Laura Shultz is a field mobilization representative with Teamsters Local 1932, one of the largest unions in the county. She is also a former public employee of San Bernardino County, who assisted county residents in getting healthcare. Public employees are often demonized especially when fighting for the pay they deserve. Much of this backlash comes from people not knowing what work they do, or being upset that their pay is going to union dues. To combat this, her union started printing full page educational ads that highlight the importance of public employees. This helped combat propaganda by major corporations that Shultz blames for the scrutiny of public employees,
“Corporate basically kind of gets behind a lot of this demonization against unions…It’s like ‘Unions are bad!’. Well if unions are so bad, why do you spend millions of dollars doing union busting?”
The Freedom Foundation, a collective of conservative people who speak out against unions in the public work sector, is one of those corporations. This orga-nization was a direct response to the Janus decision that stated that public employees didn’t have to be part of unions. Laura shares of a time she was confronted with them
“The Freedom Foundation actually attacked [Teamsters Local] 1932. They would go out to our work sites to try and get our members to opt out of their membership…But our members are smart.”
The most important part of a union is their ability to stick together. Union members are incredibly diverse in every way possible, with political ideologies differing greatly. What brings them together is their shared interests as workers, and key strategies that they use to get those interests met. It is important to encourage unity regardless of what background and opinions other union members may have,
“We all make our opinions and our decisions based on what we know in our experiences, right?…And basically politically…and, right now, especially since…a previous president…we have such a divide and even within our own members…but until I have conversations with you, I don’t know why you have the viewpoint that you have. What experience did you have?
