Apr 25, 2019 - Fighting to Raise Wages

AT&T Midwest, AT&T Legacy T, and AT&T Southeast

This week, CWA members at AT&T across the country continued to meet with members of Congress dropping off handwritten letters urging them to investigate AT&T and other companies about their broken promises for higher wages and more jobs if the GOP corporate tax cut bill passed.

Click here to read an op-ed by President Shelton published last week in The Hill about CWA's call for an investigation.

CWAers from Georgia met with Rep. John Lewis about investigating AT&T and other corporations to find out what they did with their GOP corporate tax cut bill windfall. Rep. Lewis is the chair of the House Ways and Means Oversight Committee.

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Envoy Air

In the wake of a CBS4 report this week detailing the low wages and poor working conditions at Miami International Airport (MIA) for passenger service agents at American Airlines-owned Envoy Air and for workers employed by Eulen America, Congresswoman Donna Shalala and Rep. Frederica Wilson held a congressional roundtable featuring airport workers to demand that American Airlines and Delta take action against the hazardous working conditions. Passenger service agent and CWA member James McKnight spoke at the roundtable about Envoy workers' fight for a fair contract as American Airlines continues to stonewall them at the bargaining table.

CWAers across the country are making progress on passing legislation to protect call center jobs from offshoring! Here are the new updates on CWA members' hard work to pass state legislation:

Nevada CWAers made a strong push last week for a committee vote on the call center bill and succeeded! They will now focus on amending the bill to strengthen it before a floor vote.

Colorado passed its call center bill, H.B. 19-1306, through the State House on Friday with a 41-23 vote. CWA members including call center workers and other activists lobbied committee members and testified at the hearing. CWAers secured Senate sponsorship of the bill with CWA labor champion, Senator Robert Rodriguez. 

Texas call center bill H.B. 701 was voted out of the House Business & Industry Committee last week. The bill will now head to the House Calendars Committee, which will determine whether to advance the bill to the full House Chamber for a vote. Texas CWAers held a big lobby day in support of the bill.

The Alabama call center bill, S.B. 110, passed the State Senate this week 32-0! The House will vote on the bill next Wednesday with a floor vote expected by next Thursday. CWAers have been making calls and getting postcards signed to push for the vote.

Last week, Colorado CWA members participated in the first-ever Colorado AT&T Mobility CWA STRONG/Unity@Mobility blitz. Over the course of three days, 14 blitz teams visited 36 AT&T Mobility stores represented by CWA Locals 7708, 7750, and 7777 to sign up new members and to encourage their coworkers to get involved in their union. CWAers also signed up 100% of the new employee class at the CWA Local 7750-represented DIRECTV call center in Denver.

Local leaders from across the country who have successfully built power at AT&T Mobility gathered in Chicago to discuss the strategies they used to increase CWA membership and encourage activist involvement. They will share their findings with other Unity@Mobility leaders to help locals develop plans to strengthen their programs.

Piedmont passenger service agents from CWA Local 7019 in Phoenix are fighting to raise the federal minimum wage to $15 by 2024. The issue directly affects passenger service agents at Piedmont, most of whom make under $15 per hour. The CWAers met with staff at Rep. Greg Stanton's Arizona office, and dropped off signed postcards from their coworkers at Rep. Debbie Lesko's and Rep. Andy Biggs' offices.

AT&T has increasingly offshored U.S.-based call center jobs to the Philippines where workers are paid pennies on the dollar of what U.S. union workers would earn. To fight back against AT&T's efforts to divide working people with this race to the bottom, CWA members are building solidarity with international call center workers.

This week, AT&T workers and members of CWA, the Asian Pacific American Labor Alliance (APALA), and Filipino activist groups Migrante and Bayan held protests in California's two largest cities demanding AT&T put pressure on its Irvine-based contractor Alorica to end union-busting of workers' United Employees of Alorica (UEA) union and BPO Industry Employee Network (BIEN) in the Philippines and start engaging in meaningful dialogue.

Alorica management has systematically attacked union members and brought trumped up criminal charges against union leaders.

"The brave Alorica call center workers in the Philippines are exercising their right to organize and expressing legitimate demands to improve their place of work," said CWA Local 9410 Officer Roland Andersen in San Francisco. "We are proud to show solidarity with their cause, which ultimately shares much in common with our own."

During CWA's 2016 strike at Verizon, Philippine call center workers helped CWA members uncover the extent of Verizon's offshoring efforts, exposing Verizon management's false claim that only a small part of the business' calls were sent to call centers in the Philippines.

AT&T workers and members of CWA, the Asian Pacific American Labor Alliance (APALA), and Filipino activist groups Migrante and Bayan held protests in California's two largest cities demanding AT&T put pressure on its Irvine-based contractor Alorica to end its union-busting.