Folks,
Greetings from Rio de Janeiro. We just finished two weeks of filming on my documentary “Marielle Vive,” which is being underwritten by a grant from the Illumine Service Foundation.
Big thanks to our readers, who donated to our security fund to film this week in Rio de Janeiro. Thanks so much!
Lula Administration Says Federal Investigation into Marielle Franco Will Be Released by March
This week, the Lula Administration announced that they would release the results of a federal investigation into the assassination of Marielle Franco.
In 2018, Marielle Franco, who I attended college with at PUC-RIo, was assassinated by a gunman who had breakfast with Bolsonaro on the morning of the assassination. Now, the Lula Administration has promised to announce the results of the investigation into her death by the end of March.
Marielle Franco’s widow, Rio City Councilwoman Monica Benicio, hopes the investigation will finally resolve what happened in the case.
“Our perspective is that we need to demand objective answers and concrete actions. There have been six years of this pain, where I haven’t been able to sleep without asking God for this case to come to an end”, said Monica Benicio.
UAW Renews Push to Unionize at Mercedes-Benz in Alabama
In the US, the UAW announced they planned to renew their fight to unionize at Mercedes Benz.
The UAW has tried and failed to unionize for over a decade at Mercedes Benz in Alabama. Shortly after the UAW loss at Volkswagen in Chattanooga in 2014, the UAW announced that they would form minority unions in Chattanooga and at Mercedes in Alabama.
The UAW says it will launch an intensive campaign to unionize at Mercedes in Alabama.
“In the past, people didn’t know if we had a pathway forward here,” Jeremy Kimbrell, a 24-year-old employee at the plant, told the Guardian. “Now everybody’s coming together and seeing what the pathway is, and it’s through the un on. When we get our union in here, people will once again look at Mercedes and say: ‘It’s not just another job, it’s a career ob. It’s a job where generations will want to come and work.’ And that’ll spread out to the suppliers and then to the broader area.”
For more, check out the Guardian.
UAW Launches Drive at Hyundai in Montgomery, Alabama
Further south in Montgomery, the UAW announced they launched a union drive at the town’s Hyundai plant.
“We don’t have a voice, so that’s why we need to step up and stand together, because if we don’t, companies like Hyundai and other big businesses are just going to keep running over us, we’re going to get the bare minimum while their pockets are getting full,” 19-year Hyundai employee Timothy Cripple told Alabama Daily N ws. “They brag about billion-dollar this, billion-dollar that, but when it comes time for us to stand in a line and ask, we get nothing but excuses.”
For more, check out the Alabama Daily News.
Australian Broadcasting Journalists Threaten Strike Over Palestinian Censorship
While the journalist union in the US refuses to take a position on the war in Gaza, journalists at the Australian Broadcasting Corporation (ABC) are threatening to strike over the firing of a journalist, Antoinette Lattouf, whose views were seen as too sympathetic to Palestinians.
Members of the Australian broadcaster MEAA say that her firing is yet another example of how the ABC throws journalists under the bus when they become targets of public pressure campaigns.
“Those attacks are not distributed evenly and disproportionately affect journalists of col ur. The lack of adequate support creates an unsafe workplace,” the MEAA said in a statement. “The appearance of kowtowing to lobby group pressure is embarrassing and damaging to the ABC’s reputation and impacts our ability to report without fear or favour”.
For more, check out the Guardian.
Strikes & News Happening Elsewhere
- Australian port strike continues
- Tesla boosts pay for Fremont factory workers whom the UAW wants to unionize
- LA Times journalists strike over layoffs.
- Teamsters rank-and-file revolt over union prez visiting with Trump
- Michigan’s Jim Harbaugh says college athletes should unionize.
- Northern Ireland sees biggest strike in years as workers walk out over pay and political deadlock
- Las Vegas teachers seek power from state legislature to strike
- Civilian employees at military bases in Ontario and Quebec on strike
- Finally, a Washington Post analysis finds that more than three-quarters of child labor violations in the first nine months of 2023 were in food service, with most of those at franchised brands.
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Love & Solidarity,
Melk
