Doing Something: May Day Edition

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Yeah, I think Thursday’s May Day rally on the Statehouse lawn went a little better than Wednesday’s pro-Trump “honk and wave” in Barre. I’d say the attendance was about a hundred times better, anyway. My guesstimate is that the crowd hit four figures with some room to spare. (It was impossible to capture the entire crowd in a single photo because they were so spread out.) Pretty good for a weekday afternoon.

The rally wasn’t specifically targeted at the authoritarian Trump regime as has been the case for other recent protests. Since it was May Day, the focus was on organized labor. At first I was a bit disappointed, but as the event went on, it was kind of nice not to hear the same familiar litany of terrible things our government is doing under the orange usurper.

Also, the labor movement is accustomed to fighting through setbacks and playing the long game. I mean, one speaker brought up the Haymarket affair, which occurred 139 years ago. In the context of labor’s long struggle, a few years under Trump takes on a fresh bit of perspective.

There was also a piece of well-timed good news on offer.

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Doing Something: Point and Laugh Edition

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Today I stopped by a “honk and wave” event in downtown Barre, held by fans of Donald Trump to mark the 100th day of his second term. And there, pictured above, is the “crowd.” About a dozen people at most.

Pretty sad, right?

They didn’t exactly get the response they were hoping for. There was plenty of rush-hour traffic at Barre’s busiest intersection, but the vast majority of drivers ignored the gathering; Once in a while, someone honked their horn in a show of support.

This was one of 11 Vermont events organized, if that’s the right word for it, by Gregory Thayer, failed Republican candidate, critical race theory scold, and sponsor of the CovidCruiser bus trip to the January 6 insurrection. Perhaps he attracted more sign-wavers at other events around the state, but the Barre event was a bust.

One more thing, which ought to embarrass any American who loves their country.

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Do We Really Want to Be in Bed with CoreCivic?

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The Democratic Legislature is looking at ways to limit, or end, an agreement allowing Immigration and Customs Enforcement (and other federal agencies) to house detainees at Vermont prisons. There’s a real itch for action because, well, Donald Trump’s enforcement regime is so thoroughly toxic, from the masks and the unmarked cars to the rank unconstitutionality of it all.

No argument there. But if you object to our complicity in Trump’s crackdown, what about our ongoing relationship with CoreCivic, the for-profit prison operator that’s making a fortune off Trump’s regime*? If we don’t want to be part of an arbitrary and punitive immigration enforcement system, well, isn’t CoreCivic an enthusiastic participant? Haven’t the company’s fortunes shot through the roof because of Trump?

*CoreCivic’s stock price basically doubled right after Trump’s election and has held its value since then. In spite of the Trump-triggered stock market swoon.

For those just tuning in, Vermont contracts with CoreCivic to house some of our inmates in a private prison in Mississippi. We’ve been doing this for years, with one for-profit operator or another. We’ve been told that we just don’t have enough space in our own prisons.

That may have been true in the past, but now? The numbers simply don’t add up.

So let’s end the contract, stop sending our inmates 1,400 miles from everything and everyone they know, and stop enriching an evil corporation.

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VSEA Alleges “Authoritarian Environment” in the Economic Services Division

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The Vermont State Employees Association isn’t exactly the International Workers of the World. It generally tries to avoid rocking the boat, and comes in for a fair bit of criticism from more progressive elements of the labor movement in Vermont.

Which made it all the more remarkable when two top VSEA officials went before the House Human Services Committee last Thursday to deliver harsh accusations against the Department of Children and Families’ Economic Services Division in general and its top official, Deputy Commissioner Miranda Gray, in particular. Gray, they said, has created “an authoritarian, top-down environment in which fear is used as a weapon,” leaving employees “demoralized and fearful.”

VSEA President Aimee Bertrand (pictured above), a longtime ESD employee, told her own tale of harassment, retaliation, and punitive actions that led her and the union to file an unfair labor practice charge with the Vermont Labor Relations Board. That filing, she said, led to further retaliatory actions. All of which would appear to violate terms of the union’s contract and/or state law.

It was a stunning event. I’ve been in and around the Statehouse for over a decade, and rarely have I seen such dramatic testimony. I don’t think I’ve ever seen such serious accusations made by VSEA against a unit of state government.

You may not have noticed any of this, because the media coverage was pitifully inadequate.

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Doing Something.

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Today we sent a donation to PFLAG. As with the Pride Center of Vermont, I’m sure they are far busier than they were before January 20 and are in need of the help. And we have personal connections to the LGBTQ+ community, so these issues are especially important to us.

I’m trying to vary my actions, and not concentrate too much on donations. But sometimes things just line up in certain ways.

News You Should View: Mostly About Trump Again, Sorry

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Well, I thought I had a nice varied collection of stories for this week’s Vermont media roundup. But heck, five of the eight nominees have something to do with how the excesses of Donald Trump are reverberating here in our B.L.S.

Apologies, but that’s the world we’re living in and my starship is on the fritz.

A stark warning about Trump from someone who’s been right more than most. Journalist David Goodman hosts “Vermont Conversation,” a blandly-named weekly show on Radio Vermont/WDEV available afterward as a podcast under the auspices of VTDigger. This week’s guest was author and Dartmouth prof Jeff Sharlet, who has spent years chronicling the dark corners of the far right. He has foreseen the persistence of the Trump phenomenon, its return to power, and its authoritarian intent. He told Goodman that he and his colleagues have “all been surprised by the speed with which it’s happening,” and said that the opposition has a lot of work to do.

Sharlet said he’s seen “a lot more people tuning out than in the first Trump administration. And I want to say to people, you don’t have that privilege.”

Echoes of fascism in a small rural library. In the latest installment of her podcast “Rumble Strip,” Erica Heilman takes us to the Haskell Free Library in Derby Line, VT and Stanstead, QC for an audio accounting of authoritarianism’s jackbooted footprint. The feds’ crackdown on the security-imperiling cross-border traffic at the library, announced after a deliberately provocative visit from dog-killer and Trump functionary Kristi Noem has left both communities shaken. For no reason whatsoever except that our federal government feels compelled to act like a bully.

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Doing Something.

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Today I wrote an email to Vermont Attorney General Charity Clark urging her to take all possible steps against illegal detentions by ICE and the Border Patrol. Indivisible Blue State Defiance has set up a simple way to send an email to your attorney general. (It also put me on BSD’s mailing list, I’m sure.) The process begins with a form email, but you can customize it to your liking before it’s sent. I did a pretty thorough rework of the opening paragraph to make it more pertinent to Vermont.