April 15, 2025–Labor Network for Sustainability is kicking off “Earth Day to May Day” organizing by hosting a webinar featuring the Chicago Teachers Union. Members of CTU will share how they led a year-long contract campaign where labor and community won on many issues including climate justice and public sector resilience.
In a previous Strike! Commentary I proposed a strategic perspective for defending society against MAGA tyranny. It outlined a “Social Self-Defense” based on combining civil resistance in social institutions and the streets with political resistance in the institutions of government. Social Self-Defense cannot be based on a preconceived plan; it will have to be created by the people who make it. We can learn lessons – both positive and negative – from past struggles against autocracy. But we also have to adapt those lessons to the unique conditions we face in the second Trump era.
The Chicago Teachers Union, long an advocate for climate protection, has just won language in its new contract spelling out climate and climate justice provisions for students and educators.
Can your employer cancel your union’s right to bargain by issuing a press release? On March 7 the Department of Homeland Security announced plans “ending collective bargaining” for TSA’s transportation screening officers by issuing a press release.
America’s two largest unions, the National Education Association and the Service Employees International Union, are among dozens of sponsors of a nationwide mobilization April 5 “to stop the most brazen power grab in modern history.”
