Teamsters

Grocery Teamsters Face Firing And Retaliation For Exercising Their Rights

March 11, 2023 Luis Feliz Leon, Labor Notes. Organize! Chicago, Illinois, Teamsters, Unions, Worker Rights and Jobs

Workers couldn’t wear a sticker or button, because what if it fell into the fruits and vegetables they packaged for the Anthony Marano Company, a major distributor of produce in Chicago and the greater Midwest for restaurants and grocery chains including Aldi’s, Sysco, and Pete’s Fresh Market? They couldn’t do a red T-shirt day; the temperatures are frigid in the warehouse, and workers must cover themselves in layers to keep warm. But they are allowed to wear hats over their hairnets. Luckily, there was a crafty person on the organizing team. When Latino Teamsters in Local 703 needed to take collective action to build unity and confidence after the company banned them from distributing union leaflets, they created baseball caps—emblazoned with an equestrian Teamster logo and the Chicago city colors (blue, white, and red).

Teamsters President Sean O’Brien Vows To ‘Pulverize’ UPS

November 3, 2022 Stephen Franklin, In These Times. Resist! Labor Movement, Labor Unions, Teamsters, UPS

Chicago — Spelling out union strategy for an all-important contract with UPS, Sean O’Brien worked his way up to a fiery pitch. “We gotta strategize, we gotta organize, and then we gotta pulverize UPS,” he declared. The room erupted into cheers, applause and fists clenched upward. The presentation by the short, muscular, bald-headed, fourth-generation Teamster from Boston, a union member since his teenage years, felt like a shop steward’s typical nitty-gritty warm-up speech. Listening near the back of the conference, Dan Campbell, 69, a retired Teamster from Wisconsin, felt lifted by what he heard. He liked O’Brien’s “hard-nosed” tone and especially liked his call “for everyone to get on board and row with all hands.” O’Brien is president of the one-million-plus Teamsters Union.

New Leadership, New Direction In Major Midwest Teamsters Local

October 28, 2022 Beth Breslaw, Labor Notes. Organize! Labor Movement, Teamsters, Unions, Worker Rights and Jobs

Members overwhelmingly elected new leadership in the 14,000-member Teamsters Local 135, where Dustin Roach and the 135 Members First Slate won with 68 percent of the vote. The election is a triumph for grassroots action and rank-and-file power, after an intense grassroots member-to-member campaign. Local 135 is one of the biggest locals in the Teamsters, representing members across Indiana, Ohio, and Michigan as well as 2,000 flight attendants nationwide at Republic Airlines. Until recently, no one could have seen this change coming to a local that was tightly controlled by officers and dominated from the top down. But Local 135 members organized for change from the bottom up—and now they’re in the driver’s seat.

With Nationwide Rallies, UPS Teamsters Kick Off Their 2023 Contract Campaign

August 11, 2022 Luigi Morris, Left Voice. Organize! Labor Union, Teamsters, UPS, Worker Rights and Jobs

Last week, 25 years after UPS workers last went on strike in 1997, the UPS Teamsters kicked off their contract negotiation campaign with rallies around the country. Their current contract expires in July 2023 and negotiations for a new contract have begun. In New York City alone, rallies and actions took place across 14 UPS facilities. Workers are demanding an end to excessive overtime, an end to the two-tier system, higher pay for part-time warehouse workers, more full-time jobs, job security for feeders and package drivers, ending the surveillance and harassment from the bosses, and a heat exhaustion and injury prevention plan to combat against the extreme weather we have been experiencing. For UPS Teamsters, this contract struggle is an opportunity to roll back the defeats of the current contract, including the two-tier system, which was undemocratically imposed by the Hoffa leadership onto members, the majority of whom had voted no of the tentative agreement.

Teamsters Edge Closer To A National Work Stoppage At Costco

August 5, 2022 International Brotherhood of Teamsters. Resist! costco, Strike, Teamsters, Worker Rights and Jobs

Washington - Costco Teamsters are one step closer to a nationwide work stoppage following another day of contentious negotiations for a new national contract. The Teamsters are bargaining with the company this week for the first time since members overwhelmingly rejected Costco’s “last, best and final” contract offer in June. “Our members at Costco will stand up for their rights and withhold their labor if necessary,” said Sean M. O’Brien, Teamsters General President. “As always, if our members decide to act, they will have the backing of the 1.2-million member International Brotherhood of Teamsters behind them.” In May, the Teamsters Costco National Negotiating Committee unanimously recommended a “no” vote against the company’s contract offer. On June 21, Costco Teamsters rejected the national contract offer by over 93 percent.

UPenn Teamsters Defeat Two-Tier

July 23, 2022 Liana Kallman and Alexandra Bradbury, Labor Notes. Organize! Higher Education, Pennsylvania, Teamsters, Unions, Worker Rights and Jobs

Philadelphia, Pennsylvania - Teamsters Local 115 members at the University of Pennsylvania are celebrating a contract victory that eliminates two-tier pay for housekeepers, over the resistance of their own union officials. “In my 31 years here, this is the best contract I’ve seen,” said member Theresa Wible. “We haven’t seen raises like this since the ’80s, and I’ve never seen our union hall this packed.” The 550 campus Teamsters are mostly housekeepers, and 250 of them had been stuck on a permanent bottom tier. The five-year contract, ratified June 29, puts every Teamster at Ivy League UPenn on a progression to top pay. This year the first tier is making $25.12 an hour and the second tier is at $20.90, but by the end of the contract every housekeeper will get $28.68.

This New Teamsters Union Boss Could Start The Biggest Strike In Decades

March 23, 2022 Chris Isidore, MSN. Resist! Strike, Teamsters, Unions, Worker Rights and Jobs

You might not know Sean O'Brien. But he is poised to shake up the US economy in a way no one else has in recent memory. O'Brien was sworn in Tuesday as the new general president of the 1.3-million member International Brotherhood of Teamsters, succeeding James Hoffa, son of the union's most infamous president. The younger Hoffa held the job 23 years, far longer than his father ran the union. O'Brien, a self-described "militant," is vowing to take a much harsher line with employers than his predecessor did. And that could lead to a strike at the nation's largest union employer when the Teamsters' UPS contract expires on July 31 2023. If that happens, it would be the nation's largest and most disruptive strike in several decades.

Sanitation Workers Win Raise After Going On Strike

February 19, 2022 James Stout, In These Times. Resist! Sanitation Workers, Strike, Teamsters, Worker Rights and Jobs

Chula Vista, Calif. - “Who are we?” Teamsters! “What do we want?” Contract! “When do we want it?” Now! The sanitation workers of Teamsters Local 542 were still in good voice three weeks into their strike, which began Dec. 17, 2021, even as Republic Services started bringing in nonunion out-of-staters as garbage piled up. Republic had refused the Teamsters’ demands for so long that the city of Chula Vista declared a public health emergency because of the amount of uncollected refuse. Close to 300 workers, many of them Latino or Black, were on strike across three different San Diego County locations. “We want to go back to work,” said Chula Vista picketer Ladere Hampton, “so that we can clean up the city.”

Teamsters United Takes The Wheel

November 20, 2021 Alexandra Bradbury, Labor Notes. Organize! Amazon, Teamsters, Unions, Worker Rights and Jobs

A new administration will soon take the helm of the 1.3 million-member Teamsters union. The Teamsters United slate swept to victory in this week's vote count, beating out their rivals 2 to 1. It’s the first time in almost a quarter-century that a coalition backed by Teamsters for a Democratic Union has taken the driver’s seat in the international union. The incoming president is Sean O’Brien, leader of New England Joint Council 10. He says his top priorities are to unite the rank and file to take on employers, organize Amazon and other competitors in the union’s core industries, and withdraw support from politicians who don’t deliver on union demands. Essential to organizing at Amazon or anyplace else, O’Brien argues, is winning enviable contracts for the existing Teamsters.

At A Convention Like No Other, Teamster Challengers Turn A Corner

July 15, 2021 Alexandra Bradbury, Labor Notes. Organize! Democracy, Teamsters, Unions, Worker Rights and Jobs

This was a Teamsters convention like no other—and not just because it was held online, avoiding the usual Las Vegas spectacle where a few brave reformers run a gauntlet of booing red-vested delegates. Even in person, the 2021 convention wouldn’t have gone down that way. The opposition slate didn’t just squeak past the 5 percent of delegates required to get on the ballot, as it often has before. This time it pulled half the votes—reflecting a power shift in the union. All 1.3 million Teamsters have the right to vote on their top officers. Now that the slates are nominated, members will be mailed a ballot on October 4; votes will be counted November 15. At the convention, members of the durable reform movement Teamsters for a Democratic Union and their allies achieved constitutional amendments they’ve been seeking for decades.

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