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Fenway Park’s workers to strike, today
In June, Fenway Park’s unionized workers with UNITE HERE authorized a strike. On Friday, July 25, there will be a strike by those same workers — unless Aramark changes course and their negotiation style by noon.
Members of UNITE HERE Local 26, who work at both Fenway Park and MGM Music Hall, are set to strike for their demands, which are to simply be paid like the same kinds of employees elsewhere. Per WGBH:
Workers with the union have been without a contract since the end of last year and now seek a number of changes, including better wages and protections against automation.
Workers with UNITE HERE Local 26 voted last month to authorize a strike. They’re asking fans who attend the games to support workers by not buying any food or drinks inside of Fenway during the strike.
The union said Wednesday that it did not make significant progress in its latest bargaining session with Aramark last week.
The Red Sox are facing the Dodgers this weekend, which is why the time for the strike is now: the Dodgers typically bring in fans on the road, and the fuller the stadium is and the fewer hospitality workers are around to serve them, the worse the experience is going to be. It’s also a missed opportunity for revenue, since fewer workers means fewer possible sales, even if Aramark decides to utilize their “contingency plans,” as they said they have in a statement. I’ve gotta say, Aramark, “contingency plans” sounds like “we’ll get some scabs,” which is not going to help you much on the negotiating front.
More from GBH:
In an open letter addressed to Red Sox owner John Henry and Fenway Sports Group, UNITE HERE workers said they’re struggling to survive economically. They said that Aramark pays workers doing similar jobs at Boston University and other ballparks more money.
The letter called on Henry and leadership at FSG, including Sox president Sam Kennedy, to intervene.
“This isn’t just a labor issue. It’s a community issue. It’s about whether the people who serve the hot dogs, pour the beer, and welcome the fans can afford to keep living in the city we love,” the letter said. “It’s about ensuring Fenway Park continues to be a place of pride — not just for baseball, but for how it treats the people who make it special.”
The Red Sox aren’t officially involved in negotiations, but as with all of these kinds of negotiations, they can put pressure on a resolution. Which, publicly, they’ve said they hope this resolves itself quickly. One wonders what they’re saying to Aramark privately, though, or if it will be enough to convince them to actually negotiate in the way that’s necessary to end this thing before a strike goes down, or at least before Friday’s 7:10 pm start time.
Trump signs college athletics executive order
If you pay attention to college athletics, then you’re aware that schools are trying to figure out Name, Image, and Likeness (NIL) rules, and life under the new $2.8 billion settlement signed off on by Judge Claudia Wilken. That settlement will both give athletes from 2016 to the present backpay for their participation in college athletics, while also setting up $20.5 million per year in revenue-sharing between schools and athletes starting with this season, while raising that cap annually.
Enter president Donald Trump signing an executive order to insert himself into the whole deal, with a headline that reads “President Donald J. Trump Saves College Sports” to boot. I will not bore you with the details here, but rather point you to Matt Brown’s Extra Points newsletter for the meat of this, which is what appears to be Trump’s attempt to get the National Labor Relations Board to say that these athletes aren’t employees.
I was glad — well, you know what I mean — to see that Brown agrees with the idea that an EO is not a law, no, but that we do not live in the times in which any of that sort of thinking can be relied upon. And that even if it is not upheld as a law, this likely signals Trump’s willingness to do what he always does when someone doesn’t listen to what he says, which is to threaten to withhold federal funding:
But the federal government of today doesn’t exactly work like the one I learned about in college. Congress and the courts have given more deference to the executive branch (see: tariff policy, appropriations, war powers, etc.) , and this particular administration has shown a willingness to aggressively deploy other tools to influence private businesses, higher education, and other entities not traditionally seen as under the purview of the executive.
I’m not exactly sure where this is going, but it’s going to further confuse an already muddled agreement, and as Brown notes, Trump’s involvement will likely make it more difficult for Congress to actually get anything to pass that it needs to pass in order to set this whole NIL, post-settlement era into the perpetual motion it needs.
Hulk Hogan is dead
All you need to know about Hulk Hogan’s legacy is that he’s the reason that a nascent unionization effort in WWE in 1986 — then WWF — was squashed. He did it to protect his own position at the top as the golden boy of Vince McMahon’s company, squealing on the boys in the back — including future governor of Minnesota, Jesse Ventura — who were thinking about organizing in order to receive fair treatment and pay and working conditions for themselves.
Now, 39 years later, WWE’s workers are still not unionized, and they show little interest in ever achieving that goal. McMahon’s empire has grown and grown, benefiting him more than anyone else. He is and was a monster with unchecked power who would sexually abuse his employees. His wife, Linda McMahon, is currently dismantling the department of education as one of Trump’s cabinet members, and the WWE’s wrestlers are all yes, sir that’s fine, sir about everything because none of them has anything close to any kind of protection as independent contractors and can’t really afford to be otherwise if they want to stick around or not live a life of embarrassment on national television.
This is without getting into the racism, or his role in a world where media publications live in fear of billionaires who can sue them into oblivion, or anything else from his life you can think of. It all truly got going in this moment nearly four decades ago, when he showed who he was for the first time by turning on those who should have been his comrades. Rest in piss, bozo.
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