Andy Kroll, MoJo: Inside Labor's Epic Battle in Wisconsin: How big labor and progressive groups

Inside Labor's Epic Battle in Wisconsin

How big labor and progressive groups pulled off the biggest protests in 40 years.

By Andy Kroll on Fri. March 4, 2011 12:01 AM PDT


They piled off of buses and out of cars, filling the streets of Madison, Wisconsin, and surrounding the towering Capitol. Thousands crowded inside the building’s beautiful rotunda, their cheers echoing throughout the domed structure. An estimated 100,000 people had descended on frigid Madison to protest Republican Governor Scott Walker's "budget repair bill," a sweeping piece of legislation that would strip 170,000 public-sector workers of their right to collectively bargain.

Last Saturday's "Rally to Save the American Dream" was the culmination of two weeks of protests and a 24-7 sit-in inside the Capitol. Not for 30 or 40 years have unions and progressive groups come together in such an outpouring of support for workers' rights. What makes the Madison protests even more incredible is how spontaneous they have been: There has been no master plan, no long-anticipated strategy to turn Madison into ground zero for a reenergized labor movement.

What follows is a behind-the-scenes account of how the massive Wisconsin rallies came together, based on interviews with a dozen people who were intimately involved in them. It is by no means an exhaustive or complete account. But it offers a window into how the unions and their allies responded, swiftly and effectively, to what they saw as an existential threat.

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