May 1: A Nationwide ‘Economic Blackout’ Against Billionaires and Authoritarianism

[Sings] All right, welcome everyone to Working People, a podcast about the lives, jobs, dreams, and struggles of the Working Class today. Working People is a proud member of the Labor Radio podcast network and is brought to you in partnership within these times magazine and the real news network. This show is produced by Jules Taylor and made possible by the support of listeners like you. My name is Max Million Alvarez and first, I want to apologize to everyone out there about not having a new episode for you guys last week. I was back home in Southern California with my family for my grandpa Fletcher's funeral, so I obviously needed to take a break from that and I really do appreciate y'all being so patient and kind during this difficult time for our family. But to pay you guys back for last week and to honor the sacred holiday of Mayday, aka International Workers Day this Friday, we're going to have two episodes dropping on the feed for y'all this week. And in today's episode, we're talking about what Mayday means for workers in the labor movement here and now in the year of our Lord 2026 and about the plans for a national day of protests that are going to take place this Friday on May 1st in cities and towns around the country. As journalists and friend of the show Michael Sinato reports at the Guardian, quote, labor unions, democratic organizations and community groups are organizing an economic blackout this year to commemorate Mayday International Workers Day inspired by the economic blackout in Minnesota during the massive ice operation in the state. Mayday strong events are being planned across the US with organizers calling for no school, no work, no shopping. In protest of government policies, they say put billionaires needs above those of workers. In Chicago, several local labor unions and community groups, including the Chicago Teachers Union, SEIU Healthcare Illinois and Indiana, indivisible Chicago and the Chicago Federation of Labor jointly announced an economic blackout for Chicago on May 1st. In Los Angeles, the LA Mayday Coalition, comprising more than 50 local organizations, is organizing an economic blackout around numerous demands, including immigration rights, voting rights, abolishing ice, anti-war protests and defending workers' rights. End quote. So to talk about what is happening this Mayday, why it's important and what you can do to get involved, I am really grateful to be joined today by three guests who are all involved in organizing Mayday events this week from Philadelphia to Chicago to Iowa. First, we're joined by Janne Korn, who currently serves as the Chief of Staff for the Philadelphia Council AFL CIO, and also serves on the board of Philadelphia Jobs with Justice. Prior to becoming Chief of Staff, Janne was the organizing director at her Central Labor Council. And prior to that, Janne worked with SEIU Healthcare Pennsylvania, organizing alongside hospital and home healthcare workers to build power both inside and outside the workplace. And we are also joined by returning guest Jeff Kurtz. Jeff was a locomotive engineer and union member for 40 years, and he is a member of Railroad Workers United. He served as a union officer most of his career, including eight years as president of BLET Local 391, and chairman of the BLET Iowa State Legislative Board, where he oversaw safety and legislative matters for the union in the state for four railroads for 10 years. He retired in 2014 and served as state representative for one term in the Iowa House after winning the 2018 election in his house district. And we are also joined today by John Emiliano from the Tahanan Center in Chicago. John is a healthcare worker and organizer in Chicago advocating for the Filipino community and is also part of Tungol Migrante, a grassroots Filipino migrant defense network. Janne, Jeff, John, thank you all so much for coming on the show today. I really appreciate it. And you know, before we get into the details of this week's Mayday protests, I want to start first by asking you three as, you know, working people in America as dedicated members of the labor movement. Like, what does Mayday mean to you? Why is this such an important holiday? Thanks, Max. And thanks for the opportunity. I'm really excited to be here in conversation with folks about Mayday and Trashel workers day. I think for me, Mayday is an opportunity for workers to lead in a world where we very, very rarely have the opportunity and to continue the fight that folks started hundreds of years ago for both bread and roses. We have all rose in our slogan that we're putting everywhere. It's really the opportunity for workers to say like, nobody else is coming to save us. It is our world that we're going to fight for and Mayday is the day that we have set to lead that fight. And I think for me as a relatively young person in the labor movement, this is kind of an opportunity for us to test where we are in the fight to build like a more militant, more powerful fighting labor movement that hasn't really existed in my lifetime. We only really started doing big things for Mayday in Philadelphia last year. It hasn't been a holiday that the labor movement really took on for ourselves, right? We're big on the Labor Day picnic, but maybe less so on the Mayday fight. And so really like as an opportunity to test where we are in terms of the amount of risk and the amount of disruption that the labor movement is willing to take. And then I think lastly, as we know, Ray International Workers Day, and it's an opportunity for us to really be in solidarity with workers around the world and particularly now, right, in like a moment when the U.S., or workers in the U.S., might feel particularly isolated from workers around the world to say like, no, actually our fight is year fight and vice versa, and to really continue the fight for an international workers movement. To me, it means solidarity, especially in the railroad industry, you've got 13 different unions and we've all got our own issues. And the carriers, the rail carriers have been just wonderful about using those issues against us. And so we have had no solidarity, almost no solidarity whatsoever. Even in the 2022 contract fight, we were together, we were together, and then unions started to peel off, and eventually it came down to our politicians on both sides of the aisle betraying us because we worked together. So this is something we've done this here in Lee County before. We've had a Mayday celebration. This year, I think it's going to be a lot different. I was in Northern Iowa, actually canvassing for an independent candidate for Congress, and I walked in not doors from 1030 to about 2 o'clock. And it was amazing because unlike Janet, I'm ancient. I'm one of the ancient labor guys. But for years and years, you know, they said, oh, this is here. We're coming back. We're coming back. And I always say, oh, okay, I'm probably not. This year, when we were not in the doors, 85% of the doors, and this was a very red count, at least 85, maybe 90% of the doors, we went to people were saying, we got to do something different. We absolutely have to do something different than we've been doing. Being from that world, we can't cross politicians unless we put the proverbial gun to their head. And the only way we're going to do that is solidarity. And, you know, they've let us there when they want money and when they want workers. But after that, they forget about us. And this is probably going to be a theme for what we do on Friday. We're going to make it very clear. I don't care what part of you are. If you are not four workers, you're not going to get anything from us. >> Well, and Jeff, before we toss it to John, I'm just curious, as you describe an ancient member of the labor movement, you know, as a veteran worker, like did Mayday, you know, used to mean something different back in the day? Or I mean, was it ever an important thing for you? Or do you feel like that's kind of like a newer tradition that's building in America? >> It's definitely newer. When I was working, especially the last 15 or 20 years, we were so busy. Ironically, our officials, railroad officials, they got Labor Day off. The workers had to work. And, you know, Mayday just didn't mean that much to us. It didn't really mean a lot until I started working with the Lee County chapter, Labor chapter. And one of our vice presidents, Carrie Dinton, she is just big on this. I mean, every Mayday, we've got to do something. And she has been absolutely right. Hit the nail on the head. So I think this is a relatively new phenomenon. And from what I'm hearing, this, what we're doing this Friday is going to be pretty well attended. >> And, John, what about you? What does Mayday mean to you? Why is this an important holiday for you. Yeah, I think, especially, you know, as a young also young person doing the labor organizing and, you know, being in Chicago and also being having connections and being from the Philippines, I think Mayday is this huge culmination of really, you know, the experiences of our community as well. We, you know, we really have, for us, our migrants are also our workers. And so, you know, Mayday, especially now more than ever, is a huge joint effort between the problems of workers and migrants because they're often, you know, overlapped. And I think this is a really big opportunity for us to really bridge that gap and have something really large and, you know, I think for us Filipino community, a lot of us, leave the Philippines in the first place to find work abroad. So even our own migration away from our home is a problem of work itself. And so when we come to America and work these conditions as caregivers and food service, there is a real need for us to really link those struggles of our workers here in this country and the struggle of, you know, our people back home where we actually couldn't find work or there's no jobs. And I think one really cool thing about being from Chicago and the Philippines is, you know, Mayday started here in Chicago and we have the Mayday movement, but also in the Philippines, we actually have a very militant workers movement called Giloson Mayu Uno or the Mayday movement in English. And yeah, they're really, I'm already watching all the preparation happen across here in this country and back home in the Philippines for us and seeing all the workers really, you know, take on these struggles, not only struggles for their rights and livelihoods, but like the larger economic struggle of people all over the world. Like in the Philippines, we have an energy crisis, people can't even get to work right now. And for us here in America, that means we're sending, you know, double the amount of money that we were having to send before. And now it's becoming this burden of us really taking on double the shifts, double the conditions, and you know, when we're forced to do this, I think Mayday is the opportunity to bring workers together, to really talk about what conditions they have, but also how can we really fight against this like systematic exploitation that happens, you know, from the Philippines, from all over the global South towards this country. And how can we link that international solidarity of workers all over the world to really like take back, you know, the means that they are creating, right, the wealth that they really create. So yeah, it's for us and for me, it's this huge, you know, culmination of everything, our whole existence, our whole stories. And to really, you know, take that back and put it in the hands of the people who make the wealth of the world. And to really just show workers that this is a holiday for them and that they have the power to, you know, continue pushing forward, you know, celebrate the gains that we have had historically. And, you know, continue making them as well. Hell yeah. No, I thought that was all beautifully and powerfully put by all three of you. And, you know, I think like, you know, just just by nature of growing up, you know, in this country, yeah, like we're taught Labor Day is like the quote unquote workers holiday. But it's always just a sort of an excuse for a picnic and an excuse to sort of look at our own history of labor struggle as a thing of the past, right? As like as something that, you know, our forefathers fought for, but now everything's great. You know, now, now we don't need to struggle. anymore. And I think, you know, what I'm hearing in all three of what you're saying is that, you know, Mayday really, you know, it pays homage to, you know, the traditions and the struggles and the ancestors who have like fought for us to get to where we are now. But it's also very much a reminder that that struggle is inherited by each new generation and must be carried on and moved forward or else we're going to see it slide back. We're going to see what we've been seeing in this country and increasingly around the world, which is like the hard one gains and victories of the working class of the labor movement are being stripped away to say nothing of the gains from the civil rights movement, you know, the gay rights movement. I mean, like they're coming after all of us, right? And that I think is is a kind of perfect setup to what makes Mayday 2026 so important, right? Because, you know, you all said the word solidarity, right? You all talked about how Mayday is about bringing workers together. And as we know, the greatest tool that the bosses, the billionaires, the power brokers and order givers of our world, you know, they're their number one trick is to divide and conquer. And like you see that in America today, right? I mean, people are being pitted against each other. We're being pushed away from each other. We're being told to hate each other and fear each other. And we're moving away from each other. The more afraid we are because we're trying to hold on to what little we still have, you know, that's a that's a recipe for exploitation. It's a recipe for us to be taken advantage of and and brutalized more easily. And so the message of coming together and uniting across differences to confront, you know, like the monstrous forces that we're confronting today, I think is really important, powerful and urgent. But I want to sort of ask you three, go, I want to go around the table and ask if you could just sort of set the scene for listeners like in Philadelphia and Chicago and Iowa. Like, you know, what is the sort of atmosphere right now leading up to this May day? Like what are workers going through there and how are you translating that to this push to, you know, be on the streets this Friday? Well, I'll talk a little bit and then you can tell me if I actually answered that question. But last year in 2025, it was sort of the first few months of the second Trump administration already hundreds of thousands of workers had lost their collective bargaining rights. Folks were being rounded up in the streets. It was very scary time. And we looked around and we were like, okay, we haven't actually done anything for May day in many years. The CLC hasn't. There's been sort of the occasional action here or there. But on May 1st, 2025, we want to take the opportunity to show that the the labor movement is going to respond to the threats of authoritarianism. We're not going to wait for the parties to respond. We're not going to wait for the nonprofits to respond, right? Like we're going to take May day and show what we believe. And so we we brought a really large coalition of organizations, local unions, immigrant rights groups, community organizations together under the slogan of workers over billionaires. And we ended up having seven or eight thousand people in the streets, which according to my local nerdy labor historian was the largest May day action since 1935 in Philadelphia. We're on a smaller scale than Chicago. But we also did sort of a massive all this obedience, right? We had 70 people take a rest, including 10 labor leaders, which was a bit unprecedented, right? And it really showed that like labor leaders, union members are willing to do more and risk more than we ever have because we understand the stakes, right? People are struggling. And so we were really proud of the action we pulled off. People are really excited about it. And really excited to see really like the labor movement leading in Philadelphia. In the months following May day, we brought those same organizations together basically under like basically any organization that shared the same theory of change, which was we need to organize a lot more people, right? Like our path to power is organized people and we're not big enough. And so if folks want to commit to an arc of work until May day, 2026 with the idea that we just need to organize more and more people come on in. And so we have been working together basically since last summer. And we have it was basically like an internal organizing campaign shared amongst many organizations, right? So folks were going into their memberships talking to union members, talking to folks in their congregations and their neighborhoods with the same organizing wrap, which was basically what's going on in your life, what keeps you up at night, what's your hopes, what's your dreams for the city of Philadelphia? And let me explain to you why it's the billionaire's fault, right? But it requires some real political ed, right? It's like your mad that your library's closed on the weekend because our libraries are rarely open seven days a week. Let me explain to you how that could be funded, but it's not, right? And out of all of those conversations, we have thousands of conversations with workers. We have built out what we're calling the Working People's Vision for Philadelphia, which is sort of our vision for if workers actually had more power than the billionaires. This is what Philadelphia would feel like would look like. And it's beautiful, right? It's unions for all. It's safe homes and neighborhoods for everybody. It's one job should be enough to help care for everyone. Not like to all of us, it's like nothing that crazy, right? It's not that radical. But it came out of these thousands of worker conversations. And on May day this year, on Friday, outside of a city hall in Philadelphia, we're going to have thousands of workers vote to ratify that vision. And so we're going to sort of be out in public, publicly voting. Yes, this is our mission for Philadelphia and not just that. But we're willing together to fight for it, right? And to make it a reality. Yeah, around here, one of the real problems that labor has is the fact that everybody is working mandatory overtime. They don't have time to go to union meetings. They don't have time to go to union technics. They don't have time to just take together with their union brothers and sisters. We got we've seen that in the railroad. It's we were the frog in the boiling water. You know, went up. They slowly took things away from us. And eventually we came to 2022 when I first met two masks. With a high-vis policy that basically killed people because it was so it was so draconian. And it's not better for a while. But now it's worse. It's worse than it ever was because now they're going after union officers union officers that take time off to defend their members are being penalized for the day. Being penalized for taking time off and are being fired. And you know what the railway labor at what happens with that. It takes forever before you you get any justice whatsoever. If you get justice at all, this is starting to spread to other companies. You know, we like I said, we seen mandatory overtime for a lot of the manufacturing around here. 6 12 7 12 6 16s. Things like this. How are you going to have solidarity when you're at work all the time. Either you're at work or you're sleepy. Well, this is this is one of the things that we've talked about in some of our chapter meetings that you know we've got to get. Our membership to realize what's happening to them. Because you know they see the big paychecks from the all the overtime. They should they should have those paychecks anyway without the overtime. So we're going to be able to enjoy their families, be able to enjoy the life, be able to enjoy their their co workers. But it's getting harder and harder to do. And that's why I think this. Mayday is so important. I'm really hoping that we see a big turnout. We've got a lot of guest speakers coming in. So we're actually barred politicians from speaking. The. But. I was going to say you barred all politicians are one exception. We we we let the we let the old guys come in. So. But yeah. This is this is a day where we say we've had enough now we're coming to get ours. So for us in Chicago really, you know, under the second Trump presidency, we already knew what was going to happen right like the countless attacks on workers migrant workers. You know, we formed our grassroots our migrant defense networks even as early as October of 2024 right when we he was announced to take the presidency. You know, did all that education know your rights training community build up and like even in January some of the first reports of workers already being taken were actually between caregivers that were both Filipino and Latino. And they were taken right outside of their facility right as they were going into work. So really showing that like these attacks on our migrant community where the attack on the working community as well and you know throughout 2025. The Filipino community alongside so many other communities wage so many campaigns of like I swatch migrant defense like we in particular took up a lot of deportation defense campaigns of our community members who were workers, who were legal residents even most of our cases were green card holders. And they were people who were caregivers, they were you know truck drivers food service really working all these awful conditions and then to be picked up and detained really showed how we needed to bring in the labor movement and the you know migrant movement together to really push for to end these attacks that we were seeing. And so our main a last year similar to John was like was pretty big in Chicago really linking the you know migrant workers and putting it at the forefront and you know as we continued taking on our campaigns especially with midway blitz we saw ice outside of you know stores schools hospitals communities. Our workers continued to be those folks that were on the forefront of really like defending our communities and our families and our and our people and so you know we continued taking on those cases of you know workers and building solidarity with other working groups like S.E.I.U. and healthcare worker groups church groups youth and student groups as much as we could to really brought in this fight but really putting our workers at the forefront and you know with the continued attacks of the U.S. all over the world you know we were sent into economic crisis both here in the states and in the Philippines and you know it really became real when so many of our workers similar to what Jeff was saying we're having to work this over time because you know I like I said earlier there's actually no energy in the Philippines like there's a oil crisis the gas prices were rising and we really saw how our workers were working you know double the amount that they were before to support their families back home and what kind of conditions they were forced to be under right not only the duress of really being scared to go outside and to go to work and you know not even being able to drop their kids off at school out of fear but now they were having to put themselves out there even more and working to the point of like their health declining like we even have someone a community member all the way in so cow that we were connected to he died of overworking actually and you know when we as the Filipino migrant community really asked the Philippine government similar to how the Korean government many Latin American governments really stood up for their workers they were not willing to stand up for us and actually were super compliant with what the US wanted to do and how they wanted to treat the Phillip there you know Filipino community here and every time we had asked like what are you going to do to support us there was nothing so you know even our own migrant community here and our Filipino workers are taking up fights both against you know the US government to hold them accountable to expose and oppose those conditions of what they're seeing in the communities and what it's like in detention centers but also to challenge and expose and oppose the Philippine government to for actually working with the US you know they sent us abroad and now there's no support for us and you know we've even seen cases of the Philippine government working to expedite deportations of our community members hiding it from us and we have to chase them to really you know tell us where they're flying them out to and so you know our work is going to be a lot of work to do and so you know our workers are really like seeing the truth of you know what the working class is willing to do to us right to treat us like we're nothing only use us for our labor and then you know when we're not useful anymore to just like put us in these detention centers send us back to a country where we don't have jobs opportunities you know I think one of the aunties told me she was like we come to the states and we fear criminalization but what's scarier than not being able to do it. And not being able to feed your own family and that's the reality of what we're going through today but you know as we did this we were able to build a huge mass movement you know we've been able to free like Filipino workers we've a feed like 12 Filipino migrants from detention across the country a few here in the states are in Chicago as well so there's been huge gains and really out of that you know struggle and showing people what we could do. We launched the Tehanan Center which is a Filipino migrant center here in Chicago and we're being housed with the Latino Union of Chicago and really you know emboldening and building up our workers movement and so for Mayday we have so many things happening because Chicago. was huge in the labor movement. You know, we have folks going to high schools with large migrant student populations going to present at our worker centers. And then there's like many rallies happening like in Albany Park where our migrant center is where this huge migrant population we're doing a mini rally there. And then some of us are going to the Illinois Medical District that houses the largest hospitals across Illinois and the healthcare workers are having a rally there. And then youth and students from our Tahamun Center are also having rallies on their campuses and they're all coming together to culminate at Union Park as different sectors, but really to unify under one banner of the workers over billionaires, right? And you know, that's super exciting for us to really see like the breadth of all these different groups. You know, we have church groups coming, youth and student groups coming, community groups, healthcare worker groups, etc. To really come together because, you know, working workers is the issue that really binds us together. So yeah, we're hoping we're expecting a huge rally at Union Park in Chicago that is like surrounded by like five major unions like SCIU, pipe fitters, etc. So yeah, that's what we got coming up and even after that. The Filipino community across the US is coming together for a national migrant workers conference. So go confront our Philippine president who's coming here to talk about why he's a star in migration and treating workers properly. When we know the truth of our own conditions, both here in the States and back home in the Philippine. So that will be happening like May 3rd through May 6th, like we will be confronting him in New York as well. And you know, what kind of audacity is it to have a conference about migrants here in the US and boast about how well you treat them when we're watching what the US is doing to the workers and to migrant workers, especially. So yeah, a lot of confrontations come in up and the building of our mass movement. - Hey, that's great. Maybe I mean, that's like what it's all about, right? I mean, that's the whole spirit of the holiday, right? Is you don't get what you deserve by just asking your oppressors nicely for it. You know, if history teaches us anything, it should be that. You know, working people's gains in improving our lives and building a better world, they come because we fight for them and because we fight together for them and overcome, you know, the many obstacles that we have to face. And I wanted to sort of round us around the final turn here on that note, right? I mean, I want to give you all both one more chance like if there are any other points you wanted to make about, you know, what is going to be happening in Philly, Chicago, Iowa, but also around the country this week on Mayday, like anything else that we haven't covered that you want to stress to people out there listening. But also like I'm curious to get everyone's take on like, what this Mayday means for whatever comes next, right? I mean, like how this, you know, these organizing efforts, this day of action, this day of protest, these economic blackouts, like, you know, what is the kind of goal for those actions, like, you know, in terms of like communicating to power and communicating a message to our fellow workers, but also like, what is that building towards? Like what sort of infrastructure for something different could come out of this? So any final thoughts you wanted to share on that? And then I promise I'll let you all go. I mean, I can probably talk for a while. I'll try to keep it brief. A couple of thoughts. I think I guess similar to John, what you were saying, I think one of the other sort of interventions that we're trying to make this year is to like, put a name and a face to the bill. Like when we say workers over billionaires, billionaires, it's not just like this, like, amorphous figure, right? And they're real people and in Philadelphia, you know, we're kind of a poor city. We don't have that many billionaires, but we have one, right? The CEO of Comcast is the only billionaire that lives in the city. So why should we as a city, except that they take and take from us? And then with that money, what do they do? They donate to Trump's ballroom project, right? While people in Philadelphia are struggling, right? We're struggling. Our transportation system barely works. We're at risk of having 17 schools close down this year, right? And these giant employers take from us. And then instead of giving back to the city, they align with the authoritarian, right? They go tomorrow, logo, they do whatever. And it's not even just the private companies, right? It's ads and meds. It's 10 and Jefferson to do the exact same thing, right? And everywhere that has an ads and meds economy knows the drill, right? And so after we ratify our vision on Mayday, we're going to take folks on a march, pass a couple of these key employers to make very clear, right? Like when we say workers over billionaires, we are the workers and you are the billionaires. It's not something up in the sky. And it's not just Jeff Bezos and Elon Musk, right? We know our local folks. The other thing is that folks may have heard. It's the 250th anniversary of this year country until the Philadelphia folks have been gearing up to quote unquote celebrate that anniversary for a long time. We know that we have the FIFA World Cup here this summer, the MLB All-Star Game. The 250th anniversary amongst a lot of other things. And so in Philadelphia, we're really aware that the world's eyes are going to be on us. And we have an opportunity to continue to share the vision that we are fighting for and to really call the question on folks, like really truly which side are you on? Workers are billionaires. Visitors coming in every elected official. We're going to be asking the same question. I think the next piece and folks are starting to talk about this is preparing to defend our democracy towards the end of the year. And I think really for us in the labor movement, it's thinking about how do we build the capacity to really disrupt, to strike, right, when necessary, to shut things down when we have to. And that's something that we have not been called to do as a labor movement in a very long time. And so how are we spending the next couple of months building those muscles up? And just like, really, we got to shake our training wheels off because the big fight is coming. And so how are we using May Day and the months following to really get ready for whatever is going to come? And then I think my last point that I want to just make is like, I think we have an obligation as the labor movement, as leaders in the labor movement, to help folks imagine a different kind of world, right? And we say a lot as we've been preparing for May Day, right? That we have been living in the political imagination of the billionaire class. And it's time to live in our own, right? But imagination is not a frivolous practice. It's necessary. And we haven't been doing it enough. And so it's hard. It's hard for workers to say, I don't know whether to pay-- whether I can pay my rent or my grocery bill or keep the lights on. And you're asking me to imagine this nice, pretty world, right? But we have to. We have to give ourselves something better to fight for. And I think that's part of our job and part of this national movement is to say, we are going to win a better world. And it's going to be a lot better than this one. One thing that I want to say about this is part of this solution is going to have to be-- whether we like it or not, it's going to have to be politics. When I was in the house, I saw the potential that we had where we could do a lot of good. And then I saw the reality of it, too. And I think we need more labor people to run for office. We're starting to see that here. In fact, a guy that you interviewed from Burlington, Iowa, Marcus Derby, is running for state rep. And I think one of the reasons he's running is because case, which has been in Burlington forever, is pulling out. A town of 20,000 people is going to lose 200 good jobs. And this is happening. I know Maytag is moving out of it. I can't remember the community. It's up near Central Iowa someplace. But this is happening a lot. And the way we combat this is to get our own in there. And I would encourage you after I played the party game, I would encourage people to run as independence. Because what I'm starting to see is there's a real thirst for people that aren't beholden to either side. Because in reality, they're one of the same. I mean, that's just what it is. The final point I want to make is, Jan, I keep talking about billionaires. And I watched in the morning just to get my blood pressure up. So I make sure that it's high enough that I can get through the day. I watch financial news. And they have the billionaires come. and talk about what great things they're doing. And then they talk about Zora and Mom, Donnie, given free bus tickets to people. How can he do this? And he's gonna get childcare and all this. Oh my God, how are we gonna afford that? And they keep talking about all these working people getting free stuff. And I look at these people and I think, how hard do you have to work to make a billion dollars? You know, because I've seen people work their ass off. And they don't never even snip being a millionaire. And you've got some guy that throws his money around. And all of a sudden he's worth a billion and that billion turns into a 10 billion. And now we've got a guy that they say in the next year, there's an 88% chance he's gonna be a trillion there. That's where the free stuff is going. It's not going to workers. And that's why we need people in politics that understand this, that they're getting the free stuff. And we need to cut that off so that people can live and they can have good lives in our immigrants and migrant workers can have a good, I have never understood this. What the problem is with people coming into this country. So anyway, I'm gonna get off my soapbox and let somebody else shot. - Yeah, I mean, I think I agree so much with both what Jeff and Jonna were saying that it's really what comes next is, yeah, building something big. Like we are trying to coalesce everyone in Chicago aside from whatever group or sector you come from, whether you focus on migrants rights, women's rights, your church sector to really come together and not only be on the defensive of the attacks that we've been seeing, but how do we start being on the offensive and actually show workers and show the community that when they fight, they can really win. And like Jonna said, it's having those really specific targets. There's so many targets we have here in Chicago, like the Trump Tower is here and things like that. We even have so many consulates and international governing bodies that exist here in Chicago. And so for us to really strengthen our movement across the city and then to really start, targeting and pressuring those things and be in solidarity with all movements is what I think is really the next vision. You know, like I said, we're having these confrontations as a Filipino community with our Philippine government in the upcoming days after May Day as well. And you know, this, you know, bringing together this summer of like so many conferences, like the international league of people's struggles to really, it's being hosted here in this country to really show like, you know, workers and a militant mass movement that it's not just the people of this country that can like strike blows, but you know, being solidarity with the rest of the world that is striking blows and can also really help us envision a future, you know, where we don't have the exploitation and really, you know, take back like y'all were saying, all those means and like even targeting things like the one big beautiful bill that's like super actively taking away from us here in this country and going towards the militarization of our communities abroad and things like that. And then yeah, linking the struggles of workers church all over the world, youth and students, migrants, women to ensure that we can, you know, create future. And you know, not only show them what we're fighting against but show them what we're fighting for. So I think, you know, these alliance building and solidarity across all the sectors and is a huge opportunity that will happen at May Day and you know, we'll continue moving throughout the summer. It's gonna be really hot in Chicago throughout the summer as we're building up towards even 2028 when some of the biggest major unions all over the country and in Chicago are going to have to resign their contracts and building up towards, you know, what could that actually look like? So yeah, the strength, you know, anyone with any edge should come in and, you know, help strengthen our movement across and for us to finally start dealing, you know, real blows, real tangible blows and making these huge gains for, you know, the community all over the world, are both here and in the global South as well. - All right gang, that's gonna wrap things up for us today. I wanna thank our guests, Janne Corn, Chief of Staff of the Philadelphia Council AFL CIO, Jeff Kurtz, retired railroad engineer and union officer and former state representative in the Iowa House of representatives and John Emiliano from the Tehanan Center in Chicago. You can find out more about the important work that they're all doing and about the Mayday events happening in their areas and yours this week using the links that we provided in the show notes for this episode. And of course, I wanna thank you all for listening and I wanna thank you for caring. We'll see y'all back here next time for another episode of Working People and in the meantime, go explore all the great work that we're doing at the Real News Network where we do grassroots reporting that lifts up the voices and stories from the front lines of struggle. Check us out across our YouTube channel, our podcast feeds, our website and our social media pages and help us do more work like this by going to therealnews.com/donate and becoming a supporter today. I promise you guys, it really makes a difference. I'm Max Emiliano, whereas take care of yourselves. Take care of each other. Happy Mayday, all powered to the workers, solidarity forever. (upbeat music) ♪ When my face is no longer seen ♪ ♪ I live on, yes, I live on ♪ ♪ Wherever we go ♪ ♪ We are going to roll the union on the song ♪ ♪ I live on, yes, I live on ♪ ♪ Wherever I'm hungry, hungry, I'll be ♪ ♪ Just as hungry as hungry can be ♪ ♪ The song ♪ ♪ I live on, yes, I live on ♪ ♪ Well, me and things are happening in the slang ♪ ♪ It's very the song ♪ ♪ I live on, yes, I live on ♪ ♪ Wherever the book means things ♪ ♪ What happens in the slang is red ♪ ♪ I live on, yes, I live on ♪ ♪ Wherever the video case of me is shown ♪ ♪ I live on, yes, I live on ♪ ♪ If I have to make this a better world to live here ♪ ♪ I live on, yes, I live on ♪ ♪ When my body is silent ♪ ♪ And in some bones and grief ♪ ♪ I live on, yes, I live on ♪ ♪ When my songs and poems are red ♪ ♪ I live on, yes, I live on ♪ (upbeat music) (upbeat music)