A coalition of union and community members joined fast-food and retail workers fighting for $15 and a union in a nationwide day of action to call for livable wages and union rights.
Fast-food workers walked off the job in Madison and Milwaukee, as well as over 300 cities across the country, to call for higher wages and the right to form a union free of intimidation and retaliation. Today’s action was the industry's largest-ever strike, joined by tens of thousands of Americans demanding higher wages, worker dignity, and an economy that works for all of us.
The nationwide day of action culminated in downtown Milwaukee, where union organizer and civil and immigrant rights activist, Dolores Huerta, lead a march of immigrant, faith and labor community members from Milwaukee’s Southside to link up with the Fight for $15 and Black Lives Matter activists to march together and protest the Republican presidential debate.
Huerta, legendary leader of the United Farm Workers, fired up the crowd, reminding the demonstration that all work has dignity.
"Donald Trump is not out in the fields picking fruit and vegetables for dinner tables all across this country. Are those the Latinos he is talking about? He doesn't know what he is talking about. Respect work. Respect hard work. The candidates here tonight are against immigrants, they are against the minimum wage, they are for cutting Medicare. People have the voting power and must use it. Voting power makes sure the haters don't win."
The Republican 2016 debate has been filled with hateful and racist rhetoric as well as bad policy ideas that would harm the middle-class, jobseekers and low-income working families.
Since winning wage increases from Los Angeles to New York, the campaign for $15 and a union has only grown stronger. Our movement is growing – health care providers, adjunct professors, and retail workers are all joining fast food workers on the picket lines because they know a fight for a raise in the minimum wage means a better quality of life for all.
Thousands of people were on the streets of downtown Milwaukee this evening to take a bold stand against corporations that pay poverty wages and the politicians they control. Working people came together to say that all work demands dignity and a livable wage. No one who works full-time should live in poverty. Our economy’s troubles did not just happen, but are a direct result of poor public policy and growing corporate control of politics and our economy.
Standing shoulder to shoulder, working people are coming together to call for raising wages, immigration reform and social and economic justice to all people.
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