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16 February 20
Border Patrol Will Deploy Elite Tactical Agents to Sanctuary Cities
Caitlin Dickerson and Zolan Kanno-Youngs, The New York Times
Excerpt: "The Trump administration is deploying law enforcement tactical units from the southern border as part of a supercharged arrest operation in sanctuary cities across the country, an escalation in the president's battle against localities that refuse to participate in immigration enforcement."
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Caitlin Dickerson and Zolan Kanno-Youngs, The New York Times
Excerpt: "The Trump administration is deploying law enforcement tactical units from the southern border as part of a supercharged arrest operation in sanctuary cities across the country, an escalation in the president's battle against localities that refuse to participate in immigration enforcement."
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'Sixty per cent of African Americans are poor or low income, as are 64% of Hispanics, but the largest single racial group among America's poor and low income - 66 million Americans - are white.' (photo: Justin Lane/EPA)
Reverend William Barber | Trump's Greatest Vulnerability Is the Economy - Just Ask Poor Americans
Reverend William Barber, Guardian UK
Barber writes: "Rather than offer a report on the State of the Union, Donald Trump used his annual primetime slot in the House of Representatives to host a re-election rally."
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Reverend William Barber, Guardian UK
Barber writes: "Rather than offer a report on the State of the Union, Donald Trump used his annual primetime slot in the House of Representatives to host a re-election rally."
READ MORE
Police patrolling in New Jersey. (photo: Timothy Clary/AFP/Getty Images)
In True 'Stop and Frisk' Fashion, New Jersey Police Admit to Targeting Minority Neighborhoods in What They Call 'Hunting at the Border'
Zack Linly, The Root
Linly writes: "In today's Water is Wet News we find, once again that when police are sent to target civilians at random, black and Latino people will overwhelmingly represent the victimized."
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Zack Linly, The Root
Linly writes: "In today's Water is Wet News we find, once again that when police are sent to target civilians at random, black and Latino people will overwhelmingly represent the victimized."
READ MORE
The White House at night. (photo: Susan Walsh/AP)
Trump's Secret Service Hotel Racket Is Hiding in Plain Sight. And He's Getting Away With It.
Zach Everson, NBC News
Everson writes: "On Wednesday night, when President Donald Trump addressed supporters from behind a Trump Hotels lectern in a room at his Trump International Hotel Washington, D.C., one of his company's most faithful customers accompanied him. The U.S. Secret Service."
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Zach Everson, NBC News
Everson writes: "On Wednesday night, when President Donald Trump addressed supporters from behind a Trump Hotels lectern in a room at his Trump International Hotel Washington, D.C., one of his company's most faithful customers accompanied him. The U.S. Secret Service."
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Following a rally in Brooklyn's Cadman Plaza Park, hundreds of union members march across the Brooklyn Bridge in support of IBEW Local 3 September 18, 2017 in New York City. (photo: Drew Angerer/Getty Images)
The Longest Strike in America Needs a Political Savior
Hamilton Nolan, In These Times
Nolan writes: "The longest ongoing strike in America today is happening in the media capital of the world. It involves the people who install and repair the cables that bring the news to many of the most influential people in America."
Hamilton Nolan, In These Times
Nolan writes: "The longest ongoing strike in America today is happening in the media capital of the world. It involves the people who install and repair the cables that bring the news to many of the most influential people in America."
EXCERPTS:
From the very beginning, the strike has been a battle of attrition far more than it has been a negotiation. By the time Charter acquired Time Warner Cable in 2016 and rebranded it as Spectrum, the company’s 1,800 unionized cable technicians, members of IBEW Local 3, could sense trouble. “Leading up to that time, we saw changes happening in the company, where they went away from customer service,” says Troy Walcott, a 20-year Spectrum veteran and a union shop steward. “They were doing things for increasing stock prices, as opposed to customer service.”
The new owners struck a hostile pose towards the union. They showed little interest in meaningful contract negotiations. Workers say that Charter also began imposing stricter disciplinary rules, and making changes in the metrics used to evaluate employees and in internal training programs, making it harder to advance within the company. They also seemed to show less interest in long-established union-negotiated procedures. “Their attitude was: Do what I say, and you can grieve it later,” says Chris Fasulo, a Spectrum technician since 2010. “If we said, ‘I can’t drive this truck, it has a broken windshield,’ they’d say, ‘Do it, and you can file a grievance.’”
In March of 2017, at odds over retirement and health benefits, the union went on strike. The company proceeded to hire outside contractors to do the work of the technicians, and the two sides remained doggedly opposed. After a year, the company launched a bid to decertify the union, using a former supervisor who the union says dropped into the role of a technician in order to file a challenge, trying to convince workers to give up on union representation entirely. That decertification attempt, marked by claims of coercion and unfair labor practices, remains mired in the bureaucratic morass of the National Labor Relations Board. Meanwhile, the strike drags on.
It is hard to be on strike for a week. It is hard to be on strike for a month. To be on strike for three years is superhuman. As the calendar has turned, Spectrum workers have exhausted strike funds, exhausted their savings, and become desperate. Some have crossed the picket lines and returned to their old jobs. Estimates among workers vary, but they say that close to half of the original strikers are still out. Those who hold the line do whatever they can to survive. Troy Walcott, who does not have any kids to support, drives Uber. But as a shop steward, he hears all of the stories of suffering. “You see people losing their homes, losing their cars, losing their jobs, losing their relationships with their wives, breaking down constantly… the longer it stretches out, the harder it gets for people,” he says. “When I get those calls, it affects me like it was me.”
This is the reality for workers striking against a company that wants to break the union. The choices are grim: Cross the picket line, pursue part time hustles in hopes of a resolution, or get a new full time job—starting over from square one, even if you’ve had decades of experience as a Spectrum employee. Every option is painful. Chris Fasulo loved his job. “When you go out and get some old lady’s phone working, it puts a smile on your face,” he says. This month, for the first time, he came close to being unable to pay his mortgage. The memory of the good times helps him carry on. “Sometimes you feel a little lonely, but you’ve got to have faith. I put everything into this strike.”
A group of several hundred cable workers, gutted by three long years of financial and personal sacrifice, cannot have a fair fight with a roughly $111 billion telecom company. The Spectrum strikers are a case study in how stark the differences are between traditional local union power and the power of a modern mega-corporation. In December, they held a rally on the steps of New York City Hall, marking 1,000 days on strike. They were joined by a host of local and state politicians vowing to support them. But talk is cheap. Unless the Charter/Spectrum franchise in New York is actually rejected, or a serious financing campaign is mounted for the costly “public option,” the outlook for those who have stuck with the strike is bleak. It is a gut check for the power of the modern labor movement. How much political and economic pressure can working people really bring to bear?
Mongolia's children are suffering a health epidemic as pollution caused by the coal mining industry takes its toll (photo: Fredrik Lerneryd/Al Jazeera)
The Casualties of Mongolia's Doomed Love Affair With Coal
Klas Lundstrom, Al Jazeera
Excerpt: "All the rooms in the three-storey Songinokhairkhan hospital in western Ulaanbaatar, Mongolia's capital city, are full."
Klas Lundstrom, Al Jazeera
Excerpt: "All the rooms in the three-storey Songinokhairkhan hospital in western Ulaanbaatar, Mongolia's capital city, are full."
EXCERPT:
UNICEF declared Mongolia's air pollution problem a "child health crisis" in a 2018 report which stated: "In the last 10 years, incidences of respiratory diseases in Ulaanbaatar alarmingly increased including a 2.7-fold increase in respiratory infections per 10,000 population.
"Pneumonia is now the second leading cause for under-five child mortality in the country. Children living in a highly polluted district of central Ulaanbaatar were found to have 40 percent lower lung function than children living in a rural area."
The EPA has ordered Citgo Petroleum Corp. and Oxy USA to do a hazardous waste investigation at the former Cities Service Refinery in East Chicago, which is pictured above. (photo: Joseph Pete)
EPA Orders Hazardous Waste Probe at Shuttered Indiana Site
Associated Press
Excerpt: "The U.S. Environmental Protection Agency has launched a hazardous waste investigation at a sprawling former oil refinery in northwestern Indiana that was shuttered in 1973 and later was the scene of a major fire."
Associated Press
Excerpt: "The U.S. Environmental Protection Agency has launched a hazardous waste investigation at a sprawling former oil refinery in northwestern Indiana that was shuttered in 1973 and later was the scene of a major fire."
The federal agency recently ordered Citgo Petroleum Corp. and Oxy USA to begin assessing and cleaning up dangerous waste at the former Cities Service Refinery site in East Chicago.
Local activist Thomas Frank said that the EPA's order could be an indication that parts of the property could be reused eventually for industrial purposes,
“I’m happy to see a cleanup is on the way. I’m concerned to see all the time that was wasted," Frank said. “We’re glad there’s attention. By them addressing the issues, they are posing as if they have a solution. What really is occurring is that they are putting a band-aid on it.”
Texas-Empire Pipe Line Co., a subsidiary of Cities Service Oil Co., built the 372-acre (151-hectare) refinery in 1929 with 55 large storage tanks and a daily production capacity of 15,000 barrels. The refining operation, which chiefly manufactured and stored gasoline for cars, went through multiple owners over the years. The refinery became unprofitable and closed in 1973, and in 1980 it was the scene of a major fire when naphtha erupted in an abandoned storage tank.
The Citgo Terminal Facility still operates 53 tanks on 228-acres (92-hectares) on the property's northern end with a capacity of 180 million gallons of petroleum products, according to the EPA.
EPA Region 5 Administrator Kurt Thiede said he appreciates “the willingness Citgo and Oxy have shown to cooperate and work towards our common goals of protecting local human health and the environment.”
“This is another example of the ongoing commitment that EPA and the State of Indiana – which provided valuable information about the site – have to clean up hazardous-waste sites in East Chicago,” he said.
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