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It is time for a labor movement, and I mean some serious organizing.
Do you think these groups supporting Vice President Harris just popped up overnight? No. We have been organizing since 2017. We have been putting in the work. Cultivating leaders, supporting good candidates, meeting regularly, writing by-laws, showing up when there is a call out, writing op-eds, showing up at our Capitol buildings, reading, and doing the research.
Then when the tide changed this summer, and President Biden passed the torch, we were ready! Look at the impact that has had across the country. You can feel the positive vibes everywhere you go.
Organizing is hard work, but it is necessary work. If we want anything better for ourselves then we need to get to it. We need to build union strength in West Virginia to the capacity that it makes our ancestors proud! We need to put good leaders in place, pay our dues, and start fighting back.
It is ridiculous that we have allowed that Right to Work law to stand for as long as it has. When are we going to elect a majority to overturn it?
Collective bargaining needs to come back and we can do it. Living wages -- every West Virginian deserves the dignity of being able to work and pay their bills and the current minimum wage doesn't cut it. I don't know about you, but I believe our legislators work for us, not corporations.
With the recent Supreme Court decision in Loper Bright Enterprises V. Raimondo, which overturned the Chevron decision, our workplaces are about to get a lot more dangerous.
Every workplace from the nursing homes (one of the most heavily regulated industries in the country) to the coal mines will be negatively impacted by that decision. Not to mention the safety of the public.
How do you think it will go when it is the courts that are deciding which safety regulations to implement and how to interpret them? What happens when all those decisions get bogged down in the courts? I will tell you -- people are going to get hurt. Not just the workers in those industries, but the public. If you value worker safety and you believe a worker's labor has worth, then it is time to get to work.
It is time to start organizing, because collectively we can do anything. The people are the power in this country, and it is time to remind those that have been stripping away our rights in Charleston.
It is time to remember our roots and fight like hell for the workers.
I call on educators, coal miners, nursing home workers, hospitality workers, retail and fast-food workers, nurses, first responders, and everyone else that believes in the power of the working people, start organizing!
Start paying your dues every month, elect good union leaders and then support them. Show up and make worker rights a priority -- you will not regret it.
Elect good candidates that will fight for unions and the working people.
Mandy Smith Weirich
Candidate for WV State Senate District 11