from Sanders and his allies to enact Medicare for All (single-payer healthcare), raise the minimum wage to $15 per hour, establish free college tuition and abolish student debt would go a long way to relieve economic pressure on working-class families. The Green New Deal proposed by Representative Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez and Senator Ed Markey would create millions of good, union jobs while addressing the threat of climate change. The boldness of these policies has inspired even more ambitious proposals to direct our society’s wealth into other projects that are socially useful and create good jobs, including infrastructure, publicly-and-cooperatively-owned housing, and a social wealth fund.

Technological change continues to transform the way we work and the jobs that are available to us. The only effective way to deal with the challenges posed by the “future of work” is to increase workers’ power to fight for a fair share of the wealth we produce. Strengthening workers’ ability to organize unions through legislation like the Protecting the Right to Organize (PRO) Act and Senator Sanders’ Workplace Democracy Act is a good first step, and proposals to establish sectoral-level collective bargaining, like those advanced by former CWA president and long-time friend of UE Larry Cohen, deserve serious consideration and support from the labor movement.

THEREFORE, BE IT RESOLVED THAT THIS 76^th UE CONVENTION:

1. Demands Congress:
   1. Enact a federal jobs program to stimulate the economy by addressing climate change, investing in infrastructure, and assisting funding-starved state and local governments;
   2. Raise the federal minimum wage to $15 per hour by passing the Raise the Wage Act;
   3. Pass labor law reform, including the PRO Act and the Workplace Democracy Act, to restore and expand workers’ right to organize;
   4. Pass Medicare for All, single-payer healthcare legislation;
   5. Enact legislation to establish free public higher education and forgive student debt;
   6. Address the housing crisis by declaring a moratorium on home foreclosures and investing in public and cooperative affordable housing;
   7. Enact comprehensive financial regulations including eliminating offshore tax havens, taxing economic speculation, breaking up or nationalizing banks that are “too big to fail,” and reducing corporate influence in politics;
   8. Reform the tax system by restoring higher tax rates for the wealthy and corporations and passing the Robin Hood Tax on Wall Street transactions;
2. Calls on regions and locals to:
   1. Educate our members and communities about income and wealth inequality and policies that can address it;
   2. Work with and join organizations promoting a just economy;
   3. Articulate bargaining goals within a broader economic framework that calls for greater equality;
3. Encourages members to participate in local economic development initiatives to interject pro-worker perspectives into state and local government, such as Good Jobs First.

K-12 public education, one of the most fundamental cornerstones of a democratic society, is under direct attack. Privatization forces seek ill-gotten gains from public education. They set up charter schools that generate profits. They impose elaborate mandatory testing that provides significant revenue to testing companies. At the same time, state legislatures are starving public education of adequate funding, driving down the quality of schooling and creating a false perception that public schools provide subpar education.

Communities of color who have long been underserved by the public education system have become pawns in the privatization debate. An outcome of charters has been to further roll back the gains of the civil rights movement and more heavily segregate K-12 education by race and class.

Higher education is also under a privatization attack. Corporate-backed reformers are imposing profit-based models onto higher education. Professors are under tremendous pressure to bring funding into the university, rather than focusing on doing good academic work that will benefit the greater society. The labor protections that professors fought hard to achieve through the tenure system are under threat of being dismantled with increased exploitation of adjunct and other non-tenure track faculty.

At the same time, state legislatures are starving public universities of funding, which is pushing the cost of higher education onto the backs of individual students and their families, while university costs have continued to rise due to top-heavy, corporate-style administration. 44.7 million Americans are crippled by student loan debt. Overall student debt is now over $1.56 trillion, with average student debt over $38,000. The cost of college has risen eight times faster than wages over the last 40 years. It’s no surprise that 11.5 percent of student loans fall into delinquency or default, with a disproportionate number of those who default being low-income students or students of color who have been hoodwinked into attending private for-profit colleges and trade schools.

Those who pursue graduate education are doubly affected by the crisis in higher education. The median debt for graduate students is $57,600 while more and more academic workers with advanced degrees are being pushed into contingent adjunct positions where they make as little as one quarter what a tenure-track professor makes.

Workers who are paying off student loans are delaying the purchase of homes and cars, and putting off marriage and starting families, creating a further drag on the U.S. economy.

President Trump’s education plan calls for an end to subsidizing the interest on student loans, which would raise the cost of college, most negatively affecting low-income students. His plan for Medicaid would cut screenings and therapies currently provided to low-income and special education students. The proposed changes to Title I funding redistributes funds from public schools that serve working-class communities to charter and private schools, while simultaneously raising the budget for charters and voucher programs. His plan also drastically reduces the funding from Title II, which is designed for teacher development and class size reduction. All of these will have a disproportionate negative impact on African-American teachers. 

Attempts to turn professional educators into automatons carrying out an unrealistic one-size-fits-all teach-to-the-test curriculum have resulted in teacher turnovers of 30 percent after five years. The educational policy community has united behind the position that standardized testing does not measure educational quality. Data consistently shows that neighborhood schools outperform charter schools. But the profit-driven agenda of standardized testing and charters remains all too prevalent.

Public education is facing a crisis perpetuated by testing entities and charter schools that seek to profit off our children's futures. Public schools should be adequately funded with full-time, unionized, and tenure-protected educators.

THEREFORE, BE IT RESOLVED THAT THIS 76^th UE CONVENTION:

1. Demands Congress:
   1. Pass laws implementing free public higher education and student loan forgiveness for all;
   2. In the meantime, put a moratorium on all student loan defaults, introduce default forgiveness, implement measures so that loans can be repaid at no more than 10 percent of annual income, reduce student loan interest rates to the same rate available for banking entities, and ensure interest cannot accrue until after graduation;
   3. Maintain funding for Title II intended for professional development, mentoring programs, and class size reduction;
2. Demands the U.S. Department of Education:
   1. Bar the use of taxpayer-funded voucher programs that siphon public funds from public schools and funnel them to private and charter schools;
   2. Eliminate all high stakes testing;
   3. Work with borrowers to seek loan forgiveness if schools have deceived them or committed fraud;
3. Demands state legislators:
   1. Fully fund public education;
   2. Preserve tenure systems;
   3. Disconnect educational funding from property taxation to address economic and racial segregation;
4. Encourages regions and locals to actively lobby Congress and state legislatures on this program;
5. Demands that the NLRB uphold the 2016 decision granting teaching and research assistants at private universities legal protection to form unions;
6. Supports all campaigns that advocate universal access to free higher education.

UE has warned for years that when the government is given powers of domestic surveillance and “counterintelligence,” it can and will use them against ordinary, innocent Americans, particularly those who speak out against government policies, and especially those who represent a credible power base, such as the labor movement. We saw this during the McCarthy period in the 1940s and ‘50s when the combined forces of the federal government, big business, and their business union co-conspirators nearly destroyed the UE and progressive trade unionism.

Civil liberties are under attack. States are passing laws aimed at silencing protest. Police respond to peaceful protests decked out in military gear designed for war on a battlefield. The FBI and other law enforcement and intelligence agencies continue to spy on nonviolent social movements, often under the guise of “counter terrorism.” The Justice Department continues to use the Espionage Act, which was originally used to jail labor leaders like Eugene V. Debs for their opposition to World War I, to jail whistleblowers. As information about torture, extrajudicial executions, or mass surveillance is made public, the U.S. government responds by pursuing those who made the information public, branding their actions as being on par with those of spies and saboteurs.

While threats to civil liberties have existed no matter which party was in the White House, Donald Trump has ramped up these attacks. Trump has made clear he is intolerant of dissent. His administration has tried to muzzle public employees who disapprove of his policies. Trump has called the media the “enemy of the people.” He has praised torture, surveillance, and stop and frisk. Trump has appointed a key figure in the U.S. torture program head of the CIA. He has praised police brutality and called for an expansion of the death penalty. With Trump at the top, the green light has been given at all levels of government to attack basic democratic rights. 

Bosses try to instill fear in workers during union organizing campaigns — that is the kind of fear that the government has tried to spread across society as a whole. Corporations trying to defend their profit margins have been behind a number of these civil liberties abuses. Big business has pushed for laws to criminalize those who protest them or expose their misconduct. They hire private mercenary firms, modern day successors to the Pinkertons, who work with law enforcement to stamp out protest. When Walmart learned about protests being organized in support of striking workers, they reached out to the FBI’s Joint Terrorism Task Force. 

The most basic civil liberty is the right to live without fear of being harassed, beaten, or killed. African Americans and other people of color are disproportionately targeted by police and are much more likely than white people to be victims of police harassment and violence. The abundant and growing audiovisual record of law enforcement officers using excessive force against people of color when stopped for traffic or other minor civil infractions documents that race remains a major factor in depriving people of their civil liberties. Movements against police brutality, mass incarceration, and racism, such as Black Lives Matter, have been able to win some gains in recent years. The FBI has responded by distributing a threat assessment to law enforcement across the country claiming that opposition to racism or police brutality is likely to lead to violence against police.  

An increasing portion of Americans oppose the death penalty, and a growing number of states have abolished it. When evidence such as DNA testing reveals death row prisoners are innocent, it confirms our justice system is fundamentally flawed. The question of capital punishment is historically of great concern to union members. On numerous occasions our government has framed and executed labor leaders, including the Haymarket martyrs, Industrial Workers of the World leader Joe Hill, immigrant labor activists Sacco and Vanzetti, and the coal miners known as the Molly Maguires. Tom Mooney, who spoke to an early UE convention, and the legendary Big Bill Haywood, were spared the death penalty only after massive campaigns to save them.

The chilling effect of denials of our democratic freedoms curtails political debate within the U.S., limits the ability of all citizens to make democratic choices for the future of our country, and thereby undermines our livelihoods and living standards. It is clear that the fight to protect and regain civil liberties must continue regardless of which party controls the White House.

THEREFORE, BE IT RESOLVED THAT THIS 76^th UE CONVENTION:

1. Opposes any change in the law that would further undermine our right to defend the interests of working people, specifically including changes designed to make picket-line activity subject to federal prosecution;
2. Urges all locals and members to support organizations such as Defending Rights & Dissent, the National Lawyers Guild, the American Civil Liberties Union, the Committee to Stop FBI Repression, and the National Conference of Black Lawyers;
3. Demands Congress investigate revelations of political spying and disruption by the FBI and other federal agencies and pass legislation definitively outlawing these practices;
4. Opposes any laws designed to limit the right to protest;
5. Demands the end of use of the Espionage Act to prosecute whistleblowers and journalists;
6. Calls for legislation to protect our civil liberties in the workplace, including:
   1. Prohibiting random or blanket drug testing in the workplace;
   2. Banning telephone and internet monitoring of employees;
   3. Further restricting the use of lie detectors and other surveillance technologies in employment;
7. Calls for the rescinding of the Trump Administration’s new overly broad Hatch Act guidelines, which are designed to chill the constitutionally-protected speech of public employees;
8. Opposes preventive detention and Justice Department policies that allow for closed hearings, secret evidence, refusal to name those detained, elimination of attorney-client privilege, and long detentions without bond without any specific articulated reason;
9. Demands Congress reform the process for placing groups on terrorist lists to ensure that they have sufficient notice and a meaningful opportunity to respond to charges;
10. Supports legislation to strengthen the Freedom of Information Act, supports strong whistleblower protection legislation, and opposes efforts to intimidate or bar the press and other news media from reporting on government activities;
11. Supports repeal of McCarthy-era “speech crime” laws, including the Smith Act and the Subversive Activities Control Act, and opposes exclusion of foreigners based on political beliefs or memberships;
12. Supports the abolition of the death penalty and an end to mass incarceration.

The U.S. military budget continues to soar out of control with bipartisan support. The war in Afghanistan is now by far the longest in U.S. history. Threats or use of military force are still a regular feature of U.S. foreign policy. All of this is done at the expense of the needs of working people in the U.S. and throughout the world.

At $716 billion, the U.S. military budget is already larger than those of the next ten nations combined. Yet the argument between the Trump administration and the Democratic leadership in Congress is on whether to raise it by $34 billion or $17 billion. A top executive from Boeing has been running the Pentagon. An attempted audit of the military budget couldn’t be completed due to the huge sums that could not be accounted for. Congress appointed a commission to look at defense spending levels but most of the commission members had ties to the defense industry. President Trump is establishing a so-called “Space Force” as the latest boondoggle to justify even more military spending. He canceled a nuclear missile treaty with Russia in order to buy a whole new set of expensive armaments.

Fortunately a new coalition has arisen with a “People Over Pentagon” agenda calling for the military budget to be cut by $200 billion a year as well as a commitment that the U.S. never go to war again without congressional authorization. They are attempting to insert these long-overdue demands into the 2020 presidential campaign.

Our government’s involvement in wars and destabilization in the Middle East, Eastern Europe, Latin America and elsewhere makes us less safe. The two major U.S. wars of the past decade, Iraq and Afghanistan, while costing us billions of dollars and the lives of thousands of our young soldiers, have produced more extremism, more war, more instability, and more danger.

In the Middle East, the U.S. is involved in a tangled, contradictory web of alliances and wars. The U.S. Congress actually found the fortitude to invoke the War Powers Act for the first time, directing the Trump administration to end U.S. support for the brutal Saudi Arabian intervention in the Yemeni civil war. Trump, however, vetoed the resolution, ensuring more profits for bombmakers at the cost of continuing large-scale civilian deaths in Yemen.

In addition, Trump seems almost as intent on going to war with Iran as the Bush-Cheney administration was with Iraq. Trump canceled the nuclear arms control treaty we had with Iran and has clamped on severe economic sanctions that are themselves a form of warfare. In recent months, as the Trump administration has piled on a string of provocations and unsupported accusations, our European allies have been trying to tamp down the tensions since they recognize how much greater calamity a war with Iran would cause. But Trump seems happy to throw fuel on the fire, perhaps following a typical playbook of keeping enough tension to drive prices up for the benefit of Big Oil.

Meanwhile the situation of the Palestinians has been getting steadily worse. In the occupied West Bank and East Jerusalem, the right-wing Israeli government continues to confiscate homes and land to expand Israeli settlements. Since 1967 Israel has settled more than 750,000 of its citizens in the West Bank, and has been building a wall that separates neighboring towns. Farmers are being cut off from their fields and water supplies, which could soon wipe out Palestinian agriculture in the Jordan River Valley. At the same time Israel is treating Gaza as the world’s largest prison, with its residents trapped in abysmal economic and social conditions. All of this is illegal under international law, but Israel is now doing so with the full-throated support of the Trump administration.

Palestinian trade unions and civil society organizations have called for a worldwide campaign of boycotts to pressure Israel to end its apartheid rule over the Palestinians. The movement for Boycott, Divestment and Sanctions (BDS) is modeled after the 1980s international solidarity campaign that put economic pressure on South Africa’s government and helped end apartheid.

In recent years, working people throughout Latin America elected a number of pro-worker governments, many of which then came under attack from big business forces supported by U.S. administrations, including in Venezuela. U.S. sanctions have largely crippled the country’s economy but have not yet caused the elected government of President Nicolás Maduro to fall, so the world watched as Washington tried to anoint a weakly-supported opposition politician as the president of the country in early 2019, only to see the charade fall flat on its face when the Venezuelan military refused to rise up and install into power this representative of the rich elite.

Cuba poses no economic or military threat to the U.S. Our government has no justification for the economic blockade of Cuba. The blockade hurts workers in both countries. Jobs are lost, while U.S. manufacturers are denied a major market just 90 miles offshore. Although Obama had finally reestablished diplomatic relations between the two countries, this was destroyed by the Trump Administration, which suspended diplomatic relations once again in 2017. Congress has continued to fail to lift the economic embargo. 

Foreign and military policies should defend the interests of working people, not the wealthy. UE has long supported the labor movement promoting its own foreign policy ideas based on diplomacy and labor solidarity. We are proud to be a founder of US Labor Against the War, which advances such a policy. Our government should not destabilize democracy on behalf of billionaires. It should promote peace, jobs, and justice for all.

THEREFORE, BE IT RESOLVED THAT THIS 76^th UE CONVENTION:  

1. Calls on the union at all levels to: 
   1. Promote involvement with US Labor Against the War (USLAW) and support About Face, formerly known as Iraq Veterans Against the War (IVAW);
   2. Inform and engage members on the need to change U.S. foreign policy to promote diplomacy, democracy, and workers rights;
2. Demands the U.S. government invest in peace and build economic security by:
   1. Reducing the military budget while improving wages, healthcare, and pensions of soldiers and veterans;
   2. Reappropriating defense savings into transportation, housing, healthcare, education, renewable resource development, or other peaceful infrastructure;
   3. The creation of a fund to guarantee any worker or soldier displaced by conversion from a war economy to a peace economy up to four years’ living allowance and educational expenses; 
3. Further demands the U.S. government:
   1. End incentives for corporations to profit from exporting weapons abroad;
   2. Cease military aid to countries with disgraceful human rights records;
   3. Cease all funding for the National Missile Defense program, cancel plans for a U.S. Space Force, and support efforts at the United Nations to ban all weapons in space;
   4. Cease using U.S. military and intelligence agencies in interventions against sovereign nations which pose no threat to the American people;
   5. End the use of taxpayer money for further militarization of Latin America;
   6. Cease all harassment of the democratically-elected government of Venezuela;
   7. Cease the use of drones to attack foreign nationals or U.S. citizens;
   8. Reinstate the agreement negotiated with Iran which prevents its development of nuclear weapons;
4. Welcomes initiatives by the Congressional Black and Progressive Caucuses to redefine federal budget priorities;
5. Demands the U.S. government end all military aid to Israel and pressure Israel to: 
   1. End the occupation of the West Bank and East Jerusalem and the siege of Gaza;
   2. Negotiate a peace agreement on the basis of equality, democracy, and human rights for the Palestinian and Israeli people, including Palestinian self-determination and the right of return for refugees;
6. Endorses the BDS movement and urges the union at all levels to become engaged in BDS and the movement for peace, justice and equality between the Palestinians and Israelis;
7. Opposes all efforts to outlaw BDS and otherwise punish non-violent critics of Israeli policies;
8. Supports the struggle of our sister union Zenroren to halt the repeal of Article 9 of Japan’s constitution, to close all U.S. military bases in Japan, and to halt all U.S. efforts to convert the Japanese Self-Defense Force to offensive purposes;
9. Demands Congress and the President:
   1. Normalize relations with the Cuban government; 
   2. End the blockade on trade and travel for Americans; 
   3. End pressure against countries that wish to trade freely with Cuba; 
   4. Cease funding and support for Cuban-exile terrorist groups.

In 1983, UE members on strike at a copy shop in Amherst, Massachusetts took control of their workplace after the owners shut down rather than meet their demands: They started their own worker-owned-and-operated co-op, Collective Copies (Local 274). It is now one of the largest and most successful copy shops in Western Massachusetts, paying good union wages with comprehensive benefits.

Since then, workers at Vermont food co-ops Hunger Mountain in Montpelier and City Market in Burlington have organized with UE, forming Locals 255 and 203. New Era Windows, formed by former Republic Windows employees in Chicago (Local 1110), was created after two plant occupations and a successful campaign to purchase the machinery and materials from the former owner Serious Materials. Workers at the East End Co-Op in Pittsburgh also organized in 2015, forming UE Local 667. The skill and tenacity of these UE members is an inspiration to us all.

Cooperative enterprises can offer a democratic model of economic development because they are accountable to local communities, not to distant investors. However, cooperatives — both consumer and worker-owned — are not immune from unjust labor practices. Consumer co-ops in particular are facing a coordinated effort by organizations such as the National Cooperative Grocers (NCG) to corporatize their model. UE fully supports the organization of co-op workers, not only to win justice on the job, but to keep cooperatives accountable to their mission and communities.

The Authentic Labor Front (FAT) in Mexico has a significant cooperative sector representing workers in the textile, agricultural, and insurance sectors. The UE and the FAT have exchanged delegations of co-op members. UE co-op members have also met with Zenroren co-op members to share notes, experiences, and ideas. 

As a rank-and-file union, UE has 83 years of experience operating as a democratic organization. UE is a natural home for workers in consumer and worker-owned cooperatives. UE co-ops share our union’s proud history and fighting spirit, benefiting from our status as a union with vision, integrity, and commitment that works in a principled way with other organizations in building a better world.

THEREFORE, BE IT RESOLVED THAT THIS 76^th UE CONVENTION: 

1. Supports the transition of capitalist businesses to worker ownership and supports legislation to facilitate this process;
2. Supports the unionization of consumer and producer cooperatives;
3. Encourages UE cooperatives to engage in solidarity work with each other, analogous to the conference boards we have for other UE employers;
4. Supports strengthening our relationship with the FAT’s and Zenroren’s co-op sectors;
5. Encourages the national union, locals, and members to utilize and promote the products and services of UE, FAT, and Zenroren cooperatives.

America’s family farmers are struggling to survive the one-two punch of climate change and Trump’s disastrous trade policy. Farmers are increasingly buffeted by both floods and droughts, making it extremely difficult to grow crops with any predictability. At the same time, Trump’s “easily won” trade with China has instead led to runaway tariffs that are costing the American consumer and have resulted in the loss of many billions of dollars in lost sales of U.S. agricultural products to China, which has increased their exports from Russia and South America rather than be exposed to these tariffs. Trump has provided some subsidies to farmers to make up for the loss in sales, but these are going disproportionately to the wealthiest farm owners. Many analysts now believe the U.S. agricultural sector is on the precipice of the first major crisis since the 1980s. 

Corporate farming is a growing threat. Its main objective is to strip the land of resources in order to maximize profit. Massive industrial animal feedlots have negatively impacted the environment and squeezed out family farmers. In 1980, there were 65,000 hog farmers in Iowa — there are now less than 6,000. Wisconsin has lost an average of 500 dairy farms a year for the last 15 years. It is estimated that the U.S. loses 330 family farms each week — a direct result of U.S. and state policy that supports corporate farming over family farmers.

Farmers and workers have a strong mutual interest in an America where economic growth and social justice have higher priority than rewarding corporations, their officers, and their investors. A healthy agricultural system based on strong family farms is essential to America’s economic and social well being. The U.S. cannot and must not depend on an agricultural system dominated by giant agribusiness and food conglomerates. The profit-driven push of agribusiness for the use of pesticides and genetically modified organisms (GMOs) poses a serious environmental threat to America’s land and water. It also further limits the market for the products from U.S. farmers due to the understandable reluctance of other countries to accept GMOs. 

The jobs of tens of thousands of workers in the agricultural implement industry, some of whom are UE members, depend on a healthy farm economy. The survival of America’s small rural towns where many UE members work and live are threatened by the crisis in American agriculture. In farm belt states like Iowa, Illinois, Minnesota, South Dakota and Wisconsin, corporations are using the depressed family farm economy as leverage to extract concessions from organized workers and to continue the exploitation of the unorganized.

Congress has failed to act on a farm bill that addresses not only the needs of the family farmer but also those in need of assistance. Republican congressmen frequently attack the food stamp program with the false claim that it is rife with corruption. In reality the farm bill tends to be a give-away to Big Ag after they have supplied campaign funds to their supporters. 

Solidarity among trade unionists, family farmers, and farmworkers is crucial to forging an agricultural policy based on justice and prosperity. Agricultural policy should emphasize support for the family farm, decent wages for farmworkers, restrictions on the growth of corporate farming, and an end to trade policies that do not protect the farmer and the consumer. 

THEREFORE, BE IT RESOLVED THAT THIS 76^th UE CONVENTION: 

1. Supports an agricultural policy that will allow farmworkers and farm families a fair return for their efforts and a decent standard of living; 
2. Demands that Congress: 
   1. Pass a farm bill that deals with the problems faced by family farmers and the poor 
   2. End the president’s ability to impose tariffs without congressional approval;
3. Demands that Congress and the President end their giveaways to large agricultural corporations;
4. Calls upon UE locals and regions to work with farmer and farmworker organizations in activities that promote justice for America’s farmers and workers.

UE General President Peter Knowlton will be retiring with over three decades of service to UE as a field organizer, district and then regional president, and national officer, though as Knowlton is quick to remind anyone he's around these days, this is not the end of his contributions to the union — he plans to stay active as a retiree.

Knowlton is known throughout the union for his willingness, even eagerness, to debate and discuss difficult issues; his passion for UE's progressive values and democratic practices; and above all, his boundless optimism.

Knowlton had a wide variety of organizing and social-movement experience prior to coming to UE in the mid-80s, in the student, environmental, and Native American solidarity movements. Working for a Comprehensive Education and Training Act (CETA) weatherization program in Minneapolis in the 1970s, he saw first-hand the promise of environmental policy to create good union jobs and bring them to communities suffering from marginalization and unemployment. As a union cab driver, he and his 600 coworkers tried to buy out their company and re-establish it as a unionized worker co-op.

In 1982, Knowlton was hired to be the state director for AFSCME in South Dakota, which brought him to the state during the lengthy battle UE was waging for a first contract at the Litton microwave oven factory in Sioux Falls. UE and AFSCME were among the most politically and organizationally active unions in the state, and in 1983, they combined forces to help elect the first woman — a labor friendly candidate — to the Sioux Falls City Commission.

In 1985, Knowlton joined the UE staff and was sent to Massachusetts where he was involved in one plant closing struggle after another. He helped develop groundbreaking tactics at JC Rhodes, where UE Local 284 came remarkably close to convincing the city of New Bedford to use eminent domain (the legal right of government to requisition property for the good of the community) to keep the plant open. The eminent domain legislation passed two of three required readings, but on the last reading the mayor betrayed the workers.

Knowlton was not only central to this innovative campaign to preserve good jobs in the face of corporate greed, he also worked with then-UE News editor Peter Gilmore to produce a booklet, Refuse to Lose: Eminent Domain and the JC Rhodes Campaign, so that other UE members and other unions could learn from Local 284’s experience.

Knowlton was elected president of District 2 in 2001. During his first few years on the General Executive Board, the union made a number of difficult decisions to address the union’s finances. While Knowlton and the district he led did not agree with all of those decisions and debated them vigorously, that disagreement did not lead to divisiveness.

As District 2 president, Knowlton was instrumental in convincing the members of the Connecticut Independent Labor Union to affiliate with UE as amalgamated UE Local 222. In 2005, he helped guide the union through the transition from districts to regions — after which he served for a further decade as president of the Northeast Region.

Knowlton was elected General President at UE’s 2015 convention after the retirement of General President Bruce Klipple. During his term he has consistently encouraged UE members to discuss not only the future of the UE, but a working-class vision for the labor movement, the country, and humanity itself. He has brought UE leadership to the newly re-energized struggle for Medicare for All, single-payer healthcare, a longtime UE political goal that Knowlton consistently prioritized as a district and regional president. He has also prioritized the pressing issue of climate change, and the possibilities of reviving good, union jobs while tackling this existential threat to humanity. Knowlton has played a key role in developing and nurturing UE's relationship with the Canadian union Unifor and the resulting North American Solidarity Project. He worked hard at restoring and creating strong relationships for UE with a number of progessive unions in the U.S.

The delegates to this 76^th UE Convention extend to him a heartfelt thanks for his long service to UE, and our best wishes for a long, happy and healthy retirement.

The Policy Action Committee of the 76^th National Convention moves the following plan of action in the period up to the next national convention.

Independent Rank-And-File Political Action

1. The national union encourage the locals to obtain detailed information and provide a list of state legislative websites and social media for elected lawmakers and candidates for office from UE areas, for use in ongoing political action efforts including elections;
2. The national union encourages the union at all levels to emphasize basic political action education, including the need for effective labor legislation and emphasizing political action at the state and local level;
3. The national union encourages the union at all levels to get active in the presidential race in support of Bernie Sanders at berniesanders.com and the 2020 Labor for Bernie campaign at laborforbernie2020.org 
4. The national union encourages active resistance to the current political attacks using aggressive tactics, regaining lost ground through initiatives that address working people’s direct interest such as increasing the minimum wage;
5. Each local shall, through legislative action committee, inform members about candidates running for election, expose hidden agendas and anti-union sentiment, provide information for union members, and promote pro-union candidates;
6. The national union shall provide materials to educate the membership on the need to register and vote in the 2019 and 2020 state and national elections, and encourage locals to carry out workplace activities to ensure that members are informed, registered to vote, and turn out to vote on election day, including addressing transportation and procedural barriers;
7. The national union shall update UE political action materials and workshops;
8. The national union encourages the union at all levels to conduct state-level coordinated political action in the 2019 and 2020 elections by involving members, youth, retirees, and other community organizations as possible;
9. The national union shall use ueunion.org, the UE News and UE social media to report political action success stories to counter voter apathy and improve activism, and to educate the members on the need for defensive action by the members when necessary;
10. The national union encourages locals to invite elected lawmakers and candidates to meet with UE members in our workplaces, attend union meetings, town hall and community meetings, using elected allies where possible to accomplish this;
11. The national union shall use ueunion.org, the UE News and UE social media to advertise events of interest to members including Labor Notes conferences and trainings, the Jobs with Justice national meeting, and others;
12. The national union encourages locals in a geographical and/or state area to educate members with respect to step by step process on how to effectively communicate with legislators or other elected officials;
13. Encourages locals to create a political/legislative action committee if feasible.

Healthcare for All

1. The national union shall expand the use of our workshop “How to Fix Healthcare” to include more specific straightforward examples of the effects of our corrupted and broken healthcare system that can be used to convince others with simple and direct fast fact flyers;
2. The national union shall update ueunion.org and UE social media to provide more ready to print materials and share creative tactics and strategies to engage the membership and the community in the Medicare for All campaign including but not limited to community canvassing based on the National Nurses United model;
3. The national union shall share literature with membership who are aging into Medicare as a means to get them involved in the fight to protect and improve Medicare;
4. The national union shall continue to educate the membership on the need for a single-payer healthcare system to provide a real solution to our health care disaster;
5. The national union calls on the union to work with veterans organizations to oppose cuts to their medical care, to fully fund veterans medical benefits, and to strongly oppose any efforts to privatize the Veterans’ Administration.