Concord, N.C. — Hundreds of women workers from across the country gathered near Charlotte this week for the Women Lead: Unions for All worker organizing summit – hosted by the Service Employees International Union (SEIU) – to build worker and political power to elect leaders who back their demands. During Friday’s keynote session, SEIU International President April Verrett announced that the two million-member service and care union will commit at least $50 million between now and 2030 to lean into worker organizing in Southern states.
As voters begin casting early ballots just weeks ahead of Election Day, workers are making bold demands for an economy that works for working people. Allies and special guests including N.C. Democratic Party Chair Anderson Clayton, Reproductive Freedom for All President and CEO Mini Timmaraju, United We Dream Executive Director Greisa Martinez Rosas and Women’s March Executive Director Rachel O’Learly Carmona joined the summit on Friday, and additional allies are set to rally alongside workers Saturday.
“We’re here in North Carolina because it’s not only a battleground for November – the South is a battleground every day when it comes to workers’ fight to be respected, protected and paid living wages.
Atlanta, Birmingham, Charlotte, Chattanooga, Jackson – you name it. All over the South, workers are uniting and winning,” said April Verrett, International President of SEIU. “And we’re putting the full weight of our union’s 2 million members behind them. SEIU is committing at least $50 million to building worker power across the South by 2030. This commitment is part of our bold vision to organize 1 million service and care workers into our union over the next 10 years.”
Flanked by banners proclaiming “Women Lead” and “Mujeres Lideran,” summit participants emphasized the issues that matter most to working people – from wages to greedflation to job safety and beyond – while shining a light on policies that have particular impact for women workers like reproductive healthcare, the care economy, immigrant justice and the devastating community impacts of climate change.
“The South has been left behind in many ways, grappling with policies that do not reflect the needs of our communities,” Union of Southern Service Workers (USSW) member Naomi Harris of Columbia, South Carolina told a packed room on Thursday. “With upcoming elections and critical legislation, we all have a role to play. Remember: our strength is in our unity, and our history is one of resistance. We can’t afford to go backward.”
The Women Lead: Unions for All worker organizing summit kicked off on Thursday, bringing together over 500 women workers and leaders from across the country and industries in an energizing series of workshops, discussions and plenaries focused on building power and skills to organize their workplaces and communities to vote. They celebrated major victories, including how Michigan home care workers are on track to regain union rights and how union baristas are driving a wave of organizing while also bargaining a strong foundational framework with Starbucks.
“The sides of our battle have been very clearly drawn. Our opposition, the people who are attacking bodily autonomy and freedom, are also the same people who are attacking workers rights and the same people attacking books in schools,” said Women’s March Executive Director Rachel O’Learly Carmona. “What 2024 means for women is an opportunity to come together as a power block and as a voting block. Power is built consistently, not every four years, not every two years, not related to an election cycle. If we contend with the power, respect the power and wield the power we have… and use it to govern, we can change the world.”
Participants comprised Waffle House, Starbucks, fast-food, airport, gig, healthcare workers and more who are driving forward history-making campaigns as they stand up to corporate greed across the nation. They’re demanding that candidates up and down the ballot fight to raise the minimum wage to at least $25/hr, hold corporate union-busters to account and use every ounce of government power to stand up for the people who power our economy. Throughout the summit, workers made their message clear: our votes are our demand for Unions for All.
“We are living and existing in an ecosystem that knows that organized workers are a threat to the status quo,” said United We Dream Executive Director Greisa Martinez Rosas. “For the longest time, part of the strategy has been to tell us the lie that we don’t have any power… and that we don’t deserve better. We’ve been told a lie that we are just characters in someone else’s story. The truth is we reject that false story and the lies told about us. We are the protagonists of our own story. We are the people that make the impossible possible.”
Worker Organizing Heats Up in the South
As poll after poll shows North Carolina is a toss-up in November, workers have strategically targeted the South as the new ground zero for their fight to be respected, protected and paid living wages. Starbucks baristas won another union victory in Atlanta, Ga. just this week as they continue to win union elections in unlikely places such as Alabama, Arkansas, Florida and Texas. They build on the momentum workers have built in recent years, showing their growing influence within Southern states’ economies:
- Charlotte Douglas International airport service workers won the largest union victory in North or South Carolina in 26 years.
- Richmond City workers won a voice on the job through their unions and a “historic” contract.
- Chattanooga Volkswagen workers won their union with UAW in a landmark vote.
- Waffle House workers with the Union of Southern Service Workers across North Carolina, South Carolina and Georgia are taking on one of the region's most notorious corporations and driving forward a bold campaign to demand safety on the job, dignity, equal treatment and a company-wide minimum wage of $25/hr.
- Starbucks baristas with Starbucks Workers United continue to drive a major wave of organizing, winning their union in unlikely places such as Birmingham, Ala.; Jackson, Miss.; Augusta, Ga.; Durham, N.C. and Knoxville, Tenn.
In her keynote remarks Friday, Verrett called on others to join SEIU in building worker and political power in the South, including by backing worker organizing and creating good union jobs across the South.
“SEIU is proud to commit to organizing in the South – but our commitment alone is nowhere near enough,” Verrett continued. “We need others to meet us in all of these places where workers are building power and demanding a voice on the job. We'll be your partner, and we'll do it together. Because we all know: as the south goes, so goes the nation.”
Working people are preparing to rally outside of Waffle House Saturday, bringing their demands for good union jobs, living wages and an end to corporate greed to the doorstep of one of the most iconic brands as Waffle House continues to garner attention for failing to protect workers or pay living wages. Joined by workers across the service and care economy, as well as allies and supporters, Waffle House workers with the Union of Southern Service Workers will lead Saturday’s rally before taking their message to the doors to talk to voters about the important issues at stake in November’s election.
“North Carolina is currently rated as the worst state for workers, and it’s been that way for 3 years in a row,” LaShonda Barber, a trash truck driver at Charlotte Douglas International AIrport said Thursday to a chorus of boos from the crowd. “We are determined to change that. How do we do it? By electing people who support workers and unions and by organizing.”
With the summit, workers will launch into the final weeks of the 2024 election, where swing-state workers are set to ramp up their organizing and voter contact efforts to center workers’ demands in the national conversation and in the White House. It’s part of SEIU’s historic $200M investment – the union’s largest-ever commitment – to mobilize working people to vote for Kamala Harris and Tim Walz and fellow worker champions up and down the ballot.