Working People

The Real News Network is honored to be one of the 2025 recipients of the prestigious Izzy Award for our on-the-ground documentary report, "Trainwreck in 'Trump Country': Partisan politics hasn't helped East Palestine, OH." "While corporate media covered the catastrophe in East Palestine, Ohio, with aerial views of ruined train cars and plumes of smoke likening the horrific crash to a disaster film," The Park Center for Independent Media (PCIM) states in their award announcement, "Steve Mellon of the Pittsburgh Union Progress and Maximillian Alvarez of The Real News Network were on the ground telling the stories of people in the communities devastated by the deadly toxins released into their neighborhoods long after major media outlets left them behind." With permission from the PCIM, we are sharing the audio recording of the award acceptance speeches delivered by Alvarez and Mellon in Ithaca, NY, on April 30, 2025.

Speakers:

• Eleanor Goldfield is an independent filmmaker and creator of the documentary Hard Road of Hope, which details the history and contemporary struggles of West Virginians living and dying in coal country. Currently, Goldfield is the co-host and associate producer of the Project Censored Show, and co-host of the podcast Common Censored along with Lee Camp.
• Maximillian Alvarez is the editor-in-chief and co-executive director of The Real News Network.
• Steve Mellon is a photojournalist and writer for the Pittsburgh Post-Gazette, but he is currently on strike and working as co-editor of the Pittsburgh Union Progress.

Additional links/info:

• Maximillian Alvarez, Steve Mellon, & Mike Balonek, The Real News Network, "Trainwreck in 'Trump Country': Partisan politics hasn't helped East Palestine, OH"

Featured Music:

• Jules Taylor, "Working People" Theme Song

Credits:

• Production: Park Center for Independent Media; Park Productions at Ithaca College
• Audio Post-Production: Jules Taylor

On Sunday, July 20, 2025, Working People host and TRNN Editor-in-Chief Maximillian Alvarez delivered the keynote speech at the national convention of the National Organization of Legal Services Workers (NOLSW), UAW Local 2320. "I am here to report back to you from the front lines of struggle, without hesitation or hyperbole, that we are at risk of losing everything," Alvarez told the crowd of union members. "And so I am here not to extol the virtues of your union or the value of unions in general, but to ask you bluntly: What good is a union in Hell? How much can an organization of the dawned do in a future no one wants to live in? What good does a collective bargaining agreement serve when the world as we know it is dying?"

Additional links/info:

• NOLSW-UAW Local 2320 website, X page, Facebook page, and Instagram

Featured Music:

• Jules Taylor, "Working People" Theme Song

Credits:

• Audio Post-Production: Jules Taylor

After getting a job as a barista at the Elmwood Starbucks in Buffalo, New York, Jaz Brisack became a founding member of Starbucks Workers United and helped organize the first unionized Starbucks in the US in December of 2021. In their new book, Get on the Job and Organize, Brisack details the hardwon lessons they and their coworkers have learned from building one of the most significant and paradigm-shifting worker organizing campaigns in modern history. In this extended episode of Working People, TRNN Editor-in-Chief Maximillian speaks with Brisack about their book, the facts and fictions characterizing today's "new labor movement," and why union organizing is essential for saving democracy and the world.Guests:

• Jaz Brisack is a union organizer and cofounder of the Inside Organizer School, which trains workers to unionize. After spending one year at Oxford as a Rhodes Scholar, Jaz got a job as a barista at the Elmwood Starbucks in Buffalo, New York, becoming a founding member of Starbucks Workers United and helping organize the first unionized Starbucks in the United States in December of 2021. As the organizing director for Workers United Upstate New York & Vermont, they also worked with organizing committees at companies ranging from Ben & Jerry's to Tesla.

Additional links/info:

• Jaz Brisack, One Signal Publishers, Get on the Job and Organize: Standing Up for a Better Workplace and a Better World
• Jaz Brisack, Teen Vogue, "Starbucks Workers United grew out of Jaz Brisack's undercover organizing. Here's how"
• Starbucks Workers United website, Facebook page, X page, and Instagram
• Inside Organizer School website

Featured Music:

• Jules Taylor, "Working People" Theme Song

Credits:

• Audio Post-Production: Jules Taylor

Dozens of peaceful protesters, including disabled people in wheelchairs, were arrested last Wednesday in Washington, DC, while protesting President Trump's massive spending and tax bill, which will dramatically slash taxes, restructure the student loan and debt system, and make devastating cuts to vital, popular programs like Medicaid and the Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program (SNAP). With Vice President JD Vance casting the tie-breaking vote, Senate Republicans voted Tuesday to advance Donald Trump's so-called One Big Beautiful Bill, which will now go back to the House of Representatives for final approval. In this urgent episode of Working People, we speak with Lorraine Chavez and Chrstine Rodriguez, who were among the dozens arrested for their peaceful act of civil disobedience on June 25, about what's in this bill, what it will mean for working people, and how working people are fighting back.

Editor's Note (7/1/25): Before the US Senate voted to advance President Trump's spending and tax bill, the provision to bar states from issuing new regulations on artificial intelligence for 10 years was removed from the legislation.

Guests:

• Lorraine Chavez is an educator, researcher, and community leader based in Chicago. She is also a student debtor and traveled to the Washington DC protest with the Debt Collective.

• Chrstine Rodriguez is a legal assistant and student debtor from Pasadena, California, who also traveled to the Washington DC protest with the Debt Collective.

Additional links/info:

• The Debt Collective website, X page, Facebook page, and Instagram

• Brett Wilkins, Common Dreams, "Medicaid defenders in wheelchairs arrested ahead of Senate vote on 'betrayal of a bill'"

• Chris Stein, The Guardian, "What's in Trump's big, beautiful bill? Tax cuts, deportations and more"

• Chris Stein, The Guardian, "Senate Republicans pass Trump's 'big, beautiful' bill, clearing major hurdle"

Featured Music:

• Jules Taylor, "Working People" Theme Song

Credits:

• Audio Post-Production: Jules Taylor

In Los Angeles, CA, armed, masked agents of the state are snatching and disappearing immigrants off the street, peaceful protestors and journalists are being attacked with tear gas and rubber bullets, National Guard troops and active-duty Marines have been deployed to police and intimidate American citizens. Fear and uncertainty have gripped America's second largest city as a barrage of misinformation obscures the reality on the ground; nevertheless, Angelinos continue to defy the Trump administration's attacks on immigrant communities and authoritarian crackdown on civil rights. In this episode of Working People, we take you to the streets of LA and speak with multiple on-the-ground eyewitnesses to the events of the past two weeks to help you better understand what's actually happening and where this is all heading.Guests:

• Sonali Kolhatkar is an award winning journalist, broadcaster, writer, and author; she is the founder, host, and executive director of Rising Up with Sonali. She is the author of Talking About Abolition: A Police-Free World is Possible and Rising Up: The Power of Narrative in Pursuing Racial Justice.
• Javier Cabral is the editor-in-chief of the award-winning, independent outlet L.A. Taco
• Michael Nigro is an award-winning filmmaker and multimedia journalist who is among the numerous journalists to have been assaulted by police while reporting on assignment in LA.

Additional links/info:

• Tim Javier Cabral, L.A. Taco, "A ride-along with Union Del Barrio, L.A.'s leading community patrol against ICE"
• David Folkenflick, NPR, "Press group sues L.A., alleging police abuse of reporters at ICE rallies"
• Luis Feliz Leon, In These Times, "Trump has put a target on SEIU, and the labor movement is fighting back"

Featured Music:

• Jules Taylor, "Working People" Theme Song

Credits: Audio Post-Production: Jules Taylor

On June 6, thousands of veterans, union members, VA hospital nurses, elected officials, and more gathered on the National Mall in Washington D.C. at the "Unite for Veterans, Unite for America rally" to protest the Trump administration's attacks on veteran jobs, benefits, and healthcare. In this on-the-ground edition of Working People, we report from Friday's rally and speak with veterans and VA nurses about how Trump's policies are affecting them now and how to fix the longstanding issues with the VA. Speakers:

• Peter Pocock, Vietnam War veteran (Navy) and retired union organizer
• Everett Kelley, national president of the American Federation of Government Employees
• Terri Henry, Air Force veteran
• Ellen Barfield, Army veteran and national vice president of Veterans for Peace
• Lindsay Church, executive director and co-founder of Minority Veterans of America
• Lelaina Brandt, veteran (National Guard), 2SLGBTQIA+ advocate, and part-time illustrator and graphic designer.
• Eric Farmer, Navy submarine veteran
• Irma Westmoreland, registered VA nurse in Augusta, GA, secretary-treasurer of National Nurses United, chair of National Nurses United Organizing Committee/NNU-VA
• Andrea Johnson, registered VA nurse in San Diego, CA, medical surgical unit and the NNOC/NNU director of VA Medical Center- San Diego
• Justin Wooden, registered VA nurse in the intensive care unit (ICU) at James A. Haley Veterans' Hospital in Tampa, FL
• Cecil E. Roberts, Vietnam War veteran (Army) and president of the United Mine Workers of America

Additional links/info:

• Tim Balk & Helene Cooper, The New York Times, "Military parade in Capital on Trump's birthday could cost $45 million, officials say"
• Lolita C. Baldor, Associated Press, "Transgender troops face a deadline and a difficult decision: Stay or go?"
• Eric Umansky & Vernal Coleman, ProPublica, "Internal VA emails reveal how Trump cuts jeopardize veterans' care, including to 'life-saving cancer trials'"
• Maximillian Alvarez, Working People / The Real News Network, "Trump cuts leave VA hospital nurses and veteran patients in a crisis"

Featured Music:

• Jules Taylor, "Working People" Theme Song

Credits:

• Audio Post-Production: Jules Taylor

Already burdened by years of funding cuts and understaffing, registered nurses who work at Veterans Health Administration (VA) facilities across the country are facing a crisis as the impact of the Trump administration's cuts to the federal workforce take effect. In this episode of Working People, Maximillian Alvarez speaks with VA nurses and union representatives for National Nurses United about how these cuts, coupled with Trump's attempt to strip over one million federal workers of their collective bargaining rights, are hurting VA workers, the quality of care they've been trained to provide, and the veterans they serve.Guest(s):

• Irma Westmoreland, a registered VA nurse in Augusta, Georgia, who currently serves as secretary-treasurer of National Nurses United and chair of the National Nurses United Organizing Committee/NNU-VA
• Sharda Fornnarino, a navy veteran who has worked as a VA nurse for 25 years, and who currently serves as the National Nurses United director of the Denver VA.

Additional links/info:

• National Nurses United website, Facebook page, X page, and Instagram
• National Nurses United - Veterans Affairs website
• NNU Press Release: National Nurses United RNs join Unite for Veterans, Unite for America rally in Washington, DC
• NNU statement on executive order seeking to strip federal employees of their protected union rights
• Eric Umansky & Vernal Coleman, ProPublica, "Internal VA emails reveal how Trump cuts jeopardize veterans' care, including to 'life-saving cancer trials'"
• Maximillian Alvarez, Working People / The Real News Network, "What's really behind Trump's war on federal unions?"

Featured Music:

• Jules Taylor, "Working People" Theme Song

Credits:

• Audio Post-Production: Jules Taylor

In the latest episode of Working People, we go back to the picket line to get a critical update on the longest ongoing strike in the United States. In October 2022, over 100 workers represented by five labor unions—including production, distribution, advertising, and accounts receivable staff—walked off the job on an unfair labor practice strike at the Pittsburgh Post-Gazette (PPG). The strike began after the newspaper's management, Block Communications, which is owned by the Block family, cut off health insurance for employees on Oct. 1 of that year. After more than 2.5 years on strike, with other unions reaching contracts or taking buyouts and dissolving their units, workers represented by the Newspaper Guild of Pittsburgh are the last remaining strikers holding the line. We speak with a panel of union officers for the Newspaper Guild of Pittsburgh about how they've managed to stay on strike so long and about recent legal updates that have given them hope that an acceptable end to the strike may be on the horizon.

Panelists include: Ed Blazina, striking transportation writer at the PPG and one of the Vice Presidents of the Newspaper Guild of Pittsburgh; Erin Hebert, also one of the Vice Presidents of the Newspaper Guild of Pittsburgh and a striking copy-editor and page designer at PPG; Emily Matthews, photographer on strike and treasurer for the Post-Gazette Unit of the Newspaper Guild of Pittsburgh.

Additional links/info:

• Pittsburgh Union Progress website, Facebook page, X page, and Instagram
• Donate to Support Striking Pittsburgh Post-Gazette Workers
• Newspaper Guild of Pittsburgh website
• Maximillian Alvarez, The Real News Network, "TRNN wins 2025 Izzy Award for coverage of East Palestine, OH, trainwreck & chemical disaster"
• Bob Batz Jr., Pittsburgh Union Progress, "The strike is over for 3 Pittsburgh news production unions, but the journalists' strike continues"
• Ian Karbal, Pennsylvania Capital Star, "The strike at the Pittsburgh Post-Gazette is now the longest in the nation. And it's not over"
• Mel Buer, Working People / The Real News Network, "Two years into a strike, Pittsburgh Post-Gazette workers aren't ready to give up"
• Bob Batz Jr. & Steve Mellon, Pittsburgh Union Progress, "A start to the end of the strike? Feds file for temporary injunction to return Pittsburgh news unions to work"
• Brett Wilkins, Common Dreams / The Real News Network, "'AI will not scab us': Post-Gazette newsroom decries use of artificial intelligence"
• Maximillian Alvarez, The Real News Network, "(Livestream) After months of striking, media workers aren't backing down"
• Maximillian Alvarez, The Real News Network, "(Livestream) Strikes at Pittsburgh Post-Gazette, University of Michigan, and more"
• Maximillian Alvarez, Working People / The Real News Network, "The Pittsburgh Post-Gazette's half-year strike"

Permanent links below…

• Leave us a voicemail and we might play it on the show!
• Labor Radio / Podcast Network website, Facebook page, and Twitter page
• In These Times website, Facebook page, and Twitter page
• The Real News Network website, YouTube channel, podcast feeds, Facebook page, and Twitter page

Featured Music… Jules Taylor, "Working People" Theme Song

Audio Post-Production: Jules Taylor

At this very moment, Palestinians in the Gaza Strip who have managed to survive Israel's scorched-earth siege and bombing are being deliberately starved to death as a result of Israel's 11-week blockade preventing food and aid from entering Gaza. As Jem Bartholemew writes at The Guardian, "The UN's humanitarian chief, Tom Fletcher, told the BBC [Tuesday] morning that 14,000 babies could die in Gaza in 48 hours if aid did not reach them in time. Five aid trucks entered Gaza on Monday but Fletcher described this as a "drop in the ocean" and totally inadequate for the population's needs." In response to this dire humanitarian crisis, students at multiple university campuses in the US have launched hunger strikes in solidarity with the starving people of Gaza. In this urgent episode, we speak with four hunger strikers at the University of Oregon (UO), including: Cole, Sadie, and Efron, three undergraduate students who are all members of Jewish Voice for Peace - UO and who just completed a 60-hour solidarity hunger strike; and Phia, a Palestinian-American undergraduate student who has organized with JVP-UO on the hunger strike and who currently remains on hunger strike herself.Additional links/info:

• UO Gaza Hunger Strike Instagram and TikTok
• UO Gaza Hunger Strike: Community Calls to Action!
• Press Release: University of Oregon Students, Faculty, and Staff Launch "UO Gaza Hunger Strike" Campaign Protesting Mass Starvation and Genocide
• Jewish Voice for Peace - UO Instagram
• Nathan Wilk, KLCC, "University of Oregon protesters begin hunger strike for Gaza"
• Michael Arria, Mondoweiss, "Students across the U.S. are going on hunger strike as Israeli-engineered famine takes hold in Gaza"
• Syma Mohammed, Middle East Eye, "US: UCLA student hospitalised during hunger strike for Gaza"
• Jem Bartholemew, The Guardian, "First Thing: UN says 14,000 babies could die in Gaza in next 48 hours under Israeli aid blockade"
• Ronen Bergman & Natan Odenheimer, The New York Times, "In private, some Israeli officers admit that Gaza is on the brink of starvation"
• Maximillian Alvarez, Working People / The Real News Network, "'The raids happened Wednesday, finals started Thursday': FBI agents raid homes of pro-Palestine students at University of Michigan"
• Maximillian Alvarez, Working People / The Real News Network, "'A tremendous chilling effect': Columbia students describe dystopian reality on campus amid Trump attacks"
• Maximillian Alvarez, Working People / The Real News Network, "'People are hiding in their apartments': Inside Trump's assault on universities"
• Maximillian Alvarez, The Real News Network, "'Worse' than McCarthyism: Trump's war on higher education, free speech, and political dissent"

Permanent links below…

• Leave us a voicemail and we might play it on the show!
• Labor Radio / Podcast Network website, Facebook page, and Twitter page
• In These Times website, Facebook page, and Twitter page
• The Real News Network website, YouTube channel, podcast feeds, Facebook page, and Twitter page

Featured Music…

• Jules Taylor, "Working People" Theme Song

Audio Post-Production: Jules Taylor

While state officials and legislators have positioned Texas to be "the bitcoin mining capital of the world," in small towns like Granbury, working-class residents living next to giant, loud, environmentally destructive data centers are the ones paying the price for Texas's crypto boom. "None of us are sleeping," Cheryl Shadden, a Granbury resident who lives across the street from a 300-megawatt bitcoin mining data center owned by Marathon Digital, tells TRNN. "We can't get rid of this alien invasion in our homes…This is like being a prisoner of war. It's like being tortured with loud sounds and bright lights and being sleep deprived."In this episode of Working People, we dive deeper into the reality of living next to crypto mining data centers like the one in Granbury, the unseen threats they pose to human and nonhuman life, and what residents in Granbury are doing to fight back. TRNN Editor-in-Chief Maximillian Alvarez speaks with: Cheryl Shadden, a registered nurse anesthetist and resident of Granbury, who lives right next to the site of the Marathon bitcoin mining operation; Dr. Shannon Wolf, Precinct Chair in Hood County, who lives about 3 miles from the bitcoin mine; and Nannette Samuelson, County Commissioner for Precinct 2 in Hood County.Additional links/info:

• Protect Hood County website
• Maximillian Alvarez, Working People / The Real News Network, "A bitcoin mine in Texas is "killing us slowly," local residents say"
• Andrew R. Chow, TIME, "'We're living in a nightmare:' Inside the health crisis of a Texas bitcoin town"
• Andrew R. Chow, TIME, "Noisy neighbor: Bitcoin's hidden health cost" (Video Report)
• Maximillian Alvarez, The Real News Network, "TRNN wins 2025 Izzy Award for coverage of East Palestine, OH, trainwreck & chemical disaster"
• Keaton Peters, Inside Climate News, "Texas leaders worry that bitcoin mines threaten to crash the state power grid"
• NBC News, "Inside the Texas bitcoin mine reportedly making residents sick"
• James Pollard, The Texas Tribune, "Texas Republicans want to make the state the center of the cryptocurrency universe"

Permanent links below…

• Leave us a voicemail and we might play it on the show!
• Labor Radio / Podcast Network website, Facebook page, and Twitter page
• In These Times website, Facebook page, and Twitter page
• The Real News Network website, YouTube channel, podcast feeds, Facebook page, and Twitter page

Featured Music…

• Jules Taylor, "Working People" Theme Song

Studio Production: Maximillian Alvarez Post-Production: Jules Taylor