Weekly Education and Analysis on Current Events

Zinnia

Zinnia

Category: Labor

  • Massachusetts Trash Collectors Fighting for Better Pay, Employers allow Strike to Continue for 7th Day

    Republic Services Workers represented by Teamsters Local 25 have entered their seventh day of strikes across Massachusetts. According to their union, trash collectors across the state are demanding higher wages, better health coverage, and stronger labor protections.

    Teamsters Local 25 has made it clear that they are seeking the same wages as other trash collection services in the region, ensuring that employers properly compensate their employees. The Union has also stated that they are committed to negotiating in good faith and that they are demanding fair wages and benefits for the workers.

    The power to end the strike rests upon the employers and it is their duty to ensure that their workers are compensated fairly for the work they do. The buildup of trash in local communities is on the fault of management and their inability to pay their hardworking employees their fair share for the work they do each and every day.

    Strikes are never the first action that a union takes when negotiating for dignified wages and benefits. They are the culmination of months, or even years long efforts to stall negotiations on behalf of the employers. Unions regularly engage in good faith negotiations while workers fulfill their daily obligations, and in fact, many union contracts are won without the need for a strike when employers respectfully meet the demands of their own workforce. Ultimately, if a strike is deemed necessary by the workers and their union, it is often because the employers have failed to engage in good faith negotiations and have demonstrated no desire to listen to workers’ demands. For many of these hardworking employees, there may be no other option left if management has repeatedly demonstrated an unwillingness to negotiate.

    Each strike demonstrates that it is the workers who keep society running. The fact that trash is beginning to build up just days after workers called a strike goes to show the amount of work that these employees put in each and every single day. It is only when the employers fail on their part to ensure that their workers are properly compensated that trash begins to buildup.

  • Trump’s Big Beautiful Bill is Disastrous for Working Americans

    After receiving majority vote in both the House and the Senate, Donald Trump is set to sign the Big Beautiful Bill into law on Friday, July 4, 2025.

    The consequences of this bill, once in effect, will be absolutely disastrous for working Americans, cutting social spending by over $1 Trillion, including over $900 billion in cuts to medicaid and almost $300 Billion in cuts to food assistance programs. It will also extend trillions in Tax cuts which will disproportionately benefit the wealthy at the cost of the now gutted social programs that benefitted working Americans.

    It is estimated that about 17 million Americans will lose access to medicaid coverage, threatening long term health and in many cases, their lives. Many rural hospitals also receive funding and reimbursements through medicaid. Lack of stable funding poses a serious threat to their ability to stay operational. A Hospital in rural Nebraska has already announced its imminent closure due to a foreseeable lack in funding from the passage of this bill. This will push more demand to hospitals in more dense regions who likewise, will face similar funding cuts. Hospitals across the country will face even more strain on an already failing system.

    Medicaid also covers 60% of patients in nursing homes, threatening access to care to a majority of our nations elderly who receive care, increasing the cost of family care that many Americans rely on.

    The bill also includes an additional $175 billion in funding for “border security” operations, bringing the operational budget for entities like ICE at levels which surpass almost every single standing Army in the world, excluding the U.S. and China. This budget will be used to expand the capacity of detention facilities and to hire more personnel. Keep this additional $175 Billion budget in mind as the administration ramps up what it has stated to be the largest deportation operation in U.S. history.

    Increasingly dehumanizing rhetoric and an additional 175 Billion Dollars.

    Additionally, the bill will allot an extra $150 billion to the defense budget, bringing military spending just shy of about $1 Trillion. Regardless of what the money is spent on, it will go to benefit arms and defense sales for weapons manufacturers, deepening the entrenchment of the Military Industrial Complex while leaving behind the sick and hungry in the very same bill.

    The new budget also incorporates plentiful small text provisions that haven’t made much noise but still none the less chew away at everyday working Americans. A few of these additional provisions include a restructuring of student loan repayment plans, increasing monthly payments on those who sought personal advancement, eligibility for private space projects to receive public funds and tax free investments, $45 billion in extra funding for private prisons for ice detention centers, eligibility for private corporations to write of additional capital investments at the cost of public tax dollars, the rolling back of clean energy investments, and so on.

    While proponents have claimed that the bill is a pro-American, pro-working class budget, the amount saved in taxes will be nowhere near what has been taken away from health insurance, hospital funding, elder care, food assistance programs, etc. Working Americans will bear the full weight of this bill while the wealthiest in the nation enjoy permanent, trillion dollar tax cuts.

    Keep in mind what this money can be used for instead of lining the pockets of the already ultra-wealthy. The Recent Democratic Mayoral nominee in New York City, Zohran Mamdani, has shown that a single city alone can provide universal childcare, free busses, and affordable housing projects all by increasing the corporate tax rate by a few percentage points. Americans can enjoy stable housing, fast and free transportation, undeniable healthcare, childcare to relieve stress on new parents, food assistance programs, elder care, a hospital within reach for every American, quality education for every student, and so much more. But instead, our politicians chose to prioritize the greed of those who can afford all of the aforementioned dignities without making a dent on their personal fortunes.

  • Why the Working Class Should Be Worried About the Case of Khalil Mahmoud

    Why the Working Class Should Be Worried About the Case of Khalil Mahmoud

    Khalil is a legal permanent resident of the United States. Both legal and undocumented people within the U.S. territories are entitled to Constitutional protections such as the First, Fifth and Sixth Amendments (freedom of speech, freedom from unreasonable search and seizures, due process and right to counsel).

    Khalil was arrested on March 8, 2025 and set to be deported. The government claimed that he was a threat to the United States due to his involvement in anti-war protests in support of Palestine. The government claimed that Khalil was engaging in anti-semitism and supporting Hamas, an organization deemed a terrorist organization by the U.S. government. The Judge presiding over Khalil’s case ordered the government to produce evidence for its detention and potential deportation of Khalil.

    On April 10, 2025, the government submitted a memo signed by Secretary of State, Marco Rubio, in support of its position to deport Khalil. The memo essentially states that under INA section 237(a)(4)(C)(I), the Secretary of State must personally determine that the “alien’s” presence or activities would compromise a compelling U.S. foreign policy interest, and deem the person deportable.

    This is clearly a subjective test as to what constitutes an activity or presence that compromises a compelling U.S. foreign policy interest.

    Although, this would be subject to a court’s review, it nonetheless raises serious concerns about the reach of the government. If the government is allowed to subjectively label a person’s presence or activities as compromising a compelling U.S. foreign interest, it opens the door to authoritarianism.

    If the government is allowed to violate a lawful permanent resident’s first amendment rights, will this then transpire to U.S. citizens? The answer is yes! If the government is allowed to prioritize so-called foreign policy interests over lawful permanent residents then it takes us a step closer to allow the government to prioritize “foreign policy interests” over U.S. citizens.

    Although in this case the consequence is detention and deportation, the alternative for a U.S. citizen could easily be detention and/or prohibition of their first amendment rights.

    How does this affect the working class?

    There was a time in the U.S. when being associated with the communist party or even communist beliefs led to government persecution and deportations. This period is referred to as the “Red Scare of the 1920’s.” Most importantly, labor strikes were considered a sign of communist influence and labor unions were targeted. It may appear that Unions would not be a target in the present day, as they are now widely accepted. However, Trump has shown his lack of support for labor unions.

    If labor unions were to organize and there is a rise of labor unrest and/or strikes, we can see how easily the government can deem the strikes as compromising compelling U.S. foreign policy interests, as it relates to trade and tariffs. This would significantly reduce the power and influence of the working class.

    These fears extend to anybody beyond the labor movement as well. Should any American be deemed a threat for any reason, even without evidence, they may be subject to the interests of the state without proper constitutional protections.

  • March on Washington over U.S. support for Israeli Genocide of Palestinians

    March on Washington over U.S. support for Israeli Genocide of Palestinians

    On Saturday April 5th 2025, thousands showed up in Washington D.C. to protest the ongoing genocide by Israel against the Palestinians. The event featured many speakers who highlighted the history and struggles of the Palestinian people as well as the goal for Palestinian liberation. The march was hosted by a series of organizations under the “March on Washington” banner, saying this about their movement:

    “This movement is made of students, workers, teachers, artists, activists, healthcare workers, tech workers and people of conscience all over the world who will not back down in the face of repression and intimidation, and will never back down so long as Gaza is under attack. That’s why on April 5th we are standing up to Trump and his ethnic cleansing plan for Gaza, we are standing up to repression, and we are standing up to the US’s continued facilitation of the genocide in Gaza. We demand a permanent ceasefire and an arms embargo now!”

    The goal is to encourage the U.S. government to withdraw its support as the primary supplier of military and financial aid to the Israeli government, which provides the Israeli Government with the means to conduct military operations in civilian centers. The U.S. government supplies Israel with about 69% of its arms, including bombs, missiles, jets, ammunitions and small arms, to include a few.

    The U.S. withdrawal of that support would mean the inability for the Israeli government to conduct its military operations on its current scale, which has resulted largely in civilian causalities, leading to about 50 thousand deaths of children, parents, reporters, and first responders.

    Additionally, U.S. funding to Israel has reached about $18 billion in military aid and counting since October 7th 2023, not including what the U.S. has given the Israeli government previously, costing the American tax payers billions while our schools, libraries, and public assistance programs struggle for proper funding.

    Many of the speakers called for a U.S. embargo on military aid, demands of justice for political prisoners, and for an end of Israeli occupation of historically Palestinian lands.

    One event speaker, Taher Dahleh from the Palestinian Youth Movement said: “Politicians in government everyday either choose to meet the people’s needs in housing, in healthcare, education, in access to food, or they can choose to continue sending billions of dollars to Israel for its war of extermination”.

    The Trump administration has continued its support for Israel, approving $7 billion in an arms package in February of 2025.

    Monadel Herzallah from U.S. Palestine Community Network says about Palestinian Liberation: “It’s about what kind of world that we are going to be living in, and what kind of world we leave behind for our children. That is what’s at stake. We will not accept to live in a world where genocide is normal.”