A-Infos (en) US, BRRN: ATX Solidarity Network is Fighting Wage Theft, La Migra, and Apathy (ca, de, fr, it, pt, tr)[machine translation]

AK, a founding member of ATX Solidarity Network, discusses their 
experience organizing immigrant workers to confront wage theft and other 
issues in right-to-work Texas. ---- Increased ICE enforcement has raised 
fears about fighting back, turning many to seek services in a field 
dominated by nonprofits. In this interview we explore the tensions 
organizing for direct action amid these conditions.
Black Rose/Rosa Negra (BRRN): We understand that you all in Austin, 
Texas have begun to build a solidarity network. What is that? How is it 
structured?
AK: A solidarity network is basically made up of workers and tenants 
from all over the city (or, in some cases, parts of a city) who have or 
may have issues with their bosses and landlords. Instead of organizing 
with our immediate coworkers or neighbors, we are individuals from 
different workplaces and living in different areas of town who fight for 
each other where we are at. Solidarity networks are meant to fill the 
void where workplace unions and tenant unions don't exist. Since Texas 
is a "right to work" state, capital strategically undermines workers 
from building fighting organizations like unions. Solidarity networks 
are flexible enough to meet one or a few workers at one workplace or 
tenants at a complex, and temporarily bypass the immediate need for 
longstanding organizations.

When you meet someone with a workplace or tenant issue, the whole 
solidarity network takes on the demands of the case, with those with the 
grievance-the issue(s) they want to fight around that directly affects 
them-being core organizers of their own campaign. We use direct action 
tactics, which means we don't go through the courts or ask the cops or 
nonprofits to take care of the situation for us; we rely on just us to 
get the demand met by putting pressure on the boss or landlord until it 
becomes so unbearable they have no choice but to give in.

Like most solidarity networks there is a small group of core organizers 
who respond to the day- to-day needs of the organization. The people 
with the demands must be a part of this group. Then, there is a larger 
membership which is involved in many of the functions of the 
organization, but not all of its functions. They may pass out flyers 
with us, make phone calls, or research campaign targets, for example. 
Then there is a much larger network of people who will come out to 
actions when called on.

BRRN: Walk us through how you started it. Why this kind of organization, 
and what kinds of fights do you take on?
AK: Our specific solidarity network wanted to take on wage theft 
campaigns as our main, but not exclusive, area of struggle. We began 
working with another organization here that works in immigrant 
communities around stopping deportations. They were getting a lot of 
calls about wage theft, and helped us start the solidarity network to 
meet this need. Most of our initial calls came directly from them, and 
our first campaign came out of one of these calls. We also understand 
that the immigrant community, especially here in Texas, is very 
vulnerable to wage theft, and they often feel they do not have a lot of 
options for getting back stolen wages. We want to change that! 
Eventually, we want to create a citywide network of people who can 
respond to wage theft grievances, and other workplace and housing 
issues. We want to make bosses and landlords scared to even think about 
messing with us!

In ATX, we have a small and unorganized left with a larger activist 
scene. A solidarity network is one form of organization that can work 
well under these conditions because you really only need a handful of 
core organizers and access to lots of people to show up to actions. We 
also see this form of organization being one in which committed leftists 
can develop relationships with other members of the working class. We 
see a lot of the left in ATX being very insular and removed from other 
everyday people. We feel it is important to be organizing in 
working-class communities since it is us as a class that are capable of 
transforming society.

We also want to help normalize direct action tactics to push our 
collective ability to struggle even further. Ultimately, we would like 
to see more working-class organizations in our neighborhoods, 
workplaces, schools, and more. The solidarity network isn't meant to be 
the form of organization for widespread worker rebellion, but it is one 
form of organization that can respond to specific conditions that exist 
in this moment to help take us to the next.

BRRN: You mentioned you worked on recovering stolen wages with a worker 
who is an immigrant. Tell us about it. How are you building this campaign?
AK: Our current case is with a married couple. The husband is owed over 
$4,000 in stolen wages. He was working with a contractor remodeling 
apartments and houses before the owner of the remodeling company decided 
to not pay him for weeks worth of work and stopped answering his calls. 
We are demanding the contractor pay all of the wages due.

We started with delivering a demand letter to the company to pay back 
the due wages by a certain date or else they would face further action. 
We went with a large group of people to the boss's house to show that we 
are a force to be reckoned with. From there, we waited for the date to 
come and go. Since the company didn't pay back the wages, we started to 
escalate. We  did a phone blast where tons of people called the boss and 
company phone to demand repayment of wages. This both put pressure on 
the contractor, but also tied up the company phone interrupting business 
calls. We also showed up at the boss's house to talk to his neighbors 
and flyer his neighborhood about his poor treatment of this worker.

We were going to escalate again by going to his church with a flyer to 
pass out to the congregation with a picture of his face and exposing all 
of his sins. But the worker and his wife recently decided to work with a 
nonprofit organization Proyecto Defensa Laboral (PDL) who is providing 
legal assistance. They had been waiting a year to hear back from PDL, 
and when they did, they decided to try the legal route for now.

BRRN: So it sounds like even though the campaign started by using direct 
action tactics, that shifted. Why do you think that is?
AK: These organizers see the legal route as more of a sure thing: if 
they can win in court, this will be an official mandate by a judge that 
their wages are owed. Fighting through direct action tactics isn't seen 
as solid of an outcome. Maybe the boss gets tired of dealing with us and 
being embarrassed in front of their neighborhood and church, but maybe 
they dig their heels in and never give in. $4,000 is a lot of money, and 
if they think the court is a more sure victory they may feel like doing 
whatever ends in the result of them getting their money owed is the best 
way to go. Ultimately, they may win. But even winning does not guarantee 
they will get paid.

Initially, we would get more calls about wage theft especially. In fact, 
we heard of other people who worked with the same contractor also having 
their wages stolen, but we weren't able to get any of them to work with 
us. Now with ICE being so present in our city the calls have really 
slowed to a halt. People are really scared to make noise or draw 
attention. While we haven't seen this happen in our current campaign, we 
wouldn't put it past bosses and landlords to use the threat of ICE to 
prevent people from trying to win demands. In ATX, there are daily 
kidnappings, so the threat is very real here. We totally understand how 
scary it is at the moment for folks to speak up when ICE is terrorizing 
our communities and kidnapping our people. So it is understandable that 
direct action tactics seem more risky than they are worth for some people.

BRRN: What lessons do you hope to leave with other organizers launching 
similar kinds of efforts?
Our biggest issue is trying to adapt to ICE becoming a major persistent 
threat in immigrant communities, making direct action more risky for 
folks. We haven't cracked the code on this yet, but would love to hear 
from other organizations doing similar work who may have had success 
with this. It was always a risk for undocumented workers to stand up 
against corrupt bosses, but now it is a matter of life or death. We know 
that there are daily kidnappings, and we have seen that ICE is 
responsible for straight up murdering people. It is hard to ask people 
to fight back anyway.

Another major lesson for us now is dealing with a lot of turnover from 
our core organizers. Over the year, we have had upticks in participation 
before a lot of folks stop participating. We know from past experiences 
that oftentimes people who participate in campaigns don't always stick 
around, which can also make it challenging to find core organizers. This 
happens in most or all organizations from time to time, but we are 
having to decide how to move forward now that we have so few core 
organizers.

All that said, we think about winning in a different way. Of course, 
winning the stolen wages or similar demands is the immediate goal. For 
us the larger vision is to build our capacity to fight against bosses 
and landlords. We see the fight itself as a victory. We also see that we 
have built relationships with the family and other local immigrant 
organizations. We have shown another way of getting what we deserve is 
possible through popular power. But how do you balance that with 
material needs? We have thought about what we do if we don't win. Maybe 
we could have a fundraiser to spread awareness about the solidarity 
network while also getting funds to the organizers. But it does raise 
questions around what we consider a win, and how to sell the vision that 
we need to fight ourselves, especially when nonprofits like PDL exist in 
abundance in places like Austin.

https://www.blackrosefed.org/atx-solnet-fight/
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