To: Detroit/Seattle
Workers' Voice mailing list
October 10, 2020
Re: Activists Ponder What to Do if There is an Election Day Coup, While the Top Union Leadership Does Nothing
by Tim Hall, Detroit Workers' Voice
The situation facing postal workers has changed little in the past two weeks, except that all the negative features have intensified. As before, the union bureaucrats of the NALC are still depending on the management/labor Task Force committees to deal with the election crisis. If the APWU leaders are participating in this, they are saying nothing about it while otherwise doing almost nothing.
The situation with mail delivery, crucial to a fair election, remains contentious. Postmaster General DeJoy has been barred from removing more sorting machines; some of the ones he did remove have been restored while others had already been dismantled for parts before the judges ruled that DeJoy must restore the changes he had made. But DeJoy’s hand is still felt in obstructing delivery: workers tell of his inflexibility, his ruling that trucks from the postal processing centers must leave by certain exact times, whereas the long-standing practice of the workers had been to wait, when necessary, to get the last bit of mail for the day, even if it rendered its arrival at the local postal station a bit late. The stations were well aware of this and made adjustments to make sure the mail got delivered, sometimes even working overtime and late. But now DeJoy orders the trucks to leave by the exact scheduled moment and this results, often, in quantities of mail delayed by an extra day. At the same time, overtime is still being worked in the plants, as management has not brought in any new staff to solve that problem. Unions and management all assure us that election mail will be delivered on time.
Nothing is being done to get rid of Dejoy by the APWU leadership, while theLabor Notes group is having small pickets against the other members of the postal Board of Governors. It is not clear that this is having any effect.
There is only backward motion on this. The entire matter of stimulus is in flux, with diseased Trump flipping this way and that. The Democrats’ new stimulus bill contains $15 billion for the USPS but the Republicans mock the entire Democratic stimulus proposal. Aaron Brown at the Labor Notes postal activists’ meeting reported the $15 billion figure, but consulting the CNBC, TheWashington Post and other reports there seems to be no mention of the amount. Neither the APWU nor the NALC consider this matter, which they were bellowing about two months ago, important enough to report on it on their web sites. The US Senate is suspended until October 19, when apparently negotiations will resume. Trump, upon returning to spread COVID in the White House, ruled out any stimulus bill whatsoever, then the next day declared there would be one, so who knows where this is going.
Nothing is called by anybody capable of organizing such, meaning the APWU and the NALC.
As stated, the NALC is focusing on cooperation with management in the Task Force, which may have some effect of defending the sanctity of the mail but which does nothing to strengthen the workers as a force in their own right or alert the public to the dangers of a possible Trump coup-grab of power though defeated.
The APWU, judged by its website, is doing almost nothing. Its elaborate set of messages amount to informing the workers of where they, individually, can vote and of calling on workers to be poll watchers. This is helpful, but minimally so. Their assumptions are that the workers will vote Democratic, that their presence at the polling places will defend the Democratic vote simply by their being there, and that is all. There is no mention of the danger of right-wing elements pressuring or attacking Democratic voters and of what to do in that case. There is not even a hint of what to do if Trump tries for a coup-grab; that is not even dreamed of by the writers of the web site, although the union leaders must be well aware that he has announced that he will try it if necessary. Not only is APWU President Mark Dimondstein dead asleep, as mention in our last report, a veritable Rip Van Winkle, but he also has his head in the sand. What a mixed metaphor he has achieved: Rip Van Winkle, asleep with his head in the sand!
The APWU leadership has also done nothing about guiding the workers during the period leading up to the election. What should the workers do about the DeJoy interference with mail delivery? Nothing is said publicly. Apparently just wait for the election and vote, and some of you be good poll watchers. Oh lovely! We are in a crisis here, Mark et al, a crisis! We see no guidance here on the ground! Workers in a few places have re-assembled dismantled machines and restored them where this is possible. What do you want the workers to do? And should the workers press for management to allow them to separate the ballots from the rest of the mail or leave them mixed in with the rest? This is a serious question. Apparently postal management wants them left in with the rest, out of fear that if they are separated into their own trays someone might lose them and all hell would break loose. So what to do, Mark?
According to the small number of postal activists who hold the Labor NotesZoom weekly meeting, these questions are being grappled with locally. They tell stories of how local areas have solved some of these problems in the past. In some places it has been possible to pull the ballots out of the rest of the mail and advance them to the next stage of machining, thus saving time, and not leave them somewhere on the floor. And in other cases, activists tell of plants where the very latest ballots arriving on election day have been gathered up by one worker who ensured that the post office was able to deliver them before the 5 p.m. deadline. This is great local initiative, but it looks like Mark is imitating Trump in leadership methods: where Trump left local areas without any leadership for COVID, Mark is leaving local areas without leadership in protecting mail delivery.
In other respects, the Labor Notes group reports interesting local area initiatives. One local president has a Zoom group that meets regularly to discuss problems of worker struggle, and it includes members of the APWU, NALC and mail-handlers’ unions plus activist workers from other trades. Other participants in theLabor Notes meeting raised the dangers of a Trump coup-grab and told of organizations outside the postal sphere that were preparing for it. One participant was attracted by a leaflet which sharply raised the problem but soared aloft with exaggerated dreams of general strikes. Still, the members of this group are much more attuned to the real problems than the APWU leadership; they are not asleep at the wheel nor are their heads in the sand. With respect to delivery delays, they report nothing major and add that where there are problems they seem to be under-staffing, as we have reported before.
Activists mentioned, but did not analyze, various other groups planning to defend the elections. Below are some of their web sites:
Then there are some websites that are filled with illusions that the
top labor bureaucrats of the AFL-CIO will lead general strikes if Trump
tries a coup. This one is issued by the Moratorium Now Coalition, which was organized by activists
which were formerly the Detroit branch of the Workers World Party and
are now in the Communist Workers League.
The election approaches. The crisis among the bourgeoisie sharpens, as evidenced by Trump’s lunatic behavior upon contracting COVID himself. The events of the next few weeks may be chaotic. Postal workers need to keep their heads, stick to their beliefs, vote for their candidate and be ready to come out to defend the election process if necessary. Be alert to any attacks from the racist, fascist right wing. And be alert to the weakness of their own leaders; be ready to step up and take action where needed, whether sleepy Mark calls for it or not. <>
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