2 Things Keep Happening At Starbucks: Union Wins, Union Supporters Facing Retaliatory Firing: CEO

[appalachiablue]

- Daily Kos, April 14, 2022. Ed.

Starbucks workers just keep winning. Back in December, 2 stores going union out of 3 that voted in Buffalo was a big deal, and the wins were narrow and hard-fought. This week, the union won 4 votes in a row—unanimously. There was literally no number of votes Starbucks could challenge at those stores (short of every single one) that would have yielded anything but a union. Those votes came at 2 Boston-area Starbucks, one in Pittsburgh, and one in Eugene, Oregon.

The company isn’t giving up on its anti-union campaign, though. Starbucks has started handing out fliers with fake tweets attributed to @SBWorkersUnited, the union Twitter account. And it has continued firing union leaders. Late Wednesday, More Perfect Union tweeted that the National Labor Relations Board (NLRB) had filed a complaint against Starbucks for mistreatment of 2 workers in Phoenix, AZ. One of the Phoenix workers is 19-year-old shift supervisor Laila Dalton, who was repeatedly berated & harassed before being fired. Tyler Gillette, who is autistic & had been promised some reasonable accommodations. Starbucks put Gillette on indefinite unpaid leave after the union effort went public.

A worker in Phoenix, Alyssa Sanchez, was told she could shift her schedule from 5 days a week to 4 so that she could attend flight school—until managers learned about her support of the union effort, at which point she was put on the schedule 5 days a week & pressured to resign. An earlier NLRB complaint, which also addresses the treatment of Dalton, called on the company to reinstate Sanchez. The list of obviously retaliatory firings goes on. In the Buffalo area, shift supervisor Angel Krempa was fired after a series of disciplinary actions that began when she started wearing union paraphernalia & culminated with her firing for supposedly not calling the store to report that she would be late because of car trouble. Except her phone logs show she did call.

In Raleigh, NC, an organizing committee member was fired after part of a sink fell on her while she was washing dishes. “The sink just kind of fell off the wall onto me,” Sharon Gilman told VICE. “I wasn't injured, but it did fall off & I was holding it up & there was water spraying.” Another worker confirmed that Gilman called for help & seemed scared, & workers documented the damage with photos. The incident happened in Feb., but it was more than a month later when Starbucks fired Gilman, accusing her of intentionally breaking the sink & claiming to have video showing her yanking on it. Other workers at the store say equipment malfunctions are common there. Just coincidentally no doubt, Gilman was fired the week ballots were going out for the union vote in her store, after 2 years on the job with no write-ups.

The list goes on...
https://www.dailykos.com/stories/2022/4/14/2091941/-Starbucks-keeps-trying-to-crush-its-workers-with-union-busting-campaign-but-it-s-not-working
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* Related: Starbucks CEO whines that companies are being 'assaulted ... by the threat of unionization,' April 5, 2022,
https://www.dailykos.com/stories/2022/4/5/2090217/-Starbucks-CEO-whines-that-companies-are-being-assaulted-by-the-threat-of-unionization



- Howard Schultz, CEO of Starbucks. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Howard_Schultz