Late last week the U.S. House of Representatives voted along party lines to cut $1.1 billion in previously allocated funding for public broadcasting. This rescission effort is part of a coordinated attack on journalists and media workers. Earlier this year Trump began blocking journalists — NewsGuild-CWA members — from attending White House events. His Federal Communications Commission chair has opened investigations into broadcasters including NPR and PBS. And he’s sued several news organizations, including suing the Wall Street Journal just this weekend.
It’s a shame and an embarrassment. The United States was founded on the principle that a free press powers democracy. Folks need to know what they’re voting for and journalists are the workers who tell them and then hold public officials to account.
Support for public media used to be bipartisan in America. What happened? NPR Media Correspondent David Folkenflik dove into the history and how it unraveled under Trump.
We need to look to our union family in the north for a model of what public broadcasting could one day look like. Thousands of Canadian Broadcasting Corporation journalists, technicians, camera operators and more cover more than 40 million people. Those journalists and media workers are also part of The NewsGuild-CWA and they work for Canadians as a public good. Canadians invest about $26.51 per person on public media, according to a 2022 report in NiemanLab. Prior to these cuts, Americans invested just $3.16 a person. A drop in the bucket that was just cut.
If you’re able, become a regular contributor to your local NPR or PBS station. I just re-upped my monthly contribution to my hometown station KUAF 91.3 FM in Fayetteville, Ark. I’m also a supporter of PBS SoCal and WAMU 88.5 FM in Washington, D.C.
A judge ordered police to stop shooting journalists with rubber bullets in Los Angeles. The Los Angeles Press Club filed a lawsuit last month alongside the ACLU of Southern California seeking a temporary restraining order to protect journalists. We joined a similar lawsuit against federal law enforcement agencies and support our members to make sure they can do their jobs safely.
The judge’s order bars the LAPD from using so-called “less-lethal” munitions such as chemical irritants and flash-bang grenades “against journalists who are not posing a threat of imminent harm to an officer or another person.”
It’s an important short-term victory as we push for injunctions and police reform to protect every American’s right to a free press under the First Amendment.
We’re holding a journalist safety workshop at 8 pm. ET on Monday, August 4. You can hear from other Guild journalists covering protests and how to protect yourself, learn more about your rights through collective bargaining and hear lessons about safety from Southern California journalists. Register here.
Last week our Pittsburgh strikers hit 1,000 days on strike. We’re still fighting to hold Pittsburgh Post-Gazette management to account. We were in court recently as the company faces contempt for failing to follow a rare injunction issued by the 3rd Circuit Court of Appeals. The same court is also on the verge of enforcing an order we won from the National Labor Relations Board. Soon we’ll head into court-ordered mediation to try and resolve these disputes.
A thousand days on strike.
“That’s a long time,” said Pittsburgh Guild Vice President Ed Blazina in a video posted on Instagram. He says people often ask: “How do you get through a 1,000 days on strike?”
“We get through through the kindness of strangers,” he said.
Keep standing with our family in Pittsburgh.
Our members in Buffalo, N.Y. had to postpone an event after a Buffalo News editorial cartoonist and his family were threatened. “Drawing Support for Local Journalism,” was planned more than a month ago to launch the Guild’s public “Protect Local Journalism” campaign at a museum exhibit highlighting the work of Pulitzer Prize-winning editorial cartoonist Adam Zyglis, before the exhibit’s closing.
Criticism of a recent cartoon turned into death threats against Zyglis.
“We wholly condemn the individuals who have chosen to twist a positive, public event into an attempt to terrorize and silence Zyglis, spread fear among journalists and their supporters, and distort the mission of a free press,” the Buffalo News Guild said in a statement.
Our members in Buffalo encourage everyone to speak out against hateful and illegal intimidation tactics and support the work of journalists. Buffalo’s campaign is at protectlocaljournalism.com
Journalists at the New York Daily news rallied Monday with supporters as they bargain for their first contract. We’ve been bargaining for three years for a first contract amid cuts, staff reductions and no raises in several years.
Vulture fund Alden Global Capital bought the Daily News in 2021 and has squeezed journalists and cut costs to extract cash for the secretive owners.
The News was bought by vulture fund Alden Global Capital in 2021 and since then the journalists have been squeezed as the fund looks to extract cash for the secretive owners.
“We want a piece of what we make,” said Evan Simko-Bednarski, a union steward and transit reporter, about the contract negotiations. “We’re not asking for the moon — we’re asking for enough to continue to do our jobs.”
The Chief covered the rally, which featured several New York City Council members, who plan to introduce a resolution next month expressing support for our union members and calling out Alden Global Capital.
The rally irked the bosses, who quickly put out an unsigned editorial riddled with errors. Our members—who seek truth and report it—corrected management’s errors.
Hearst announced plans to buy the Dallas Morning News. This came just a few months after the company gobbled up the Austin American-Statesman, firing copy editors and tossing out the hard-fought collective agreement with the journalists.
It’s part of a pattern of behavior where Hearst is more intent on attacking journalists than supporting them. It’s the same behavior of authoritarian governments and mirrors President Trump’s attacks on journalists.
Because the company is acquiring the whole company, our collective agreement at the Dallas Morning News will remain intact. In a statement, journalists said they were surprised to learn about the acquisition at the same time it went public.
“As a group of journalists, it’s not surprising that we have a lot of questions, for both The News’ and Hearst executives,” they wrote. “The experiences of our colleagues at other Hearst papers have left us with concerns that we look forward to discussing with Hearst leadership.”
Journalists in the Pacific Northwest are fighting for a first contract at two local newspapers. Carpenter Media group gobbled up the Everett Herald (Everett, Wash.) and The Bulletin (Bend, Ore.) and journalists are fighting hard for an agreement that respects their work and importance in the community. Who is Carpenter Media Group? What impact is the publisher having on newspapers in the Pacific Northwest? What can you do? Our members have outlined several quick things you can do, by signing a petition or sending an email to the top management.
Workers at Snopes just won voluntary recognition, after going public with their union campaign just a little over two weeks ago. Instead of delaying and pushing the workers at the fact-checking newsroom to an election, management rightly realized that support for a union was high. Helps that 80% of the workers signed a union authorization card!
“We welcome management’s decision to voluntarily recognize the Snopes Guild,” the Snopes Guild organizing committee said. “This is a great step toward creating a fairer workplace for all and we appreciate management’s willingness to engage with us. We look forward to meeting them at the bargaining table.” Congrats to our newest members!
Nonprofit staff at Ozone House Youth and Family Services have gone public with their union campaign in Southeast Michigan, joining the Newspaper Guild of Detroit, TNG-CWA Local 34022.
“We are the workers on the front lines of every eviction, mental health crisis, interfamily conflict and community intervention our organization engages with,” workers said in a statement. “It is time we have a voice in how Ozone House is run.”
With their public launch, Ozone House United joins a growing wave of nonprofit workers organizing to build more just, accountable institutions rooted in care for both staff and community.
We’ve lost more than 75% of America’s local journalists since 2002. That’s according to Rebuild Local News and Muck Rack, which just released a study based on Muck Rack’s data on journalists and media outlets across digital, broadcast, print, podcasts, newsletters and social media. The findings showed that counties across the U.S. of all sorts have severe journalist shortages. Fast-growing counties often have too few journalists to cover a growing population and many counties with large populations are severely undercovered. These numbers track with a long-standing campaign by our union to fight news deserts spreading across North America, often sped up by hedge funds and private equity destroying local newspapers.
Non-media members are coming together to form a caucus. The Guild represents about 26,000 workers and 80% are journalists or media workers. However, we represent about 4,400 workers at nonprofits and labor organizations. Are you one? The new caucus is meeting to talk about coordinated contract bargaining, mobilizing community and support groups and finding ways to support worker-friendly legislation. Guild members can join them at 8 p.m. ET Wednesday, July 23. Register here.
The NewsGuild’s Sector Conference is fast approaching! We’ll have a half-day of workshops on Friday, August 8 and our conference will commence at 9 a.m. ET Saturday, August 9 in Pittsburgh. Your local should already have elected delegates to attend this year’s conference, which happens just before the CWA Convention. Read more here.
Guild members are sharing strategies in the fight for pay equity. We’re hosting a new member organizer pod, where we bring together Guild activists to teach each other how to be better organizers. By building a member-led movement we can all help each other improve our lives and our workplaces. In September we’ll start a two-part series on Research for Organizing around Pay Equity. Come learn how to research pay equity and move our fight forward. Learn the tools available and real life case studies. The two-part series will run from 8-9:30 p.m. ET on both Sept. 9 and Sept. 16. Register here.
Have a great week!
Solidarity,
Jon Schleuss
President
The NewsGuild-CWA