Original online here.
Holding our elected officials accountable is paramount to our union values the same way we hold our medical facilities and management accountable.
SPONSORED BY
To: Bonnie Castillo, CNA, NNU, NNOC and affiliated unions
From: [Your Name]
We are bearing witness to a genocide of the Palestinian people. Elected politicians are seeking out and approving funding for the bombs and shells Israel is using to perpetrate this crime. As members of California Nurses Association/National Nurse Organizing Committee and its affiliate unions in National Nurses United (CNA/NNOC/NNU) , we are one of the largest unions representing nurses in the United States. As union members we feel that we must hold elected politicians accountable to our social justice resolutions passed at convention in 2023.
As healthcare workers we have watched as Israel has decimated the medical infrastructure of Gaza in violation of international law. The Biden administration has been complicit in this crime from the beginning, even bypassing congress to increase weapons sales to Israel and vetoing UN Security Council proposals for a humanitarian ceasefire.
We as rank and file union members seek not only hold these elected politicians accountable but we also hold our executive board responsible for endorsing candidates or elected officials who do not align with our resolutions against war or broader calls for a ceasefire. The actions of the elected politicians who continue to fund this genocide, a genocide that has explicitly targeted healthcare workers like ourselves in Gaza, goes against the global movement for labor solidarity and everything our union stands for.
Therefore, together as CNA/NNOC/NNU members, we call on our board and the council of presidents to withdraw its endorsement of President Biden until he meets the conditions outlined below. Furthermore, we pledge not to participate in any union-sponsored Get Out the Vote actions for President Biden or any other candidate who supports the ongoing genocide of Palestinians until they meet the following demands:
1. Call for an immediate ceasefire, an end to the genocide of Palestinians, and the provision of humanitarian aid to Palestinians.
2. Stop providing military funding, stop providing intelligence to Israel, ending providing diplomatic cover for Israel’s criminal behavior and end the U.S. siege of the Middle East.
3. Commit to ensuring Israel’s compliance with international law and universal principles of human rights, including ending the occupation, dismantling the illegal apartheid wall, guaranteeing equal rights for Palestinians, releasing prisoners (both Palestinians and Israelis), and recognizing the right of return for Palestinian refugees.
4. Commit to fair due process for asylum-seekers and refugees, including demilitarizing the border, stopping border wall construction, closing open-air detention centers, expanding shelters, granting work permits, and establishing legal pathways to citizenship (e.g., DACA).
In the face of the worst humanitarian crisis in modern times, surpassing even the original 1948 Nakba, it is our obligation as union members and working people to fight for the livelihoods and freedom of all Palestinians. Together, we can hold these elected politicians accountable, and we can build a labor movement that truly fights for justice everywhere in the world, irrespective of the bosses’ borders. We hope you will join us.
In solidarity,
The Undersigned
Rank-and-File Members
