In a decision today that could disenfranchise millions of average Americans, the U.S. Supreme Court upheld, on a 6–3 vote, Indiana’s voter identification law, the most restrictive law of its kind in the country.

In his dissent, Justice David Souter echoed what critics of the law have said all along:

Indiana's voter ID law threatens to impose nontrivial burdens on the voting rights of tens of thousands of the state's citizens, and a significant percentage of those individuals are likely to be deterred from voting.

After the 2000 election, Republicans in many states have pushed for voter ID laws, claiming voter fraud is rampant. But studies have shown the problem does not exist.

John McCain completed a swing through the South on Friday with yet another high-dollar fundraiser in Little Rock, Ark. As they have in the past few weeks, union members were there to raise the issues of concern to working families in this election year.

The more than 20 AFL-CIO union members who gathered outside the Little Rock Convention Center wanted answers from McCain on issues like trade and health care—and they wanted to know why McCain voted to block the Employee Free Choice Act.

Child care providers in Pennsylvania are gaining a voice by joining a union.

Some 20,000 home-based child care providers in Pennsylvania now have a voice after they overwhelmingly voted for representation by Child Care Providers UNITED (CCP), a joint effort of AFSCME and SEIU.

Gov. Ed Rendell (D), who was elected with strong union support, signed an executive order last June granting providers the right to join a union if they care for no more than three unrelated children in their homes. The executive order called for an election to take place after a union collected signed authorization cards from at least 30 percent of the providers.

The deaths of 55 workers in a fire at a mattress factory in Casablanca, Morocco, over the weekend, is a chilling reminder of how dangerous our workplaces can be. Today is Workers Memorial Day, the day workers around the world honor those who died on the job and reaffirm their commitment to make all workplaces safe.

The International Trade Union Confederation (ITUC) reports that more than 14 million people are taking part in some 13,000 activities today to highlight the plight of the more than 2.2 million workers who die every year and the 160 million more who become ill due to unsafe work and unsustainable forms of production.

Rosa Altagracia Fuentes

The global union movemnent is strongly protesting the murder of Rosa Altagracia Fuentes, the general secretary of the Workers’ Confederation of Honduras (CTH), trade union leader Virginia García de Sánchez and motorcyclist Juan Bautista Gálvez.

The three were killed early morning on April 24 on the highway between El Progreso and San Pedro Sula by six masked persons, according to eyewitness acccounts. Altagracia Fuentes was shot 16 times.

In a strongly worded letter (in Spanish) to Honduran President José Manuel Zelaya Rosales, Guy Ryder, general secretary of the International Trade Union Confederation (ITUC), called for

a full investigation to establish, as quickly as possible, the motives for the murders and identify those materially and intellectually responsible for these crimes, to punish them with the full weight of the law.

Some 700 AFSCME members in two Oklahoma cites won first contracts and more news from "Bargaining Digest Weekly." The AFL-CIO Collective Bargaining Department delivers daily bargaining-related news and research resources to more than 900 subscribers. Union leaders can register for this service through our website, Bargaining@Work.

Settlements

AFSCME, Enid & Lawton, Okla.: Some 700 municipal workers in Enid and Lawton, Okla., represented by AFSCME locals 1136 and 3894, respectively, won first contracts, after the passage of a 2004 state law that requires cities of 35,000 people or more to recognize non-uniformed workers’ unions. Enid’s employees won a 12 percent across-the-board wage increase over the duration. The Lawton employees’ new contract includes a 3 percent wage hike through 2009 and improved benefits.

Aneil Patel and his co-workers at Caesars Atlantic City want a first contract.

Despite overwhelming votes by workers at four Atlantic City casinos in favor of forming a union with UAW, management at the four casinos continue to stall and delay negotiations to avoid granting the nearly 4,000 workers a voice at work.

At a press conference last week, New Jersey State AFL-CIO President Charles Wowkanech said:

The casino dealers and slot technicians fight to organize and management’s opposition to the workers’ freedom to form a union clearly illustrates that the current system for establishing a union in America is broken and is skewed in favor of employers. It is a system that is in desperate need of reform and thousands of workers in Atlantic City are unfortunately victims of this failed system.

Since March 2007, a majority of casino dealers, dual-rate dealers and other workers at Caesars, Tropicana, Bally’s and Trump Plaza in Atlantic City have voted in favor of UAW representation. Bargaining is under way at Caesars and Tropicana; the union at Bally’s has just been certified; and Trump Plaza is still trying to delay certification before the National Labor Relations Board (NLRB).

Lede: The May Day anti-war shutdown of west coast ports is shaping up to be a real bottom-up, rank-and-file action. Doug Cunningham has more.

West Coast long shore workers have voted to stop work for eight hours during the day shift on May 1st, shutting down west coast ports to protest the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan. Clarence Thomas is with the Port Workers May Day Organizing Committee in San Francisco.

[Thomas]: "We believe that only in a peaceful world is it possible for there to be the kinds of gains that all working people need in order to have any kind of economic sustainability."

Lede: The May Day antiwar shutdown of west coast ports is shaping up to be a real bottom-up rank and file action. Doug Cunningham has more.

West coast long shore workers have voted to stop work for eight hours during the day shift on May 1st, shutting down west coast ports to protest the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan. Clarence Thomas is with the Port Workers May Day Organizing Committee in San Francisco.

[Thomas]: “We believe that only in a peaceful world is it possible for there to be the kinds of gains that all working people need in order to have any kind of economic sustainability.”