With each passing day, more Israeli bombs are falling on Gaza, more bodies are being blown apart and buried under the rubble, over a million Palestinians have been displaced from their homes. Over the past month and a half, the world has borne witness to a genocidal military campaign to clear out Gaza once and for all, and every day, every hour, it feels like the chance to stop one of humanity’s most inhumane crimes is slipping through our fingers, and the powers that be have shown no interest whatsoever in listening to the thundering calls for a ceasefire coming from governments and mass demonstrations around the world, particularly the Biden administration in the US, the increasingly fascistic Netanyahu government in Israel, and the arms manufacturers and war profiteers who are raking in billions from manufacturing mass death. This is prompting people of conscience around the world, including unions and worker-led groups, to speak out and take action to try to stop the slaughter. One of those unions is the Association of Legal Aid Attorneys – UAW Local 2325 (ALAA), whose members include legal aid workers at over 25 organizations, including the Bronx Defenders, Brooklyn Defender Services, Neighborhood Defender Service, and the Legal Aid Society of New York City. Last week, ALAA members were preparing to hold a vote on whether or not to approve the union publicly issuing a “Resolution Calling for a Ceasefire in Gaza, an End to the Israeli Occupation of Palestine, and Support for Workers’ Political Speech.” In the lead-up to the vote, union members at different legal aid offices reported strong opposition from management. “These statements call for the elimination of the state of Israel and the annihilation of the Jewish people,” Twyla Carter, Chief Executive Officer of the Legal Aid Society, reportedly told staff, expressing concern that certain donors would pull funding from the Legal Aid Society if the union passed the resolution. Then, on Thursday, Nov 16, as Akela Lacy reports at The Intercept, “attorneys at the Legal Aid Society of Nassau County sued in New York State Supreme Court to stop the vote, saying it posed an ethical dilemma for attorneys that would make it “impossible for them to properly do their job as Public Defenders.” Those four attorneys were ALAA bargaining unit members. “On Friday,” Lacy continues, “the court granted a temporary restraining order enjoining the vote. Voting had gotten underway at 9 a.m. and only 15 minutes were left on the clock when the injunction was issued. The tally never got underway.” In this urgent mini-cast, we speak about this unprecedented attack on union democracy and workers’ free speech rights with three ALAA members: Allie Goodman, an attorney in the Family Defense Practice at Bronx Defenders; Michael Letwin, a former public defender at Legal Aid in Brooklyn for 37 years who also served as president of ALAA – UAW Local 2325 for 13 years; and Dany Greene, who has worked as a public defender for six years, four of which were spent at Bronx Defenders, where they helped found and organize the BXD Union, and who now works at an appellate office focusing on criminal appeals. Additional links/info below… Labor for Palestine website and Twitter/X page Association of Legal Aid Attorneys, United Auto Workers Local 2325, “Resolution Calling for a Ceasefire in Gaza, an End to the Israeli Occupation of Palestine, and Support for Workers’ Political Speech” Akela Lacy, The Intercept, “Public Defenders Get Restraining Order to Block Their Own Union from Voting on Gaza Statement” Jake Johnson, Common Dreams, “Bar Association Urged to Fight Censorship of Pro-Palestinian Voices” Permanent links below… Working People Patreon page Leave us a voicemail and we might play it on the show! Labor Radio / Podcast Network website, Facebook page, and Twitter page In These Times website, Facebook page, and Twitter page The Real News Network website, YouTube channel, podcast feeds, Facebook page, and Twitter page Featured Music (all songs sourced from the Free Music Archive: freemusicarchive.org) Jules Taylor, “Working People” Theme Song
Transcript
0:00[Music] I got to I
0:15got my name is Ali Goodman I work at the Bronx Defenders I’ve been there for three years um and I am an attorney in
0:24the family defense practice I’m also a member of our Union um and the family defense practice we defend parents and
0:31caretakers against government allegations of abuse and neglect um and I also relevant to this podcast I
0:38organize with uh the Jewish voice for peace chapter in New York City my name is Michael Lewin I was a public defender
0:44at Legal Aid in Brooklyn for 37 years H for 13 years of which I was president of
0:51our Union alaa UAW 2325 and I’m a co-founder of both labor
0:57for Palestine which is at Labor forp palestine. net and Jews for Palestinian right of return my name is Danny Green
1:04I’ve been a public defender for six years for four years I worked at the Bronx Defenders doing trial level
1:10criminal public defense I helped found and organized the bxd union and I’m now
1:15working at an pellet office doing Criminal Appeals and I also organize with Jewish voices for peace all right
1:22well welcome everyone to another episode of working people a podcast about the
1:28lives jobs dreams struggles of the working class today brought to you in
1:33partnership with In These Times magazine and the Real News Network produced by Jules Taylor and made possible by the
1:41support of listeners like you my name is maximilan Alvarez and we’ve got an
1:47urgent mini cast for y’all today uh I’m really really grateful to have Danny
1:53Michael and Ally on the show um especially after kind of everything that
1:58we are all going through as a society and that they are going through as workers and union members uh amidst the
2:06the just devastating uh assault on Gaza the the the humanitarian crisis that is
2:12unfolding before our eyes as you guys well know uh you have no doubt listened
2:18to the episodes that we’ve published in recent weeks including the 9-minute conversation I got to have with uh Issa
2:26Amro uh in the occupied West Bank after he just uh narrowly escaped uh uh
2:32violent settlers who were chasing him in Hebron and you heard the three-minute message from Gaza that uh we received
2:40from journalist Muhammad El saifi um hopefully you’ve been following the work that we’ve been doing at the real News
2:46Network where I’ve also been interviewing uh you know trade unionists uh in the UK who are you know forming
2:54human blockades around Israeli weapons suppliers uh you’ve heard me on break
3:00points interviewing healthcare workers in New York leading candelight vigils uh
3:05uh in solidarity with their Healthcare colleagues in Gaza um you know we’re
3:11we’re doing everything we can to sort of lift up the voices of regular people who are taking a stand and speaking out
3:18against the genocidal violence um because you know with each passing Day
3:23More Israeli bombs are falling on Gaza more bodies are being blown apart and
3:29buried under the rubble over a million Palestinians have been displaced from their homes in the past month and a half
3:36alone the world in that time has borne witness to a genocidal military campaign
3:43to clear out Gaza once and for all and every day every hour it feels like the
3:49chance to stop one of Humanity’s most inhumane crimes is slipping through our
3:54fingers and up until now it it’s really felt like the powers that be have shown
4:00no interest whatsoever in listening to the the massive thundering calls for a
4:05ceasefire coming from governments and mass demonstrations around the world uh
4:11that’s especially true of the Biden Administration here in the United States the increasingly fascistic Netanyahu
4:17government in Israel to say nothing of the arms manufacturers and War profiteers who are raking in billions
4:24from manufacturing Mass death now we are recording this episode on Sunday
4:29November 19th there are initial reports out today from The Washington Post that
4:34we may see by the time this episode comes out it is possible that there will be a 5-day pause uh in the um Slaughter
4:45uh you know this this is again I don’t want to kind of um report on this before it is locked in but there are reports
4:52that there may be a 5-day pause um based on a US brokered agreement between Hamas
4:59and netanyahu’s government um so we’ll see what happens with that um but the
5:05fact remains is that we we’ve already lost so much Palestinians have lost so much um Israeli families who whose loved
5:13ones were killed on October 7th have lost so much this is to say nothing of the countless people who have lost so
5:20much over 75 years of violent occupation and as I said at the top you know we’ve
5:26been doing our best here at working people and at the real News Network to try to lift up the voices of regular
5:31people taking a stand uh speaking out uh um people of conscience who you know
5:37refuse to sit idly by while this Slaughter unfolds and um you know our guests today
5:44are are part of that right I mean uh we are going to discuss um you know how
5:50Danny Michael allly and their fellow union members with the association of legal aid attorneys uh represented by
5:58UAW Local 2325 this is uh New York City’s Union of
6:03over 3,000 public defenders and legal workers at different offices um you may
6:08have been hearing over the past couple days uh about the Saga that they have been embroiled in um and in their
6:16efforts to release a resolution as a union calling for a ceasefire in Gaza an end to the Israeli occupation of
6:23Palestine and support for workers political speech now I want to just sort
6:29of um read extensively from a recent report
6:34that came out this weekend U by AAA Lacy at The Intercept uh we will link to this
6:41report in the show notes but uh I just wanted to sort of you know read uh a
6:47number of passages from aaa’s report just so listeners have uh a sort of Baseline understanding of what we’re
6:53going to talk about today right because there there kind of a lot of um nuances here that I want to make sure we don’t
6:59pave over um and then I’m going to turn things over to our guests to really sort of give us the story from from their
7:06side let us know what’s going on over there but um to give everyone just sort of like a common basis of understanding
7:13here AAA Lacy writes in The Intercept in a piece titled public defenders get
7:20restraining order to block their own Union from voting on Gaza statement AAA
7:26writes quote five groups providing public Defender Services in New York City are cracking down on speech about
7:33Palestine leadership at the groups are pushing back on statements or internal
7:38Communications that reference The Siege on Gaza and at least one staffer has been forced to resign two of the
7:46organizations sent cease and deist letters to Union shops considering resolutions calling for a ceasefire
7:53another group called staffers into meetings with human resources for using work channels to share share links about
8:00Palestine and proposing to do fundraising for the Palestine children’s Relief Fund in lie of an annual holiday
8:08party management at several of the offices said statements on Gaza under
8:13consideration by their unions were jeopardizing funding pro-israel activists launched a petition to defund
8:20the Bronx Defenders after its Union issued a statement opposing Israel’s
8:25quote genocidal intent in Gaza public Fender offices across the country are
8:31already severely underfunded While most rely heavily on Public Funding many also
8:37receive support from private institutions including Major law firms
8:42several firms have responded to criticism of Israel’s war in Gaza by resending job offers and threatening to
8:48curb recruiting efforts at law schools on Thursday ahead of the
8:59according to a partial recording of the meeting obtained by The Intercept chief executive officer Twila Carter said the
9:06resolution’s language was anti-semitic staff could vote how they wanted she said but she had an
9:13obligation to warn them about the impact on the organization’s work four law firms had already threatened to pull
9:19funding from the office over the resolution Carter said in discouraging union members to vote for the statement
9:25she said quote I’m not trying to lose a dime end quote AAA Lacy’s article
9:31continues quote the legal fight revolved around a statement from the association of legal aid attorneys UAW Local
9:402325 which covers more than 25 organizations including the Bronx Defenders Brooklyn Defender Services
9:47neighborhood Defender service and the Legal Aid Society of New York City
9:52staffers across the four offices as well as the New York County Defender Services
9:58which is not represent Ed by the union have been retaliated against reprimanded
10:03surveilled and encouraged to oppose the union resolution the resolution
10:08expresses solidarity with Palestinians calls for a ceasefire in Gaza and
10:14demands an end to Israel’s occupation decrying apartheid ethnic cleansing and
10:19genocide with a yes vote the union would also oppose future military aid to
10:25Israel and Endor the boycott divestment and sanctions move movement against
10:30Israel at the legal aid all staff meeting on Thursday Carter the CEO said
10:36the resolution was anti-semitic quote these statements call for the elimination of the state of Israel and
10:42the annihilation of the Jewish people Carter said you don’t have to agree but that’s how some of our colleagues feel
10:49and some of our supporters accusing Israel of being an apartheid state and of genocide are all
10:56dog whistles for anti semitism she said she suggested Jewish readers of the
11:03statement might see it the same way black people would see Pro police sloganeering quote and again as a black
11:10woman my closest analogy is hearing how people talk about blue lives matter or other things that land on me differently
11:17end quote uh to wrap up my reading of AAA Lacy’s uh um article uh just two
11:24more passages here quote several hours after the meeting on Thursday a Attorneys At The Legal Aid Society of
11:30Nassau County sued in New York state supreme court to stop the vote saying it
11:37posed an ethical dilemma for attorneys that would make it quote impossible for them to properly do their job as public
11:44defenders and quote on Friday the court granted a temporary restraining order in
11:49joining the vote voting had gotten underway at 9:00 a.m. and only 15
11:54minutes were left on the clock when the injunction was issued the tally never
12:00got underway end quote so that’s what we’re here to discuss I apologize for
12:06the extended intro but I thought it was important to sort of just try as best as I could to lay out that information and
12:12aaa’s already laid it out in more depth than I could here in the intro again we
12:17will link to that piece in the show notes but more importantly we’re going to turn to our guests who are in the
12:24thick of this struggle themselves so we want to hear directly from them now
12:30Danny Michael Ally again really really appreciate y’all coming on the show especially as you are dealing with all
12:36of this uh crap um and and you know really appreciate you being willing to
12:41come on speak up speak out tell us your side of the story I want to dig into the
12:47events of the past week uh with y’all but first I wanted to just sort of take a quick step back right before we dig
12:54into the the the letter um and the the the sort of backlash the the
13:01injunction uh I wanted to just sort of like remind folks a bit more about the
13:06kind of work that you do uh and and get to know a little more about you all and
13:11the struggles that you’ve been facing at alaa over the past year I mean I’ll be
13:17totally upfront with folks and I’ll link to this video in the show notes but I mean I was I was at one of y’all’s
13:22picket lines uh in New York City earlier this year I was I was invited out um I I
13:28post a video from the picket line to the real news network account uh I even myself walked the picket line for uh a
13:35time so uh that’s where I remembered y’all from and then I heard about this current story so I wanted to sort of
13:42just connect those dots for folks listening like can we remind people about the work you do uh at your offices
13:50the the the the the union struggle there and um the sort of issues that y’all
13:56have been dealing with as workers as legal workers up until you know October
14:017th 2023 so our members work in a number of different
14:07agencies either as public defenders or as other kinds of legal service workers
14:14public defenders of course represent people charged with crimes and under Gideon V way wght Supreme Court decision
14:20from the 60s everybody charged with the crime at least in theory has the right to be represented by Council so in New
14:27York City there’s no one governmental public defender office what there are is contracts between the city and a number
14:34of different agencies the biggest of which is Legal Aid Society but also the other groups that we’ll mention here
14:40today and so the members who work in public defense do entirely criminal
14:46defense work and of course that um is extremely stressful as you might imagine especially for the people that we
14:52represent who are you know being subject to the prison industrial complex and uh
14:58the new gym Crow and all those kinds of things uh but we also have members who do other kinds of work and some of those
15:05are landlord tenant lawyers or represent people who are facing loss of their homes or
15:11eviction we represent uh either the parents of children or the children themselves sometimes in neglect and
15:18abuse cases as well as delinquency cases and a number and a number of our members do immigration work to defend people who
15:26are being or who are being subject to that whole monstrosity that horrific
15:31monstrosity so those are some of the areas in which our people have worked and and do the work every day and of
15:37course funding for those agencies is always under threat and never sufficient and case loads are always too high and
15:43on top of that we have to deal with very often anti-union managements of these different agencies so those are some of
15:51the battles that we’re involved with both on behalf of our clients individually and collectively and for us
15:57as union members and and you know concern with justice justice throughout the world as Michael said the different
16:04um shops the different places um the different organizations rather have
16:10their own individual unions and we are working on getting all the different uh public
16:16defenders to become unionized and uh some of us have contracts some of us don’t have contracts so the strike that
16:22you’re referencing I’m not exactly positive which one it was it might have been with one of the specific um
16:29it might have been with one of the specific um organizations that was that was striking
16:36at that time um but the Bronx Defenders like many of the many different uh shops
16:42are in the middle of trying to ratify contracts or are um moving forward with
16:50different elements that they’re fighting individually so we have similar overall struggles but then individually as
16:55organizations have different struggles but um overall we’re all fighting for people um and putting people first and
17:04that’s why this cause I think is so important to us as well yeah I can also talk a little bit more to connect our
17:11work specifically like why as public defenders we care about Palestine and
17:17why this is an issue that matters so much to all of us and really it’s the same reason we care about justice issues
17:24everywhere we care because this is a genocide that’s happening andic specifically it’s a genocide that’s
17:30being supported and legitimized by our government and by our media and as
17:35public defenders like Michael said we represent the most oppressed communities in the US we see every day how
17:42government legitimizes violence against our communities through courts through prisons police deportation family
17:51separation and more and how that’s supported by the media and we know that those very same tactics are at work work
17:58in Israel’s 75y year occupation of Palestine and that that occupation is
18:04enforced by Israel’s military and its increasingly fascist court system and
18:10that it’s supported by us tax dollars and so as public defenders that see the same things happening to our clients in
18:16a different way every single day and we work as part of that in that system we know that we need to stand against that
18:23same structures of Oppression when they’re happening elsewhere and if I could pick up where jny just left off
18:30also as union members those same concerns because you know the genocide that’s
18:37going on now in Palestine and has been going on for 75 years or more uh since
18:42the establishment of the Zion state is something that unfortunately Union
18:48official Dom in this country has supported for all these decades going back in fact to at least the balford
18:54Declaration in 1917 in which the European Colonial Powers gave Palestine
18:59or promis Palestine to be a future Zionist state so you know it’s it’s not
19:06a question of whether unions should be involved in this unfortunately unions have always been involved in this issue
19:11of Palestine it’s the problem is they’ve been on the wrong side for the most part
19:16and so as union members now we’re being called on by Palestinian trade unionist
19:22trans unionists who have issued an urgent call for union members in this country for workers everywhere
19:28to stand with them in demanding an end to the genocide in demanding an end to
19:35the occupation an end to the apartheid state an end to Us weapons for Israel
19:41and for workers themselves not to handle cargo for Israel particularly military cargo and so we think it’s really
19:47essential to respect that picket line and that unions have to respect the picket line that have been set up by
19:53Palestinian trade unionists just as we would respect any other picket line and every other pick line our job is to walk
19:59picket lines not cross them and so that’s what we’re trying to do here with our Palestine resolution in this Union
20:05uh and more broadly is to walk the Palestinian picket line with our Palestinian siblings I would just add
20:11the only thing that I would add to what Michael so beautifully stated um and I know we’re going to get to the specific
20:17statements in a bit but um the only thing that I would add is that the call from Palestinian trade unions was a
20:22specific one that was uh sent out on the 16th I believe of October um a legitimate call from the Palestinian
20:29trade unions to to quote end all forms of complicity with Israel’s crimes um in the ways that Michael spoke about and
20:36just in the ways that uh in speaking out about solidarity with Palestine and Palestinians generally um and so we
20:44think it’s our duty as in all the ways that Michael stated as union members and as people of moral conscience to um
20:51speak out and to comply with the you know forms of being in a Union and being
20:58in solidarity with other union members and also particularly in the ways in which Palestinians themselves are
21:04calling for um because that so rarely that so so often is ignored um in how
21:10people can show up um and right now we are getting an explicit call from people in Palestine to sh show up in this exact
21:16way well let’s let’s let’s zero in on that um let’s let’s talk about Gaza and
21:23and what’s been going on over there within the union and these different uh shops um that that that are part of the
21:31union and I want to just ask yall if you could sort of um tell us more about the
21:37sort of discussions that yall have been having within your own workplaces within
21:42your union um you know like what you’ve been feeling as legal workers right and
21:48rank and file union members over the past month and a half and and and also just as human beings watching all of
21:55this genocidal Madness unfold in real time time and I want to ask if you could talk you know more specifically about
22:02how the the the resolution the statement um came together um why y’all felt it
22:08was important to put out that statement um what what is in it we will link to the the the draft in the show notes but
22:14um yeah just just talk us through the timeline of of how this statement came to together um how and why yall wrote it
22:22the way that you did um and and what role you think unions can and should be playing
22:28right now in forcing a ceasefire and ending this violence and
22:34Slaughter um really important and big question I’m going to actually walk us
22:40backwards um I work at the Bronx Defenders and my union specifically came
22:46out with a statement I believe in the middle of October I think it was October
22:5217th or 18th maybe the 19th but it was very shortly after the call specifically
22:57from pales and trade unions came out um some folks at my union drafted a really
23:03beautiful statement um in solidarity with Palestinians and naming the genocidal violence that’s happening and
23:11specifically stating that as you know people of moral conscience but also as um as workers we were going to fall in
23:19line and fall follow the lead of Palestinian trade unions um and since
23:24that time we um receed D push back from
23:31all different levels of of of people people in our courts um and we can speak
23:38more on this later perhaps but in general um I think that it’s helpful background because after that um it
23:45became clear that as we all know as people who are workers there is safety in solidarity and safety in numbers and
23:51it felt important for the rest of our Union to um you know also most
23:57importantly speak on the genocidal violence that Palestinians are and have
24:02been experiencing for at new rates for the past over 40 days um of bombs
24:09reigning in Gaza increased violence in the West Bank but also um for 75 years
24:14of colonial occupation um and then also in order to stand in solidarity with our
24:19Union at the Bronx Defenders um and protect us all together um collectively
24:26Ali explained very well the history of this in in recent times I guess I just want to take a step back and start from
24:32an earlier point which is that there’s a long history of more than two decades really of battling around Palestinian
24:40rights and the right to even express a pro Palestinian point of view in an
24:45anti- genocidal point of view uh in our Union and especially at The Legal Aid
24:51Society again which again is the largest of these institutions of the employers and uh that history really starts with
24:59immediately after 911 of 2001 when a number of us started an effort called
25:05Labor uh New York City labor against the war and issued a statement less than a week or so after 911 calling for what it
25:14just what it sounds like to oppose the the US war that was going to be Unleashed and that was Unleashed both
25:19abroad in places like Afghanistan and Iraq and Palestine and also at home in terms of the attack on on Muslim people
25:26on people of color generally on civil liberties and and free speech and so in
25:32the wake of that uh a number of us were came under intense attack from within
25:38our own ranks of the Union a small number of people but nonetheless very uh
25:44vocal uh who condemned us for taking that position and basically tried to get
25:49the Legal Aid Society the employer to shut down any kind of ADV advocacy
25:55against the war or for Palestine and in fact for years there was a battle that went on between the Zionist members of
26:01the Union who tried to shut down any anti-war prop Palestinian speech both at
26:07the Legal Aid Society by the employer and even went to outside agencies and and people to try to get funding
26:13deprived or threat of funding deprived to the agency if they continue to allow
26:18and didn’t shut down and totally Des censor this kind of speech and you have to understand this is in an agency where
26:24and in a union which traditionally has discussed everything in anything under the Sun including on the email system
26:30where anything could be said uh and yet the one thing that couldn’t be said apparently was Palestine and that that
26:36is not true just in our situation that’s the whole so-called Palestine exception
26:41to free speech that is out there and that is if anything the most intense right now as we can see in this
26:46temporary restraining Ru against our resolution being voted on so skipping ahead then however uh over the years
26:53people pers persevered in our Union continued to speak about Palestine issued numerous statements to that
26:59effect and a defense of free speech and then finally in the wake of one of the earlier Wars on Gaza since there there’s
27:06been so many since 2008 2009 in 2022 our union membership adopted a
27:13Palestine solidarity resolution very strong resolution which called for BDS called for the UAW to divest from Israel
27:20bonds and which was passed by 75% of the membership voting which is a huge land
27:28Landslide uh far far greater than you could ever hope for in almost any situation and then more recently before
27:36our resolution was brought this year in our local there was a rank and file BDS
27:41resolution that was formulated by pe other people in other UAW places uh
27:46calling on in response to the Palestinian call issued on October 16th at Ali had mentioned and that resolution
27:54is a sign on statement which calls on the UAW in particular to end its support for genocide and to to condemn the
28:01genocide and to divest from bonds and all those other things and join BDS and finally then on the heels of all of that
28:07and on the heels of October 7th came this resolution that we now being stopped from voting on and that
28:15resolution again is very strong very much in the in the same voice as our 2022 resolution that was overwhelmingly
28:23adopted and the point I think about all this is that like throughout Society
28:28there is such growing support for Palestinians and that Israel has so delegitimized itself especially in
28:35regard to the brutalization of Gaza I mean it’s it’s ganika all over again it’s the Warsaw Ghetto all over again
28:41it’s it’s Soo it’s it’s any number of places you can think of with historic analogies and it’s so clear that this is
28:48genocidal and and unjust and so because of that huge outpouring and we can see
28:54300,000 people marched in Washington just a couple of weeks ago for Palestine because of that the only
29:01response that the the zionists or pro-israeli forces have is to silence
29:07and to intimidate and to Blacklist and to fire all the things that are now
29:12going on to anybody who speaks up for Palestine because they can’t def they can’t defend the indefensible they can’t win the argument they can’t convince
29:19people in a democratic process not to vote for a resolution like this the only thing they can do is threaten our
29:25funding go to the court to shut found the democracy and to enable uh Israeli
29:30genocide and that’s what we’re facing here well and I I really really appreciate that breakdown I think it
29:36really underscores um you know like one of the things that I really wanted to to communicate to listeners uh in this
29:43episode and that we’ve been trying to communicate with other interviews that I’ve been doing here on the real news at
29:49breaking points everywhere else I’ve been running myself ragged trying to cover this as much as I can but like you
29:54know this this is a this is a worker issue on so many levels this is like at base a Humanity issue right you know
30:02like we as human beings like like what kind of world are we expected to give to
30:07our children what kind how can we look our children in the face how can we even look towards a future and think it’s one
30:12word living in where Humanity has shown itself capable of just accepting this
30:18and doing nothing while our fellow human beings are slaughtered in Mass while Futures are stolen children are murdered
30:26uh in in and left to die in incubators like again that’s where we got to start
30:31is just from a basic human perspective from the side of life we need to be
30:37speaking out against this and fighting for justice um and peace as much as
30:42possible but also as you’ve heard from the conversation so far this is fundamentally a labor issue not only
30:50because our fellow unionists in Palestine have put out this call uh to
30:55to workers and unions around the world to oppose the the violence of Israeli
31:01occupation the genocidal Onslaught in Gaza to use the our power as workers to
31:07bring an end to this madness um and at the same time uh everything that we’re
31:13talking about here is a worker issue you know your boss uh and and and the sort
31:19of like I mean workers getting censored from releasing a statement the kind of censorship that we’re talking about
31:26we’re not even talking about the the the the many instances of censorship and repression that we’ve been hearing about
31:33uh for weeks across the country people getting fired from their jobs people
31:39having promotions rescinded people getting docked even students you know getting docks just for showing up at a
31:47rally not speaking at it um you know the pressure the intense pressure coming from the donor class and and certain
31:55members within it um um to to to push universities to crack down on Free
32:01Speech as well right I mean like if we if workers and unions cannot harness our
32:07Collective power to stand up for the right to free speech um you know what what movement do we have left um and so
32:14I think that that’s also really important to underline here and I want to sort of uh uh talk about how this is
32:22playing out for y’all and has been playing out over the past week kind of building on on the great break break
32:27down that Michael gave us I wanted to sort of ask if we could uh again walk
32:32listeners through like how this is unfolded um as the the the statement
32:38came together um as y’all were were preparing to vote on uh the resolution
32:44to release this statement and were you know people at different offices you know being called in and and told you
32:51know like uh that that you shouldn’t do this by by your employers and that you know like you’re going to lose funding
32:57and and then having a injunction slapped on you like like this is wild I don’t I
33:03know I’ve heard about similar things to this but I was struggling to sort of think of a of a a similar situation
33:09where a a union was enjoined to not even complete voting on a resolution to
33:16release a a statement like that’s pretty wild to me so can you can you guys break that timeline down for us a little bit
33:22more and talk about just the past week specifically for people listening to this so as Ally explained earlier our
33:31Union alaa is composed of 25 different shops and so various members from those
33:38different shops came together to create the resolution and to write the resolution and then that resolution once
33:46it was written um in support of Palestine was brought to the Joint Council and That Joint Council consists
33:53of members from each or leaders from each each of the shops um who meet on
34:00occasions to vote through resolutions and do other Union activities um so that
34:06resolution was brought to the Joint Council um and on that meeting was on
34:12November 14th when the Joint Council met and they overwhelmingly voted in favor of bringing that resolution to a wider
34:20membership vote the vote was 108 to3 to8 and then they set that membership vote
34:26for November 17th but between no November 14th which was the Tuesday to
34:32November 17th the Friday a lot happened and I can walk us through that um first
34:41Las The Legal Aid Society um their management made a public statement and
34:48held a town hall meeting for all employees at The Legal Aid Society that statement was put out on um
34:56November 16th one day before our scheduled union vote um and in the
35:02statement and in that town hall they smeared the resolution they called it anti-semitic threatened um that it would
35:10lead to a loss of funding for the organization and strongly discouraged members from voting in favor of the
35:17resolution the New York Legal Assistance group nyag also their management also
35:22released a very similar statement the following day so on the day of our vote
35:29um in that statement they again urged members to vote no they blasted this
35:35resolution is anti-Semitic and they threatened that it would cause the organization to lose
35:42funding at the same time as this all happening on this interference from
35:47management there was a group of four attorneys who were who are union members
35:53um from The Legal Aid Society of nasau County that sued the New York sued in the New York state supreme court to stop
36:00our resolution from going to a vote they filed that lawsuit on Thursday afternoon
36:06and rather than just voting no for the resolution they resorted to this as an attack on our Union
36:13democracy the vote started as planned on November 17th the
36:19Friday but 15 minutes before the vote closed and a tally began a nasau County
36:25Supreme Court judge issued a blatantly unconstitutional temporary restraining
36:31order which barred our Union from completing the vote we strongly oppose the
36:38fear-mongering that management took place in their attempts to silence us as
36:43well as the blatantly anti-union and anti-democratic um actions of just four
36:49members preventing this vote from continuing and I know we want to speak to each of those points more in depth um
36:55I believe that Ally can speak a little bit more to funding now thanks Danny so yeah I think one important thing is that
37:02um most of the conversations to get us to stop speaking out on behalf of
37:08Palestinians and un favor of Justice um have have been about funding um and have
37:14been about threats to funding and as Danny called it fearmongering um but it
37:19is important to note that uh funding and and money uh historically has gone hand
37:27inand with promoting genocide people who people who are um in leading roles at
37:36universities Pol funding politicians um people who are in
37:41positions of Power with the ability to determine who gets money or what gets money um often play really big roles in
37:51controlling speech and in controlling um war and genocide and profiting off of it
37:57as you stated earlier Max Milan which was a really wonderful Point um and
38:04so we’re sort of responding in response to that first of all um one of the twia
38:11had indicated previously at a meeting um with legal aid attorneys that something along the lines of how we wanted to be
38:19aligned with law firms um because law firms give us money to do discretionary
38:24things at our different Union shops um but we explicitly do not want to be morally aligned with law firms um more
38:32that of more often than not that is not our goal um and I think that’s important to remember as you keep highlighting as
38:38working people um and really importantly we are a group of
38:45Public Defense offices so the truth is that the government needs us um we are
38:52protecting people’s constitutional rights as Michael stated their right to to the custody and control of their
38:58children their right to be live you know their right to Liberty their right to freedom and Justice um and our system of
39:07governance requires us as public defenders in order to even keep up the
39:12veneer or facade of Justice um in our systems that uh could only resemble
39:19Justice with us being in the roles that we are um so conditioning our funding on
39:25silence about is isues that matter to us is in line with Fascism and McCarthyism
39:31and we should all take extreme issue and actively fight against this um for ourselves and our clients and for
39:38Humanity honestly and um I ultimately and I think we all here refuse to
39:45legitimize the fear mongering around money and funding for that exact reason um curtailing our rights as union
39:52workers and as people and our first amendment rights generally which I know Michael will speak more about um you
39:59know that that’s something that we refuse to believe as a legitimate threat um unless if the government is prepared
40:04to accept uh their status as fascist mccarth ists and so the problem is not
40:10our speech but their attempts to unjustly intimidate us out of
40:17speaking I also want to talk about man’s attempts to silence Us by through their
40:23dangerous conflation of anti-Semitism and anti- Zionism um many of our union
40:29members including Ali Michael and I are all Jewish anti-zionists um and Las and nyag
40:37specifically their management have has attempted to silence our Union in our critiques of Israel by mislabeling them
40:44as anti-semitic at The Legal Aid Society meeting when pushed by members to
40:50identify any anti-semitic statement in the resolution L management pointed to
40:55the this language one in the occupation of Palestine and two we stand for human
41:03rights and against AP partide ethnic cleansing and genocide to Carter the CEO of Las called
41:11these dog whistles for anti-Semitism but they’re not they’re far from being anti-semitic and their
41:17language that aligns with human rights organizations across their across the world in their assessment of Israel’s
41:24conduct in Palestine our resolution expresses opposition to the actions of the state of Israel and
41:31those of the United States and the state of Israel is distinct from the religious or ethnic identity of Jews and to assert
41:39otherwise conflates a government with its people and it’s incorrect and it’s
41:44dangerous Legal Aid Society and nyag in their management they misrepresented the
41:50definition of anti-semitism both publicly and in the workplace and in doing this they impeded our work for
41:57justice and they’ve endangered our communities they attempted to silence our union members who support Palestine
42:04again many of whom are Jewish we also strongly oppose the statement that Las
42:09CEO Twilight Carter made when she stated that advocating for free Palestine is
42:15equivalent to stating that blue lives matter in our fight for Palestinian
42:20Liberation we also fight for racial Justice and against anti-Semitism and we
42:25reject claim that they’re mutually exclusive all of these fights for justice go hand in hand and we do them
42:32simultaneously man that one that one gets me uh I mean all of this gets me
42:37but like I’ve seen some in my day for management and like this sort of
42:43like faux Progressive weaponization of identity politics and
42:48other like nominally sounding Progressive issues to bust work to bust
42:53unions to to uh suppress workers rights like that is that is next level because
42:59what and I’m speaking for myself here I’m not speaking for anyone else on the call this is me Max the host opining on
43:05that right but like uh it reminds me of when we interviewed uh workers at no
43:11evil Foods a vegan you know meat alternative producer in North Carolina a
43:17couple years ago um and the like you know pseudo Progressive kind of punk
43:22rock looking owners you know who had tattoos and piercing they were standing I got the the
43:28recordings from the the um captive audience meetings they held to bust their Union Drive and they were using
43:35like all these sort of faux left talking points saying that like oh we’re a vegan
43:40you know company that like believes in a meatless future and you guys want to unionize with the UFCW who also
43:47represent meat packing workers and so like you’re undercutting like the mission uh you know like just just
43:53cherry-picking so many things to ultimately the grand scheme of things the whole goal was to bust the Union
43:59Drive the whole goal was to strip away workers rights so I’m not I’m not conflating these two instances I’m I’m
44:05comparing them in that regard that bosses can use so many different
44:10mechanisms to try to ultimately achieve the same end which is get their workers to shut the hell up and stay in line and
44:18not exercise their own rights and that is wrong uh regardless of the situation
44:25but especially in a situation like this where we are literally with our own eyes watching the extermination of a people
44:32and we are being told it’s anti-semitic to say anything about it that’s ridiculous pardon my French again I’m
44:37just speaking for myself I don’t want to get anyone in trouble but I’ve been bottling this up for the past 48 hours
44:43after learning about what y’all are going through and it is blowing my goddamn mind and again we’re talking
44:48about a mccarthyite situation here where people are getting fired people for for for even liking stuffff on social media
44:56I mean like just the the sort of repressive nature uh of this is is so
45:01intense and you know working people and people of conscience everywhere have to fight against that because if we lose
45:08that battle now you know if you lose those if you give up your ability to exercise those rights you are not going
45:14to get them back without a hell of a fight right and so you know for many many reasons everyone listening to this
45:22should stand up and oppose uh what is happening here um because if it’s not
45:27happening at your shop I promise you it will come to your shop if we all stand oddly by and let this happen and so I
45:35want to kind of end on that note I wanted to turn things over to y’all one more time I know that that uh we’ve
45:41already gone over a little bit I don’t want to keep you for too much longer but I just wanted to ask what happens now like I mean like
45:47where do things stand we’re again we’re recording this on Sunday November 19th we’re going to try to turn this around
45:53for tomorrow uh as quickly as we can um but as as Danny said like a ton
45:59happened in the span of like three days last week so I’m going to hedge my bets here and say that a lot could happen in
46:04the next 24 48 72 hours so uh I guess what happens now um and where do things
46:13stand now what can other unions what can other workers what can other people of conscience do uh to support y’all in
46:19this fight well I’ll just start by saying that you know the the temporary straining order against our Union
46:26silencing our Union on speaking out on a on a human rights issue and a Liberation
46:32issue and an anti-genocide issue especially is truly unprecedented at
46:38least in modern times I mean there was a time you know when there were no free speech rights at all in this country
46:43really and where you know unions were even illegal until you know basically
46:49you know the end of the 19th century and and still had to fight all kinds of battles uh ever since including battles
46:55in which lots of workers were killed by the employers of the state but uh in
47:00modern times to have a a court uh of all places in Nassau County Supreme Court to
47:07which is the trial level Court in in New York state for them to issue a a a a
47:13prior restraint prior censorship against political speech by a union or for that
47:18matter anybody else is just absolutely groundless in terms of the law it’s a
47:24blatant violation of the First Amendment the only time I’m aware of in recent times recent years modern times when a
47:31court even issued an injunction against the union for for for making it for speech was around uh 1999 2000 during
47:40the transit workers negotiations in New York City and I remember going to court with the transit Workers Union on behalf
47:46of our Union and opposing a temporary restraining order which forbid the union
47:52that Union from taking a vote to authorize a strike at the New York Transit Authority and
47:58the reason the basis for that although that was also blatantly unconstitutional but at least the grounds for that was
48:04that going on strike for those workers is illegal under the Taylor law in New York state a horrible an you know
48:11anti-union law but it and so that issue that should of course never been issued it was like
48:17the the the injunction against the Memphis sanitation workers in 1968 that the court there ordered same time that
48:24Reverend Martin Luther King was killed assassinated but at least again they had
48:29the hook there that what was being voted on was to Advocate or even authorize
48:35what was purportedly an illegal job action here this is purely political speech and again not to defend what the
48:41court did there but to say this is even worse because here all that’s being voted on is something that doesn’t even
48:48have to do with collective bargaining directly it’s not about an issue at work although actually it is because of the
48:54silencing and the censorship but that’s not primarily even what this resolution was about and even if it was we have the right to say so so to have this court
49:03issue this injunction and and not just an injunction but a temporary restraining order in other words
49:08basically an expar that means that we didn’t have the right to be heard before this is this uh was voted was ordered is
49:14just absolutely unheard of and I think is very much part of the times that we’re facing now I mean this is not post
49:20911 all over again this is McCarthyism all over again this is the Red Scare all over again this is you know becoming
49:28co-intel Pro uh all over again from the 1960s the FBI notorious FBI program to
49:34uh de you know to attack the Black Liberation movement in particular and so it’s essential we think to oppose this
49:41we will oppose this we will not be silenced we as we say in one of our press releases you know we will prevail
49:48here we will vote we will pass the resolution and and and Palestine will be
49:54free not not just because of us but but with our support and our our strong uh
50:01act intervention to the degree that we can and in that regard I would just ask
50:07people to uh do a number of things one is or actually Ally do you want to
50:12address this okay sorry let me take that apart St back so we would ask people to do a number of things themselves one is
50:19to if you’re in a union get your union bring a resolution to get your Union to respond to the call
50:27of Palestinian trade unionists for a ceasefire yes but not just a ceasefire for the liberation of
50:33Palestine and for the end to the uh the the the Zionist regime that exists there
50:39and that stops people from being free so that we have a society in Palestine with uh Liberation for
50:47Palestine from the river to the sea with equal rights for all that’s what we’re talking about ultimately here and
50:53secondly to so to bring that resolution of your union to get your union to divest from Israel bonds to call for
50:59those different things to support the BDS movement and we’d also ask UW members to sign on to the rank and file
51:07UAW BDS statement that’s out there you can find it online to sign on if you
51:12whatever Union you’re in to sign on to labor for Palestine statement posted at Labor forp palestine. net which upholds
51:18the palestin in Union call and to uh to to take these steps now so so
51:25that we can look at ourselves in the face both as union members as workers and as human beings I’ll also just
51:31provide um our email that we’ve created alaa for Palestine gmail.com ala athe
51:40word f Palestine gmail.com uh if you are
51:45in a union if you’re trying to form a union uh everyone should try and form a union but in general um we would be
51:52happy to support other Union shops in coming up with statements and figuring out how you two
51:57can stand in solidarity with uh Palestinian trade unions and Palestinians generally and support
52:03palestini and Liberation and Liberation for us all if I could just add one thing you may not have use for this but I just
52:08want to call attention to the fact that already uh workers around the world are
52:14refusing to handle Israeli Cargo in particular Dockers and even in this country a couple of weeks ago block the
52:22vote Campaign which is uh coordinated by the a resources and organizing Center in Oak in the Bay Area with support of ILWU
52:30Local 10 doc workers refused to handle Israeli cargo that was coming on on a
52:35zim Line ship into Oakland and then refused to handle it when that when that ship uh fled to Tacoma because it
52:42couldn’t get unloaded in Oakland and this reflects an ongoing block the boat campaign that started in 2014 and which
52:49for the past almost 10 years has kept Israeli ships away from the West Coast so these are the kinds of actions the
52:55direct actions that we can be taking in all kinds of ways to support Palestinian trade unionists and Palestinian people
53:01generally it’s it’s resolutions are critical and the fight for free speech is critical But ultimately it’s that
53:07kind of direct action by workers at their jobs that can make all the
53:12[Music]
53:24difference
53:32I got work to I got I got
53:39to I got
