Speaker 1: Also media.
Speaker 2: Hello and welcome to it could happen here. My name's
Speaker 2: Kim Kelly, and I'll be your host for this morning
Speaker 2: or evening or afternoon. I don't know your schedule, little
Speaker 2: web me. I'm a freelance journalist based in Philly, a
Speaker 2: third generation union member and author of the books Fight
Speaker 2: Like Hell, The Untold History of American Labor and his
Speaker 2: Young Reader's edition, Fight to Win Heroes of American Labor.
Speaker 2: Labor industry is obviously a passion of mine, but it's
Speaker 2: also my job to keep up with current worker struggles
Speaker 2: here in the US and abroad. Our pal Sophie, Robert James,
Speaker 2: everybody else have kindly given me the opportunity here to
Speaker 2: share some recent labor stories you might have missed, and
Speaker 2: adding a little historical context here and there to explain
Speaker 2: why exactly they're so important. All that being said, let's
Speaker 2: talk about silica. There are a lot of things out
Speaker 2: there that can kill you at work, but silica, specifically
Speaker 2: respirable crystalline silica, really goes above and beyond the call
Speaker 2: of duty. What is silica, you might ask, Well, it's
Speaker 2: a chemical compound made up of silicon and oxygen that
Speaker 2: is extremely common. Its government name is silicon dioxide. There's
Speaker 2: actually the second most abundant element on Earth after oxygen.
Speaker 2: Doesn't sound so bad, right, Well, it all comes down
Speaker 2: to how you encounter it. If you eat it in
Speaker 2: the form of dietary silica, that's fine. You can find
Speaker 2: it in leafy greens, oats, brown rice is actually pretty
Speaker 2: good for you. But and this is a big butt,
Speaker 2: if you breathe in silica dust, you're pretty much fucked. See.
Speaker 2: Silica dust is extremely harmful, toxic, dangerous, no good. If
Speaker 2: it gets into your lungs. It causes swelling and inflammation,
Speaker 2: which then turns into hard scar tissue, which makes it
Speaker 2: really hard to wreath at least even bigger problems like
Speaker 2: lung cancer, tuberculosis, silicosis, COPD, kidney disease, and one of
Speaker 2: the scariest occupational diseases in American history coal workers numoconiosis,
Speaker 2: which you might know better as black lung see. Silica
Speaker 2: is ten times more toxic than coal dust and has
Speaker 2: been fueling a quiet epidemic in the Appalachian coal fields
Speaker 2: for years now. A new report from the National Institute
Speaker 2: for Occupational Safety and Health reveals that black lung rates
Speaker 2: are higher than they've been in fifty years. A disease
Speaker 2: that most people assume has been eradicated has come roaring back,
Speaker 2: and now one in three miners with twenty five or
Speaker 2: more years experience in the mines has this brutal, fatal,
Speaker 2: incurable disease. There's no longer an old man's disease either.
Speaker 2: Do the math real quick. So if a worker goes
Speaker 2: underground when they're eighteen nineteen, you know, right out of
Speaker 2: high school, get their first big job, go down the mines.
Speaker 2: Twenty five years later, they've barely hit their forties. These
Speaker 2: are not old dudes. This is not the end of
Speaker 2: the line. Like the stereotype of the elderly coal miner
Speaker 2: with the oxygen tank. These people in their late twenties,
Speaker 2: their thirties, their forties. It's horrifying. These workers have so
Speaker 2: much more life to live, but their futures are being
Speaker 2: stolen from them by silica and more specifically, the mine
Speaker 2: operators who refuse to follow the proper safety protocols and
Speaker 2: engineering controls needed to protect them, and the Trunk administration's
Speaker 2: refusal to do deadly squat to make them. Actually, this
Speaker 2: administration is actively making the problem worse they see. After
Speaker 2: decades of work from coal miners and their allies, the
Speaker 2: Department of Labor under Biden was poised to enact a
Speaker 2: new silica rule that would have the amount of deadly
Speaker 2: dust that miners would be exposed to. Finally, it took
Speaker 2: decades to get to this point, and this rule was
Speaker 2: supposed to go in defect in April twenty twenty five.
Speaker 2: A guess who was president then, for all trumps squawking
Speaker 2: about beautiful clean coal and American workers and blah blah lah,
Speaker 2: he and the scrubs who work for him are actively
Speaker 2: killing coal miners to protect their coal barren Buddi's bottom line.
Speaker 2: And silica isn't just wreaking Havoc and Appalachia and his
Speaker 2: coal mines. It's a huge problem in the construction industry too,
Speaker 2: specifically among stone masons and countertop fabricators. See, silica isn't
Speaker 2: just floating around like Lucy Goosey. It's not like you're
Speaker 2: not going to breathe it in and walking down the street.
Speaker 2: You got to dig it out of rocks like granite
Speaker 2: marble courts. Coal miners digate out of the earth. For
Speaker 2: stone masons and countertop fabricators. They release the dust when
Speaker 2: they're cutting and finishing slabs of stone. Artificial stone aka
Speaker 2: manufacturer courts isn't especially popular material for that kitchen makeover.
Speaker 2: It is chock full of silica. That's right, you're a
Speaker 2: shining new kitchen counter. It might have killed someone already, sorry.
Speaker 2: California is currently grappling with a silicosis epidemic that is
Speaker 2: sickened over five hundred workers, fifty of them and needed
Speaker 2: lung transplants, and as of today, thirty two of them
Speaker 2: have died. These are not old men either. Their median
Speaker 2: age is forty six. In almost every case in California
Speaker 2: has occurred among Mexican and Central American immigrant workers, many
Speaker 2: of them have died within a few years of their diagnosis.
Speaker 2: It is a fucking nightmare, and like black lung and Appalachia,
Speaker 2: it is completely preventable when workers' health and safety is
Speaker 2: taken into account and existing regulations are followed. When they aren't,
Speaker 2: people die. Regulations are there for a reason, like it's
Speaker 2: not just for funzies, like it matters. Man makes me
Speaker 2: so mad. But with all that in mine, let's wrap
Speaker 2: up this silica sponsored portion of our program with a
Speaker 2: little sweet treat from Starbucks. Yes, the coffee giant has
Speaker 2: gone all in on blended and frozen drinks. You've seen
Speaker 2: them on Instagram, TikTok. They're very pretty, they look very
Speaker 2: radioactive in like a fun way, and they've recently started
Speaker 2: using a new blending powder that contains wait for it,
Speaker 2: silicon dioxide. Our old friend. Now, this silica is food
Speaker 2: grade FDA proved and it's safe to ingest. Caveat caveat caveat.
Speaker 2: The trouble is that the workers who are required to
Speaker 2: use this blending powder in the drinks they're making for
Speaker 2: you are being exposed to it as they mix up
Speaker 2: these little treats. That's not good. Members of the Starbucks
Speaker 2: Workers United union have raised the alarm over this and
Speaker 2: collected testimonies from hundreds of Starbucks workers who started to
Speaker 2: suffer adverse health effects as soon as the new blending
Speaker 2: powders showed up in their stores. As one worker explained
Speaker 2: on the union's Instagram, you inhale those powders every time
Speaker 2: you scoop them. Workers report experiencing rashes, headaches, coughing fits, nausea,
Speaker 2: throat irritation, swelling, they had trouble breathing, and, as one
Speaker 2: of them said, this powder is literally unavoidable. Now, given
Speaker 2: what we've learned about silica today, you might be feeling
Speaker 2: a little nervous for those Starbucks workers. Some of those
Speaker 2: symptoms might sound a little familiar. Doesn't sound good. We
Speaker 2: don't like silica in things. We don't want silica in
Speaker 2: anybody's lungs. And you think that after said workers alerted
Speaker 2: their company to this issue, Starbucks management would have swiftly
Speaker 2: removed this potentially dangerous substance from their stores and stopped
Speaker 2: requiring their employees to handle it. But as of now, anyway,
Speaker 2: you'd be wrong. So far, their response has been to
Speaker 2: blog about it. Here's the entirety of the response Starbucks
Speaker 2: posted on their official website and I quote. Their product
Speaker 2: used in our coffee houses is a blending powder which
Speaker 2: contains a small amount of food grade silica, an FDA
Speaker 2: approved ingredient commonly used in food products that helps ingredients
Speaker 2: mixed consistently and supports a consistent beverage experience. It does
Speaker 2: not contain crystalline silica and is safe for use in food.
Speaker 2: We are committed to providing accurate information about our ingredients.
Speaker 2: To learn more about our commitment to high quality food
Speaker 2: and drinks, visit this link. End quote. So okay, that's
Speaker 2: not the problem though. We know it's food safe. We
Speaker 2: know it's fine once you get in your guts. It's
Speaker 2: the lungs we're worried about. We know it's food safe.
Speaker 2: The issue is that it's not worker safe. In a
Speaker 2: message the company sent out to its stores, it avoided
Speaker 2: the potential health issue entirely and instead simply told the
Speaker 2: workers to poor slower when handling it, putting the burden
Speaker 2: on them to protect their health instead of actually doing
Speaker 2: something about it. Classic case, you hate to see it,
Speaker 2: And for now, Starbucks work as United are continuing to
Speaker 2: push the company to address the actual issue here and
Speaker 2: I bet data appreciate yourself, So keep an eye out
Speaker 2: on their social media accounts to follow this story. Let
Speaker 2: them know I sent you. And now a word from
Speaker 2: our sponsors. And now for some good news. Deborah Kapisia,
Speaker 2: a medical surgical nurse at Maine Medical Center in Portland,
Speaker 2: is back home after a terrifying encounter with ice. According
Speaker 2: to her union, the Maine State Nurses Association SLASH National
Speaker 2: Nurses Organizing Committee, an affiliate of National Nurses United. Kapisia
Speaker 2: was detained on July thirtieth while traveling through Boston Logan
Speaker 2: International Airport. The union and her fellow nurses at Main
Speaker 2: Med immediately organized a rally that saw hundreds of nurses
Speaker 2: and allies mobilized and successfully blocked her transfer to a
Speaker 2: facility in Louisiana. Quote. We knew we had to take
Speaker 2: action first to stop her from being transferred out of
Speaker 2: New England while in custody, but also to demand her release.
Speaker 2: We're incredibly proud that nurses and the community came together
Speaker 2: in Portland to advocate for her, and now we need
Speaker 2: to figure out how to stop ICE. That's a quote
Speaker 2: from Kelly Brennan, a registered nurse at Main Med and
Speaker 2: a nurse leader with a union got done a press release.
Speaker 2: So Kapisha was born in Zambia and she's legally authorized
Speaker 2: to live and work in the United States. She's waiting
Speaker 2: for asylum case we processed. I have no reason for
Speaker 2: ICE to snatch her up bother her any of that.
Speaker 2: Her fellow nurses have written more than one hundred letters
Speaker 2: of support while the union continues to coordinate with her
Speaker 2: attorneys and her coworkers that made med are demanding their
Speaker 2: employer sponsor her permanent residency. She has a bond hearing
Speaker 2: on August tenth, and I know we're all crossing fingers
Speaker 2: for her.
Speaker 1: You know.
Speaker 2: I don't know if this is common knowledge, but nurses unions,
Speaker 2: especially National Nurses United, go ridiculously hard for their members
Speaker 2: and their communities, like they are so tough. And then
Speaker 2: you has been on ICE's neck, calling it a illegitimate,
Speaker 2: violent paramilitary organization that must be abolished. They've been publicly
Speaker 2: mourning the ICE murder of Lorenzo Salgado Arajo and condemning
Speaker 2: the persecution of anti ICE activists in Minnesota and Texas.
Speaker 2: The union has been extremely outspoken on other human rights
Speaker 2: issues too, that many other big unions have ignored or
Speaker 2: barely acknowledged because they're politically sensitive. Not really if you
Speaker 2: have a heart in the brain. They've been calling out
Speaker 2: Israel for destroying medical warehouses and hospitals and gaza killing
Speaker 2: thousands of healthcare workers and Palestinian patients. And they just
Speaker 2: demanded an end to the US blockade of Cuba. This
Speaker 2: is just the last couple of months of press releases
Speaker 2: like they've been out here and then you. Is also
Speaker 2: the biggest nurses union in the country, with more than
Speaker 2: two hundred and twenty five thousand members. They have a
Speaker 2: lot of power and they're not afraid to use it
Speaker 2: for good. Today they're trying to free a member from
Speaker 2: ISI's clutches to or they may be striking for safing
Speaker 2: staffing levels, or organizing a new union in Louisiana, or
Speaker 2: holding your grandma's hand as she takes her last breath.
Speaker 2: Nurses really are the best of us, and I'm really
Speaker 2: glad they're on our side. So everyone say good luck
Speaker 2: to Deborah. Finally, I want to end today's episode with
Speaker 2: some very big news. As I'm sure you all know,
Speaker 2: it's now Black August, the month we dedicate each year
Speaker 2: to honoring the memory of fallen black freedom fighters and
Speaker 2: political prisoners. It's a tradition that began in nineteen seventy
Speaker 2: nine after the assassination of George Jackson, a Black panther
Speaker 2: and black liberation activist. With that memory in mind, jailhouse
Speaker 2: Lawyers Speak, a collective of formerly and currently incarcerated workers
Speaker 2: around the country, have just gone public with their plans
Speaker 2: for a big nationwide prison strike in twenty twenty seven,
Speaker 2: and they're calling for allies and comrades to support and
Speaker 2: spread the word. On August second, they announced that prisoners
Speaker 2: will hold a national prisoner's human rights strike from May one,
Speaker 2: the International Workers Day, through June nineteenth June teenth, twenty
Speaker 2: twenty seven, uniting the fight to and legalize slavery with
Speaker 2: the struggle to restore voting rights to the prison class.
Speaker 2: They share three core demands, which I'll read to you now.
Speaker 2: They also maintain ten national demands on their website. They
Speaker 2: have a bigger program going on, but this specific campaign
Speaker 2: is focusing on these three things. One and legalized slavery repeal.
Speaker 2: The exception clause is the thirteenth Amendment. Two restore voting
Speaker 2: rights repeal exception clauses including Section two of the Fourteenth
Speaker 2: Amendment that strip voting rights from confined citizens, pre trial detainees,
Speaker 2: and former felons. Three free all the political prisoners in
Speaker 2: US prisons. So they've got a lot of work ahead
Speaker 2: of them. It all sounds very reasonable to me, but
Speaker 2: unfortunately I'm not in charge. You know, this isn't the
Speaker 2: first time the JLS and their affiliated prisoner led organizations
Speaker 2: have raised these demands norms of the first time they
Speaker 2: put their bodies on the line for them. There's a long,
Speaker 2: long history of resistance behind the walls of the American
Speaker 2: prison industrial complex. I devoted a whole chapter to in
Speaker 2: my book, and groups like JLS, the Free Alabama Movement,
Speaker 2: and the Incarcerated Workers Organizing Committee have done an incredible
Speaker 2: amount of work over the years keeping the spirit of
Speaker 2: hope and rebellion alive and organizing these huge nationwide actions
Speaker 2: under nearly impossible circumstances. Just because you haven't heard about
Speaker 2: them doesn't mean they're not happening. There is so much
Speaker 2: organizing happening in tign prison in the US, it's just
Speaker 2: difficult to report on unless you have contacts and you
Speaker 2: care enough to do a little bit of digging, which
Speaker 2: I guess not that many mainstream reporters do, but fuck
Speaker 2: them now. The largest prison strike in modern US history
Speaker 2: is said to have been the twenty ten Georgia prison strike,
Speaker 2: wherein prisoners in seven facilities across the state one on
Speaker 2: strike for six days. Between twenty eleven and twenty thirteen,
Speaker 2: thousands of prisoners in California when our hunger strikes to
Speaker 2: protest the dire conditions in which they're held. Since then,
Speaker 2: we've seen large scale, coordinated prison labor strikes in twenty seventeen,
Speaker 2: twenty eighteen, and perhaps most notably twenty sixteen, which commemorated
Speaker 2: the forty fifth anniversary of the Attica prison uprising, which
Speaker 2: itself bears a historical precedent to ancient Rome, when in
Speaker 2: about one hundred and thirty five BC, just after the
Speaker 2: First Servile War, a thousand slaves let a bloody revolt
Speaker 2: in Attica, a region of what is now Greece. There
Speaker 2: really is nothing new under the sun, at least when
Speaker 2: it comes to the carsoral system and human enslavement, and
Speaker 2: the twenty twenty seven prison strike makes the connection explicit
Speaker 2: with its slogan, from May Day to Juneteenth, we refuse
Speaker 2: to slave. Now, a prison strike may look a little
Speaker 2: different from what you're thinking. Strikers have to get very
Speaker 2: creative since they can't exactly walk out of their workplace. Yes,
Speaker 2: there won't be any picket lines or cool matching T shirts,
Speaker 2: and I'd be very pleasantly surprised if any elected officials
Speaker 2: or political hopefuls showed up to support these strikes. May
Speaker 2: it sure would be nice, given that one of the
Speaker 2: major goals of this action is to have these incarcerated
Speaker 2: workers voting rights restored. People in prison are a part
Speaker 2: of our society and always have been. Ripping away their
Speaker 2: rights as well as their freedoms is a crime against
Speaker 2: their humanity, and this strike is another desperate cry for
Speaker 2: help from people who have been left behind and forgotten.
Speaker 2: A lot can happen in nine months, and a lot
Speaker 2: needs to happen to pull off an action of this magnitude.
Speaker 2: Prison strikes aren't easy. There's so many dangers and risks
Speaker 2: for the people that participate, so much repressions, so many repercussions.
Speaker 2: It's truly an incredibly difficult and brave thing to take
Speaker 2: part in a strike behind the walls, and they need
Speaker 2: support from people outside too. JLS is calling on supporters
Speaker 2: of the strike to get involved and support their resistance
Speaker 2: inside by sharing the strike statement widely, centering prisoner voices,
Speaker 2: and pressuring Congress and all those other fancy powerful people
Speaker 2: to heed their demands or at the absolute least show
Speaker 2: that they're listening. As JLS stated, the National Prisoner's Human
Speaker 2: Rights Strike is more than a strike. There's a commitment
Speaker 2: to building lasting institutions, expanding legal knowledge, strengthening political education,
Speaker 2: and organizing inside and outside the walls until legalized slavery
Speaker 2: and the broader system of exploitation are abolished. So, if
Speaker 2: you got some time, you got some skills, and a
Speaker 2: desire to burn down the American plantation, give a little whistle.
Speaker 2: JLS is waiting for you, and they need all the
Speaker 2: help they can get. This has been a special labor
Speaker 2: episode of It Can Happen Here. I'm still Kim Kelly
Speaker 2: and it's been lovely talking with you. Until next time,
Speaker 2: Be good, do no harm, and take no shit.
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