Over the last week leading up to May Day, UE members have participated in three mass calls with other organizations and unions across the country. Local 256 President Lauren Chua spoke on the No War, No ICE, Free Palestine May Day Mass Call on Monday, April 20 to explain how her local is incorporating anti-war demands into their May Day plans. UE General President Scott Slawson spoke on the May Day Strong Labor Call on April 21 to explain how organized workers can not only change their workplaces but the world around them. GLU-UE Local 1105 President Ben Lewis spoke on a Hands Off Higher Education May Day call on April 22 entitled “Students and Workers Rise Up on May Day”alongside Senator Bernie Sanders and other labor leaders in academia. On each of the calls, UE members illustrated how all of our struggles are connected, and that an injury to one is an injury to all.
On the anti-war call on Monday, Chua said, “The broader anti-war movement, including the efforts we made during the encampments, depends on our ability to build organization, whether in our workplaces or other communities… Anti-war organizing cannot be separated from workplace organizing, especially in higher education, because ultimately the same group of billionaires who are driving the war on Iran are also defunding education and threatening our jobs and futures.” In her speech, she emphasized the ties between the bosses in higher education and the military industrial complex. Chua also went on to say that her local was looking forward to May Day so they could join the millions of workers calling for no work, no school, and no shopping while attacks on working people everywhere continue.
On the labor call on Tuesday, Slawson called on workers to keep the organizing momentum up not only going into May Day but after it passes. In his speech, he also referenced the power that unions used to hold. He said, “Unions were the one proven thing that has created political and economic stability. We had the power to help shape the future. It was a power government and corporate interests feared.” The ultra-wealthy worked hard to dismantle that power, he said. “It’s time we reclaim that power. It’s time to organize the unorganized.”
On Wednesday, Senator Sanders opened the “Students and Workers Rise Up on May Day” call by explaining that the workers of the world are winning the fight against the billionaires but that we must keep fighting. The Senator praised the organizing work that UE has been doing in every sector of work. He said, “What May Day symbolizes is that we are all coming together to improve our lives, our children’s lives, and for our elderly.”
Lewis, a graduate worker at the University of Minnesota and president of Local 1105, spoke to the hundreds on the mass call about the organizing he and his local had done alongside other unions and organizations in Minneapolis following the murders of Renée Good and Alex Pretti. Lewis said, “We at UE know the power workers are able to wield when we stand together, and what better time than now to do just that?” He went on to name the many types of people on the call, from professors to custodians to students. He said that now is the time to wield our power. “Because our bosses aren’t going to be the ones to fight for us. In Minnesota it wasn’t our university president walking the streets with a whistle protecting her neighbors and documenting ICE’s crimes. CEO’s weren’t hopping on their laptops at night to plate check suspicious vehicles in our community. Those were the workers who did that.” Lewis ended his speech by calling on everyone to push back against the rising tide of fascism, saying that the workers in higher education were skilled and equipped to lead the fight.
UE leaders on each of the mass calls emphasized the importance of union power and workers standing up for one another. They called on people to not work, not shop, and not attend school on May Day. They explained how connecting to other unions and organizations in the community is needed to expand the fight. UE members are leading the way and taking an exemplary role in organizing to make the world around them better for working people.