White House summit lifts up Minnesota workers’ success stories

  When President Obama called a Worker Voice Summit at the White House last October, he pledged his administration would hold regional summits across the country in 2016 to continue the conversation about common issues working people face on the job. The first of those summits took place in Minneapolis today – and with good […]

SuperAmerica workers’ concerns fall on deaf ears

SuperAmerica continues to stonewall workers looking to meet with corporate leadership to discuss concerns about low pay, favoritism and poor working conditions. Workers from the St. Cloud area, organizing with Working America and the Greater Minnesota Worker Center, brought their campaign to the Twin Cities yesterday. Joined by allies in the labor movement and students […]

Striking workers revive campaign for Working Families Agenda

  Fast-food workers and retail janitors from 70 Twin Cities stores joined a nationwide strike today, rallying early this morning with other low-wage workers in support of a $15 minimum wage, paid sick days and other policies in the stalled Working Families Agenda. Workers in 270 cities planned to join the strike, which mostly targeted […]

Victory in New York strengthens workers’ resolve for $15 in Minneapolis

  Fast-food workers in New York state won their fight for $15 yesterday. Workers in Minneapolis intend to be next. “If New York can do it, then Minneapolis and Minnesota can do it,” Guillermo Lindsay, a McDonald’s worker and CTUL organizer, barked into a megaphone at a rally outside the Dinkytown McDonald’s yesterday. Fast-food workers, […]

Janitors fired after joining strike confront dealerships they used to clean

  WAYZATA – Backed by a delegation of supporters, three janitors fired after going on strike confronted the car dealerships they used to clean yesterday, asking managers to use their influence with cleaning contractor ROC to help them get their jobs back. “I am angry because they’re not listening to us,” fired worker Julio Romero […]

Fired after joining strike, four janitors suspect retaliation

  Four janitors with 8 years of experience cleaning car dealerships in Wayzata were fired June 9, the same day they joined a Twin Cities-wide strike for better wages and working conditions. Suspecting retaliation was the motive behind their release, the janitors and their supporters are pressuring the dealerships and their cleaning contractor, ROC Commercial […]

Protesters to Best Buy: ‘Get out of the way so we can have justice’

  RICHFIELD – Inside and outside of Best Buy’s annual shareholders meeting today, Minnesotans called on the corporation to stop using its political clout to block policies that improve working families’ lives. That includes proposed legislation in Minnesota that would provide workers and their families with the stability and security they need to ensure a […]

Victory in Los Angeles buoys hopes of local 15 Now supporters

  Workers taking collective action and communities organizing for political change form the groundwork of 15 Now, panelists said Wednesday during a forum on the nationwide movement to raise wages. The discussion was the second in a new series of monthly educational events hosted by the East Side Freedom Library in St. Paul, co-sponsored by […]

Janitors set new strike deadline, accuse cleaning contractor of wage theft

Janitors who clean big-box and department stores in the Twin Cities announced two key developments in their campaign for better wages and working conditions today, setting a new strike deadline and filing a class-action lawsuit to recoup wages allegedly lost to wage theft. Members of with the Twin Cities worker center CTUL took legal action […]

Kohl’s refuses to hear from workers who keep its stores clean

  Executives at Kohl’s had no interest today in hearing concerns about working conditions maintained by cleaning subcontractors inside their department stores – not in Roseville, and not at the company’s annual shareholder meeting in Milwaukee. That’s disappointing, workers said, given the pattern of OSHA violations recently exposed at one of Kohl’s cleaning contractors in […]