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Three Democrats running for presidential elections marched Thursday against striking McDonald's workers, their latest effort to convince working-class voters on the picket lines.
Julián Castro, Jay Inslee, governor of Washington, and New York City Mayor Bill de Blasio rallied workers in three of the 13 cities where McDonald's employees staged a work stoppage to claim a salary. hourly rate of $ 15 and the right to join a union.
"We are here to tell McDonald's that it is unacceptable to pay a salary they can not live on to workers," Castro told a crowd of McDonald's workers in Durham, North Carolina, early Thursday.
The former Secretary of Housing and Urban Development was warmly applauded by the crowd when he said his campaign would not spend money at McDonald's as the company would not pay workers $ 15 an hour, recognize their right to form a union and respond to complaints of widespread sexual harassment. violence against workers.
It is unclear how many employees of the fast food industry are on strike and whether the restaurants are seriously disrupted. At least some restaurants had close their doors.
The strike in several cities has been scheduled to send a message to McDonald's executives at the company's annual meeting in Dallas. Fast food workers have been demonstrating for years as part of the Fight for $ 15 movement. McDonald's has largely ignored them. But the group, which is supported by the Service Employees International Union, has since become an influential player in the growing labor movement, pushing lawmakers in seven states to adopt a minimum wage of $ 15.
Democrats vying for the White House know that union support is essential to their success. They worked hard to convince cooks and cashiers of fast food restaurants. Picketing with strikers is now a regular step in the campaign for several 2020 candidates.
McDonald's workers know how to exert their influence
In recent months, fast food workers have seen their efforts to increase wages pay off. They have already pushed lawmakers from four states to adopt a minimum wage of $ 15 so far this year, and they rely more closely on Congress for a similar rise at the federal level.
Last month, the presidential pioneers announced their support for a federal minimum wage of $ 15. Despite their political successes so far, McDonald's employees are frustrated that the company has done little to address their concerns.
This week, about two dozen women in 20 cities filed sexual harassment complaints against the company with the US Equal Employment Opportunity Commission. Most are new cases that must first be investigated by the EEOC, but a few relate to complaints filed by women with the agency last year, and that they are currently bringing to justice. The group of McDonald's alumni and former workers said the company had done nothing to ensure the safety of the workers at its franchised and franchise-owned restaurants.
Workers also say they need a union to force McDonald's to act.
But the Chicago-based company wants to avoid that at all costs. He will not recognize McDonald's employees as his own employees as most of them work in independent franchises.
The company is locked in a labor dispute whether the fast food chain is considered a "common employer" and is therefore partly responsible for the work violations committed by individual franchises. McDonald's says that it is not a common employerTherefore, he can not be held legally responsible for sexual harassment and other illegal behavior at the workplace in any of his independent restaurants.
However, the workers do not agree. They say the company has too much control over franchise restaurants and workers to make that claim.
Because McDonald's does not consider cashiers and cooks as its employees, the company will not participate in setting hourly rates for food service workers and will not negotiate with them through a union. McDonald's employees continue to make as much noise as possible.
In Dallas, security agents blocked a group of workers who wanted to send a list of their demands to McDonald's executives at the hotel where they were. "We are just trying to earn a living wage like you," said Blue Rainer, a McDonald's employee in Tampa, Florida.
Rainer and three other McDonald's workers had just joined a video session with Senator Bernie Sanders (I-VT). "We need a place at the table with McDonald's to solve these problems," said one of them in Sanders. "How would you use the power of the office to get McDonald's to the table to talk to workers like me?"
"We may invite the CEO in our office to sit down and talk to you," Sanders replied, adding that it would make it easier for all to join the unions and force companies to reserve seats. to the board of directors.
Bill de Blasio, candidate for the 2020 competition, with McDonald's employees in Des Moines, Iowa. Jay Inslee rallied the workers in Chicago.
And with a record number of US workers on strike these days, we will likely see even more Democrat candidates on the picket line.
Candidates court voters at picket lines
Democrats have long focused their campaigns on working-class voters, particularly unionized workers, who are most likely to go to the polls. But in the race to 2020 so far, candidates are doing more than just attending public meetings. In fact, they join the demonstrations and actively support the workers.
Meaning. Elizabeth Warren and Bernie Sanders, South Bend Mayor Pete Buttigieg, and former Vice President Joe Biden have all been keen to show their support to employees at Stop and Shop supermarkets for 10 days. strike against corporate pressure to reduce benefits.
"When workers fight, workers earn," Warren told a group of workers in front of a picket at one of the chain's stores in Massachusetts. She even brought them donuts.
But the labor movement has changed a lot in the past 20 years and poses interesting challenges for Democrats, as Vox's Tara Golshan explains:
The tensions within the American trade union movement are representative of the main forces of the Democratic Party. While Joe Biden attempts to consolidate the old coalition of white-collar, working-class voters who have defected to Trump, candidates like Sens. Warren, Kamala Harris and Sanders are also trying to address an increasingly progressive working class see a champion in Trump or Clinton in 2016.
While overall the number of union members has decreased, people of color are joining more unions. Groups such as Service Employees International Union, which mainly represent women working in sectors such as home care, housework and health care, say their members did not vote for Trump. They stayed at home.
The McDonald's strike reflects the changing demographics of the labor movement. The American fast-food workforce may not have a history of unionization, but the workers who marched on Thursday mobilized thousands of workers despite everything. Most of them were black and Latin women. And the 2020 candidates clearly see this as an opportunity to get more support.
As the primary elections draw closer, we will likely see more than 20-year-old candidates among Democrat candidates on the picket line.
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