A US war of choice abroad and the unconstitutional use of the US military at home is causing anxiety in the ranks of patriotic Americans who signed up to defend their nation not to unravel it. For decades the U.S. military has used enlisting immigrants to meet recruiting numbers, yet now immigrant GIs find their families targeted by the same federal government that recruited them.
We open with a conversation about the GI Rights Hotline, a critical resource for current and former service members, military families, and potential recruits trying to understand their rights and options in this moment of unprecedented crisis and uncertainty.
Our guests Steve Woolford and Lenore Yarger, who are married, have spent decades answering the call from thousands of GIs trying to navigate the troubled waters between their military obligation, their conscience, and their family's well-being.
In our B Block, with May Day approaching, we turn to the intersection of labor, climate justice, immigrant rights, and democracy with Paula Rogovin, Karen Szczepanski, and Ted Glick, organizers involved in the Make Polluters Pay contingent at Jersey City’s May Day action as well as the larger statewide rally being convened in Newark, New Jersey.
In our C Block we get an east of the Hudson River May Day labor preview with Brendan Griffith, president of the New York City Central Labor Council, AFL-CIO, that represents over one million workers in over 300 unions. At a time when the Trump regime has engaged in widespread union busting by trying to strip one million federal workers of their collective bargaining rights, this May Day takes on an historic gravity.
Brendan tells Jenna that adding "insult to injury" the Trump regime's unprecedented attack on the unionized federal civil service maligned it as unnecessary when "these people were doing vital work to protect this country,"
In our conversation we discuss the need to push back on the acceleration of corporate consolidation and wealth concentration that's happened as wages have flatlined or declined.
At around 7:15 AM we were joined by long time friend of organized labor NYS State Senator John Liu (D-Queens). John updated us on the overdue state budget in Albany and explained his take on Gov. Hochul's use of that process to address other policy issues NOT directly related to fiscal matters.
John, who chairs the New York State Senate Committee on New York City Public Schools, described the impacts of Trump administration's dismantling the U.S. Department of Education, the impact of aggressive ICE enforcement on immigrant communities, and his push for a curriculum that teaches the contributions of Asian American, Native Hawaiian, and Pacific Islander communities in New York public schools.
John tells Jenna that during Trump's first term the president's use of derogatory racial epithets like "Kung flu" helped spark "during the COVID years a spike in anti-Asian hate." It's his hope, that with more education about the contributions of Asian Americans, Native Hawaiians, and Pacific Islanders will counter lingering prejudice born of ignorance.
We finish up with a wide ranging interview with John Samuelsen, international president of the Transport Workers Union of America, a union that has continued to grow, even as national union density declined.
Samuelsen notes that while in Washington D.C. currently its Republicans are most anti-union, the TWU finds itself battling prominent Democratic Governors like New York State Gov. Hochul whose MTA wants to reduce subway train crews from two to one, a move that puts both workers and the riding public's safety at great risk.
"It's neo-liberal beancounters" whose top priority is not taxing the rich, Samuelsen argues. On the private sector freight rail side, Samuelsen argues its the pursuit of profits at any cost that sets the stage for catastrophic derailments like the 2023 CSX disaster in East Palestine, Ohio.
Jenna asked John about his early days on a track gang in the New York City Transit System, one of the most dangerous job titles in the MTA. He described how that experience made it clear how union organizing was the only way to promote not only worker well-being underground but the riding public's safety as well.
"I began in the early 1990s on the New York City subway tracks with a track gang there's an immediate realization in the 1990s that everytime I come to work it could be a life or death situation-- every single time your working live train traffic in the pitch black around live third rails, or out on an elevated structure," John recounted. "In the 1990s it was really like the O.K. Corral everytime we went to work. The bosses at the New York City Transit Authority didn't really give a rat's ass for worker safety. They pushed production."
John continued. "There were two things that were important--maintenance production and on time train performance and we had a score of transit workers that got killed in the line of duty and in the 1990s it was happening at an alarming frequency. So organizing the track gang against the bosses was the only way we were going to make sure we came home."
This month TWU successfully won a union election among flight nurses and flight paramedics who carry out dramatic high-risk rescues in northern Nevada and California.
"The air ambulance crews - who respond by helicopter and small plane to medical emergencies in remote, hard-to-reach areas, including alpine ski trails and desert highways, said they decided to unionize to seek better pay, benefits, and respect from their employer, REMSA Health," according to the TWU.
“These critical first responders no longer have to fight their callous and dismissive bean-counting bosses alone,” Samuelsen said. “The 165,000-member-strong TWU will fully engage to help them secure a first contract that improves their lives and livelihoods.”
