Pols Join Workers for Wisconsin Solidarity Rally in Front of News Corp

Source: Observer

Hundreds of people massed in front of the News Corporation building yesterday evening in a show of solidarity with protestors in Wisconsin who have staged a days-long sit-in at the state Capitol there.

The crowd encompassed several unions including the Civil Services Employees Union, the Writers Guild of America and the United Federation of Teachers, many of them wearing foam cheesehead hats. There were there, they said, to fight the perception that unions, rather than corporations or the financial industry, had become scapegoats for the country's financial woes, and they feared that Wisconsin indicated a broader national trend of waning union clout.

"Right now public workers are under siege everywhere," assemblyman David Weprin told the crowd. "They're under siege in New York state."

In a subsequent interview, Weprin said that Andrew Cuomo has a "strong history of support for unions" that boded well for New York's public unions, which are facing some combination of layoffs and reduced wages as they wait to negotiate a new collective bargaining agreement with the governor. But he said unequivocally that "there will be layoffs and jobs lost by attrition."

Manhattan Borough President Scott Stringer was more specific when he addressed the rally, singling out Wisconsin governor Scott Walker, New Jersey governor Chris Christie and New York City mayor Michael Bloomberg for divisive rhetoric and reticence in negotiating with unions.



Read more: http://www.observer.com/2011/politics/supporters-wisconsion-unions-rally-front-news-corporation-building