Thousands of Working Ohioans Show Up to Protest a Koch Brothers Summit

More than 3,500 working people from across Ohio and neighboring states – including hundreds of CWAers – showed up in downtown Columbus, OH, last week. They came to protest a summit funded by the billionaire Koch brothers that was all about how to undermine the collective bargaining rights of American workers.

The Koch-funded group Americans for Prosperity had planned a "Defending the American Dream Summit" and Ohioans turned out in force to tell them to stop the attacks on working people.

"Thousands of Ohio working families, which included many from CWA Locals, were on hand to greet the extremist Americans for Prosperity group and let them know that 'right-to-work' is wrong for Ohio and wrong for America," CWA District 4 Vice President Linda Hinton said.

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Update on Presidential Endorsement

August 11, 2015

To: CWA Local Presidents

 

Dear Colleagues:

 

I wanted to update you on the recent discussions and actions by our CWA Executive Board for determining whether and how our union will endorse a Presidential candidate.

 

CWA has not made an endorsement for the presidential primary elections. CWA doesn’t get out in front of our members, and our members will decide what action we take on endorsement. The Executive Board has moved forward on a process to provide information about the candidates, along with an online poll for members to make their views known. I want to outline that process here.

 

CWA’s political action website will include responses from the candidates to our questions on our priority issues: good jobs and trade, fair wages, retirement security, bargaining rights, and more.  The website will be live sometime in September, and the information also will be provided to members in the Fall issue of the CWA News, which members will receive in early October.

 

CWA members and activists will be able to weigh this information about candidates at worksite events and in a telephone town hall call before casting votes in the on-line poll. The poll will stay open into early December and will help determine whether a single candidate has overwhelming support from the membership.

Our members are motivated, and many thousands more have been activated by our fair trade fight.  I want this activism to grow and build our movement.

While local unions should continue to refrain from making an endorsement until the National Union as a whole makes a determination about endorsement, members can and should volunteer to work for the presidential candidate of their choice.

I’m very proud of our union and our members, and the role we play not only in political action, but in what we do to benefit all working families.

In Solidarity,

Chris Shelton
President

DOJ Approves Massive AT&T, DirecTV Merger

AT&T Inc has won U.S. antitrust approval to buy DirecTV for $48.5 billion, an acquisition that will combine the country's No. 2 wireless carrier with the largest satellite-TV provider, the Justice Department said on Tuesday.

"After an extensive investigation, we concluded that the combination of AT&T's land-based Internet and video business with DirecTV's satellite-based video business does not pose a significant risk to competition," Assistant Attorney General Bill Baer of the Antitrust Division said, in a statement.

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AT&T Embracing Net-Neutrality Rules It Slammed to Speed DirecTV Deal

The company once known as Ma Bell has assumed the mantle in recent years as the leading antagonist to advocates of net neutrality, rules designed to give every Internet publisher the same speed and access to consumers.

To read the full article, CLICK HERE!

AT&T’s Latest Promise to FCC in Effort to Win DirecTV Merger Approval Reeks of Desperation

While no one on the outside knows exactly what’s going on behind closed doors, it appears as though AT&T still has some work to put in if it hopes to get its $50 billion DirecTv merger proposal approved by regulators. The company had already made some promises in an effort to win favor with the Federal Communications Commission, including a promise to deliver gigabit U-verse Internet service to nearly 12 million households, but now we’ve reached a new phase of bargaining that was probably inevitable: AT&T has a deal for poor people that it hopes is too good for regulators to pass up.

To view the full article, CLICK HERE!