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5 California Victories That Burned Bright in the Year of Trump

Dean Kuipers Capital & Main
California appears to be ready to stand up against the Trump agenda. This builds off much of the organizing already taking place in the state, including some strong victories for workers in 2016. (It is worth noting that even white voters vote differently than whites elsewhere - see http://www.sacbee.com/opinion/california-forum/article119870398.html).

The Radical Roots of the Great Grape Strike

David Bacon The Reality Check
Mythology has hidden the true history of how and why the great grape strike started, especially its connection to some of the most radical movements in the country's labor history. After 50 years that silence is lifting. Dawn Mabalon, a history professor at San Francisco State University, has documented the radical career of Larry Itliong, who headed the Agricultural Workers Organizing Committee (AWOC), one of the two organizations that carried out the 1965 strike.

Jerry Brown's University of California Perma-Temp Problem

Danny Feingold Capital and Main
The controversy over UC’s use of thousands of contract workers who earn low wages with few, if any, benefits has taken center stage in Sacramento, where legislation that would end such practices cleared the Legislature earlier this month.

labor

The Image and Influence of California's Organized Labor

Scott Detrow California Report (Public Radio Consortium, KQED)
While unions are "taking it on the chin" in many areas of the country - e.g. states like Wisconsin and Indiana eliminating collective bargaining rights - organized labor is alive and well in California politics.
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