LNS Spotlight:

Jeff Johnson

Jeff Johnson is the retiring chair of the LNS board. He has been a board member since 2018 and will continue in that role. For many years he was president of the Washington State Labor Council AFL-CIO. He joined the labor movement in 1979 as a member of Local 2190, American Federation of Teachers, AFL-CIO, New York City. He taught Labor Economics and Labor Studies at Empire State College, the Center for Labor Studies and in many union and community sponsored education programs in the New York area before moving to the West Coast. His work has gained respect not only across the labor movement but also with a diverse group of organizations in Washington State. He is a well-known and deeply respected elected labor leader who is playing an important role in the Pacific Northwest, on climate as well as on a range of other labor issues. He joined us for the first Labor Convergence on Climate, and we have continued to work more and more closely with him since. Recently he has been able to move resolutions on both climate and Just Transition through the WA state AFL-CIO convention.

Editor Jeremy Brecher,
Senior Strategic Advisor, LNS Co-Founder

Those who care about climate, jobs, and justice are facing tough times. At best we face a right-wing rollback of all our gains and the dismantling of all the programs and policies that protect climate, jobs, and justice. At worst we face a violent, criminal, fascist assault on everything that makes our life together in society possible. Either scenario will mean a radical escalation of poverty, misery, war, and climate catastrophe. 

Given the outcome of the 2024 elections, we can have little expectation of making progress through conventional electoral and legislative strategies. In this newsletter you will find out how the Labor Network for Sustainability is responding to this desperate situation. LNS’s statement on the elections says, “Together we must and we will continue to come together and organize our communities, our campuses and our workplaces to build the economically just and ecologically sustainable future that we need.” LNS board member and President of the Washington State Labor Council April Sims says: 

Much like the strategy during the civil rights movement to fight violence with anti-violence, we fight hate and anger with love and joy. The labor movement remains a place of unity, a place of community, and a place of hope. In this moment, hope is a radical act of resistance.  

And LNS board member Jennifer Krill of Earthworks says, “This election challenges us to fight harder than ever—for our environment, our communities, and our democracy.”

To resist and eventually overcome the coming forces of tyranny, we need to create bastions of what the Polish activists who overthrew their country’s dictatorship called “social self-defense.” It is a defense of everything that makes our life together possible, from basic human rights to collective action to address shared problems. Today social self-defense will involve many methods, including mutual aid, on-the-ground protection of those under attack, combatting lies and slanders, and above all organizing at every level to reinforce our courage against fear and submission.  

Over the past five years the Green New Deal has provided a vision and program that would simultaneously protect the planet, create good jobs for working people, end poverty, and create a more just society. And at the grassroots communities, cities, states tribes, and unions have been initiating Green New Deal programs in their own locales. LNS’ Green New Deal from Below Project -- including the launch of my new book The Green New Deal from Below: How Ordinary People Are Building a Just and Climate-Safe Economy – is helping build these initiatives. The Green New Deal from Below can provide crucial inspiration and a crucial base for fighting back against the impending onslaught.   

At LNS we believe that the Green New Deal from Below and other forms of social self-defense can be key to resisting the threats to people and the planet.   

Statements on the Election
Green New Deal from Below book launch
Climate Electoral Victories 
Supply Chain Solidarity
Fare-free Transit in Massachusetts

LNS at Climate Reality Conference with Al Gore

In response to the results of the elections, LNS issued the statement “Our Next Steps Together . . .” It said in part:

We as a nation awoke to the confirmation that Donald Trump will be serving a second term as president. For those of us who strive for climate justice and worker empowerment, this reality is an incredible setback. 

As workers, we must never forget – despite seemingly insurmountable odds – our succession of victories throughout history.

Let us remember that during Trump’s first term, we saw a wave of sustained social protest from below that brought about real and often swift change: “#MeToo” burgeoned into an international movement that won major cultural shifts against misogynistic practices, student campaigns against tuition debt and cost-prohibitive higher education made significant gains, immediate mobilizations at airports and in communities across the country resisted and then bested Trump’s Muslim ban, and of course the wave of strikes bravely organized by previously invisible workers – who are truly essential – won protections and improved workplace conditions. These worker strikes emboldened even more workers from additional industries, so that at least half a million workers last year went on strike to improve their workplaces.

It is these workers from whom we must take courage and find our strength. No matter who is elected in our towns, states or federal offices, we must always remember that we have the power to hold those in office accountable. We are not simply voters who come out of burrows once or twice every four years. We are students and family members, citizens and workers who hold authority over any of our politicians. Together we must and we will continue to come together and organize our communities, our campuses and our workplaces to build the economically just and ecologically sustainable future that we need.

Join Us today – our solidarity is more crucial than ever.

For full statement: https://www.labor4sustainability.org/articles/our-next-steps-together/

Excerpts from statement by President April Sims and Secretary Treasurer Cherika Carter, Washington State Labor Council on the 2024 election: 

The election of Donald Trump is a gut punch for Americans committed to unity, equality, and workers’ rights. Eight years ago when he was first elected, many of us were paralyzed by our grief over the direction of this country. As we face those same emotions today, we cannot let our grief hold us back from action. We know Trump’s playbook; we can and we will organize to defeat it. 

We have strategies to win. Much like the strategy during the civil rights movement to fight violence with anti-violence, we fight hate and anger with love and joy. The labor movement remains a place of unity, a place of community, and a place of hope. In this moment, hope is a radical act of resistance.  

And yet, we cannot deny that fascism, fueled by racism and misogyny, has been leveraged to divide and weaken working people. But our movement was built to fight the forces that seek to undermine democracy and enslave the human soul; we are made for times like these. 

Anti-worker politicians benefit when we give into fear and division. Our movement includes people with diverse political views; no matter our differences, we all want safe communities and secure futures for our families. We will remain united to protect one another and build power for working people. Resiliency is in our DNA. 

For full statement:
https://portside.org/2024-11-07/wslc-hope-radical-act-resistance?utm_medium=email&utm_source=portside-snapshot

Jennifer Krill, Executive Director of Earthworks and a member of the LNS board issued this statement in response to Donald Trump’s re-election:

“The consequences of this election are clear for those on the frontlines of the climate crisis. Low-income communities and communities of color will bear the brunt of impact, from poisoned air and water to extreme weather events and rising sea levels, all within our lifetimes. 

“This election challenges us to fight harder than ever—for our environment, our communities, and our democracy. The fight for environmental justice is the fight for human dignity and freedom for all. 

“Preventing the worst consequences of the climate crisis and working toward a just transition now falls to Governors, state legislatures, business leaders and the international community. We cannot afford to lose momentum, even in the face of Trump administration denial, irresponsibility and neglect.”

Source: https://earthworks.org/releases/statement-on-us-presidential-election/

On November 20 LNS launched The Green New Deal from Below by its co-founder and senior strategic advisor Jeremy Brecher. 

At the launch event Jeremy said that, while the Green New Deal has languished five years in Congress, community groups, unions, city and state governments, tribes and other non-federal actors have been creating their own Green New Deal programs -- from below. The Green New Deal from Below can provide a crucial base for fighting back against Trump’s looming devastation.

If you missed the live launch of the book, click here to watch the recording!

For a 30% discount on all editions of The Green New Deal from Below: https://www.press.uillinois.edu/books/?id=p088278 and use Promo Code F24UIP when you order the book. 

On the day after the elections, 50,000 people joined a four-hour on-line event to plan how to respond. Sponsored by more than 200 organizations, the call heard from leaders of dozens of progressive groups, including the presidents of the Service Employees International Union (SEIU) and the National Education Association (NEA), as well as members of Congress. More than 100 communities were organized on the spot. 

To see the full video of “Making Meaning of the Moment”: https://www.youtube.com/live/_aQXWR-r260

By LNS Network Organizer Oren Kadosh

Nevada is “ground zero” for U.S. lithium extraction. Last month, LNS helped organize workers and activists on a tour through Nevada to observe proposed lithium mining sites and hear from Tribal, Indigenous, and frontline community members who are fighting back against the accelerating pace of mining that is threatening to turn critical ecosystems and sacred lands into profit-making sacrifice zones. Workers and organizers included representatives from transit rider organizations, UAW auto manufacturing workers, the Amalgamated Transit Union (ATU), and newly organized Teamster delivery drivers for Amazon. 

At Ash Meadows National Wildlife Refuge in the Mojave Desert we heard from community members and advocates about the impacts to water systems and endangered species of proposed lithium mining sites. In Clayton Valley, the only current active lithium production site in the U.S., a representative from the Western Shoshone Defense Project put the accelerating mining encroachment in context of their continuing loss of Tribal lands and habitat. At the Tahoe Reno Industrial Center we visited the Redwood Materials battery recycling plant as well as the massive Tesla Gigafactory that employs 12,000 workers. We finally finished our journey at Peehee Mu’huh, the Thacker Pass lithium mining site. 

Although we must immediately transition away from a fossil fueled transportation system, how we transition is as important as the need to transition. A transition that unleashes a corporate mining bonanza across U.S. communities and ecosystems, as it already is entrenched in places like Argentina, Chile, and Bolivia, is one that won’t solve the climate crisis and will only expand extractive, damaging, and unjust power dynamics. As a report by the Climate and Community Institute puts it, we need “More Mobility and Less Mining,” and for that we must learn and organize with the workers and communities who are upstream and downstream of us in this transitioning sector.

According to a roundup in Inside Climate News, at least five of six climate change ballot measures were passed in the recent elections.

• In the state of Washington voters rejected a measure to overturn the state’s Climate Commitment Act which authorized program to reduce greenhouse gas emissions by 95% by 2050. It would also have decreased funding for investments in transportation, clean air, renewable energy, conservation, and emissions reduction. The measure was opposed by a coalition of more than 575 organizations and was opposed by more than 60% of voters.

• In California voters approved a $10 billion bond measure for climate resilience and safe drinking water. At least 40 percent must go to projects that benefit vulnerable and disadvantaged communities. 

• In Honolulu, Hawaii, voters approved a climate resiliency fund with money to come from existing property tax revenue.

• In Louisiana, voters overwhelmingly passed a constitutional amendment that requires any revenue received by the state from renewable energy production go into Louisiana’s Coastal Protection and Restoration Fund. 

• In South Dakota 60% of voters rejected a “Landowner Bill of Rights” designed to ease construction of carbon dioxide pipelines. The law had been passed by the legislature, but a grassroots campaign gathered 31,000 signatures to put the law on the ballot and voters overruled it. 

For the full report: Climate Initiatives Fare Well Across the Country Despite National Political Climate - Inside Climate News

The World Meteorological Organization reported that carbon dioxide in the atmosphere is accumulating faster than at any time in human history, with concentrations rising more than 10% in just two decades. It hit record levels in 2023 -- 51% greater than before the Industrial Revolution, when people began to burn large amounts of coal, oil and fossil gas.

Source: Planet-heating pollutants in atmosphere hit record levels in 2023 | Climate crisis | The Guardian

The anti-poverty non-profit Oxfam reports that fifty of the world’s richest billionaires produce on average more carbon emissions in under three hours than the average British person does in their entire lifetime. Their jet flights alone emit as much carbon as the average person in the world would in 300 years. Their luxury yachts emitted as much carbon as the average person would in 860 years. It estimated that in the coming century 1.5 million excess deaths will be caused by the 2015-2019 consumption emissions  of the world’s richest 1%. 

Source: https://www.theguardian.com/environment/2024/oct/28/carbon-emissions-of-richest-1-increase-hunger-poverty-and-deaths-says-oxfam

The state of Massachusetts has announced grants to 13 Regional Transit Authorities to provide year-round, fare free public transportation services. The program grows out of pilot free transit programs that have been running since the start of the COVID pandemic. In some communities the program has let to transit ridership at pre-pandemic levels. 

For more information:
https://fallriverreporter.com/healey-driscoll-administration-announces-fare-free-regional-transit-across-massachusetts/?amp=1

By LNS Co-Director Liz Ratzloff

I recently attended the Climate Underground conference hosted by chef Alice Waters and former Vice President Al Gore at his farm in Carthage, Tennessee. The Climate Reality Project’s conference convened farmers, scientists, chefs, non-profit staff, and others to talk about how regenerative farming practices can decrease emissions in the agricultural sector and help create more resilient farms that can better withstand the severe storms brought about by global warming.

At this conference, we heard from farmworker leaders that farm workers lack the basic protections held by workers in other sectors like workers’ compensation, health insurance, and the right to join a union. Only a few states, like California and New York, have enacted any legislation protecting the organizing, collective bargaining, and unionization rights of agricultural workers. 

The United Farm Workers (UFW) has contracts protecting thousands of workers and fights for legislative and regulatory reforms on issues like worker protections, pesticides, and immigration reform. Teresa Romero, the President of the United Farm Workers, highlighted how the effects of climate change, like extreme heat, pesticide use, and flooding are harming farm workers and that a just transition in agriculture must center the essential workers feeding our country. 

Another farm worker organization, the Coalition of Immokalee Workers (CIW), has developed a different model of farmworker action. CIW is a worker center that runs food justice campaigns and actively fights forced labor and worker exploitation through direct actions that have successfully won industry wide wage increases and worker protections. CIW’s Fair Food Program is an agreement between workers, growers, and retailers to require that growers comply with a code of conduct. The CIW is credited with helping to end modern-day slavery and forced labor. Those of us in the labor climate movement who are preparing to fight back against an authoritarian administration can learn from the fights that UFW and CIW have been fighting for decades. 

Making a Living on a Living Planet is published by the Labor Network for Sustainability. Copyright 2024. Labor Network for Sustainability. All rights reserved.

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