Featured photo by Ethan Schmidt
Story by Ethan Schmidt
AT&T Southeast employees represented by the Communication Workers of America labor union established picket lines in multiple spots around Murfreesboro Monday.
The demonstrations are part of a larger effort involving the CWA’s 17,000 AT&T Southeast employees, who went on strike in nine states last Friday after the union filed an Unfair Labor Practice charge to the National Labor Relations Board. The CWA accused AT&T in a Friday press release of “not bargaining in good faith, engaging in surface bargaining, and not sending representatives to the bargaining table with the authority to make decisions.”
Murfreesboro affiliates of CWA Local 3808, representing AT&T workers in Middle Tennessee, formed picket lines outside the dispatch centers where they work. Striking workers formed picket lines at three intersections in Murfreesboro off exit 81, including Church Street, Middle Tennessee Boulevard and Cannon Avenue.
Candidates for the Tennessee House of Representatives saw an opportunity to show their support for labor unions. Luis Mata, the Democratic candidate for House District 49, joined the Church Street picket line on Monday, announcing his attendance on Instagram. On Monday and Tuesday, Democratic House District 37 candidate Cheri Brown visited the Church Street picket line to show her support.
Brown said Tuesday that she heard about the strike from a Michigan-based United Auto Workers organizer and Amelia Park, a Democrat running for the Tennessee House of Representatives in District 34.
“We’re here because we support unions. I mean, Tennessee is a … you know, they call it a ‘right-to-work’ state. Well, it’s not a right to work. That’s such a deceiving title, right?” said Brown.
Right-to-work legislation can be enacted by individual state legislatures, and, according to an April 2015 report from the Economic Policy Institute, “entitles employees to the benefits of a union contract—including the right to have the union take up their grievance if their employer abuses them—without paying any of the cost. This means that if an employer mistreats a worker who does not pay a union representation fee, the union must prosecute that worker’s grievance just as it would a dues-paying member’s, even if it costs tens of thousands of dollars.”
According to a June 2022 working paper from the National Bureau for Economic Research, “RTW laws lower wages and unionization rates.” Despite Tennessee’s enshrinement of a right-to-work law in its constitution in 2022, the CWA Local 3808 maintains a dedicated membership.
“We have a very strong membership, and those people will remain out on strike,” local president Josh Foster said at the Church Street demonstration Tuesday.
The president said that the local represents roughly 800 AT&T workers—about 91% of all AT&T employees in the Middle Tennessee area, including the cities of Murfreesboro, Nashville, Franklin, Clarksville, Dixon and Lebanon. So far, none of the unionized members have crossed the picket line, but the president said that some of the 9% of non-unionized AT&T workers in the Middle Tennessee region have.
“But, you know, our numbers far and away outweigh theirs,” said Foster. “And the type of work that we do, you know, to keep everybody up and running with internet, phone, business lines … all those things, you know, it’s very intricate, very tedious work. It’s very specialized work. So, the company won’t be able to maintain that without us.”
The duration of the strike is currently unknown.
“We’ll end the ULP strike whenever AT&T stops the unfair labor practice and sends people to the bargaining table on their side that are authorized to make changes,” said Foster.
Ethan Schmidt is a reporter for MTSU Sidelines.
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