NEWS ROUNDUP

Furloughs | Millionaire tax | Delete the app

Tuesday, February 3, 2026

 

STRIKES

► From FOX 11 LA — Kaiser Permanente strike enters 2nd week as more workers join picket lines — As of Monday, February 2, picket lines remain active at dozens of facilities, with no immediate resolution in sight as both sides remain deadlocked over staffing levels and wage increases…As of Monday, February 2, picket lines remain active at dozens of facilities, with no immediate resolution in sight as both sides remain deadlocked over staffing levels and wage increases…As of Monday, February 2, picket lines remain active at dozens of facilities, with no immediate resolution in sight as both sides remain deadlocked over staffing levels and wage increases.

► From Starbucks Workers United:

 

LOCAL

► From Willamette Week — She Took Her 13-Year-Old Daughter to a Labor March. ICE Tear-Gassed Them Both. — Teressa Barsotti’s daughter wanted to see her middle school teacher dressed as an inflatable animal. Instead, she tasted tear gas. “I went Saturday because I come from a union family. My dad and my brother are both in the Plumbers and Steamfitters Local 290. So I’m a union kid. I was really excited about worker solidarity with immigrants…My lungs burned. That didn’t last too long. I stopped to flush my daughter’s eyes with our water bottle because they were streaming, like running and burning. It wasn’t until we met up with my dad about a block later that I felt relief. And then he and I both felt so much anger. “Those fucking assholes,” is what we both said to each other. Because as far as we could tell, it was completely unprovoked.”

► From the OPB — Oregon leaders remain concerned for Gresham family detained in Texas — The family had arrived at Portland Adventist Health seeking treatment for Diana’s nosebleed that wouldn’t stop. The family is now at the South Texas Family Residential Center in Dilley, Texas. The facility — the same one where 5-year-old Liam Ramos of Minnesota was held with his father last month — has come under scrutiny for its inadequate food, water and medical care…On Sunday, the Department of Homeland Security reported two detainees at the center had contracted measles, prompting the facility to “halt all movement within the facility.”

► From the Spokesman Review — Spokane police chief apologizes for officers wearing masks at protest — Spokane police Chief Kevin Hall on Monday acknowledged that it was a “mistake” for two plainclothes officers who attended a protest last week to wear masks, a violation of city policy. “I just want to remind everybody, and I know this council knows this, is that we’re all human beings,” Hall said at a city council committee meeting. “The officers are human beings. Mistakes will be made. We will address those mistakes when they’re made.” The officers joined more than 1,000 health care workers and protesters who marched from Riverfront Park to the Spokane County Courthouse to honor 37-year-old Alex Pretti, an intensive care nurse who was shot and killed by federal agents in Minneapolis on Jan. 26.

► From the Guardian — DHS’s account of two Venezuelans shot by border patrol falls apart in court: ‘A smear campaign’ — Immediately after a US border patrol agent shot two people in Oregon last month, the Department of Homeland Security (DHS) said the targets were “vicious” gang members connected to a prior shooting and alleged they had “attempted to run over” officers with their vehicle. In the weeks since, key parts of the federal government’s narrative have fallen apart…court records obtained by the Guardian reveal a Department of Justice prosecutor later directly contradicted DHS’ Tren de Aragua statements in court, telling a judge, “We’re not suggesting … [Niño-Moncada] is a gang member.” An FBI affidavit issued following the incident also suggests that in the previous shooting cited by DHS, Zambrano-Contreras was not a suspect, but rather a reported victim of a sexual assault and robbery. Neither Niño-Moncada or Zambrano-Contreras have prior criminal convictions, their lawyers have said.

 

CONTRACT FIGHTS

► From Game Developer — QA workers at Blizzard ratify union contract with Microsoft — A majority of quality assurance workers at Blizzard studios in Albany and Austin have ratified a union contract at Microsoft after just under three years of negotiations. In a statement to press, the Communications Workers of America (CWA) said employees in Albany and Austin—represented by CWA Locals 1118 and 6215, respectively—”overwhelming voted” to ratify a contract that guarantees wage increases, enhanced regulations around the usage of generative AI in the workplace, and crediting protections.

► From Front Office Sports — WNBA Offered No Proposal at Critical CBA Meeting — Monday’s pivotal meeting between WNBA players and owners at league offices in New York City lasted roughly three hours before attendees slowly started trickling out. It was the first time players met in person with the league and members of ownership since the fall and roughly six weeks since the union’s last proposal was sent. The WNBA did not counter the players’ proposal at Monday’s meeting. Instead, it was communicated to the union on Monday that the league would begin working on an official response to their proposal.

 

NATIONAL

► From In These Times — Poll Shows Massive Participation in Minnesota Shutdown Against ICE — Roughly one in four Minnesota voters either participated in the January 23 day of shutdown and protest against ICE, or have a loved one who did, according to new polling data.  Of those participants, 38% percent stayed off the job, either because they did not go to work, or because their employer closed for the day of action. The data does not distinguish between those who made the choice to stay out, and those who saw their workplaces close. (Some workplaces were shuttered that day due to worker pressure.)

► From NPR — Kilmar Abrego Garcia becomes symbol of mistaken deportations — Immigration lawyers said Abrego Garcia’s landmark case highlights the challenges with the speed and scale of the Trump administration’s goal of mass deportations. “We really thought this was going to be one of a kind,” said Simon Sandoval-Moshenberg, one of Abrego Garcia’s lawyers. “If anything, it was just the tip of the spear. There have been countless illegal deportation cases since then. If anything, the problem is getting worse and not better.”…”Wrongful deportations have taken place under all different administrations, so this is not novel,” echoed Trina Realmuto, executive director of the National Immigration Litigation Alliance, which is a nonprofit that provides legal assistance to organizations and immigrants. But she said she has noticed an uptick in these cases coming to her organization over the past year.

► From Reuters — Minneapolis hospitality workers wary of ICE’s promises to pull back, union says — Hundreds of unionized workers in Minneapolis, including those at hotels, restaurants and an airport, are still staying out of sight as they wait to see if U.S. immigration enforcement tactics change in coming weeks, a union official said. Federal agents have said they would take a less confrontational approach, and would focus on immigrants with criminal charges or convictions, amid widespread criticism of the Trump White House’s aggressive immigration enforcement efforts.

► From the AP — ICE claim that a man shattered his skull running into wall triggers tension at a Minnesota hospital — AP shared the details of Castañeda Mondragón’s injuries with Dr. Lindsey C. Thomas, a board-certified forensic pathologist who worked as a medical examiner in Minnesota for more than 30 years. She agreed with the assessment of hospital staff. “I am pretty sure a person could not get these kinds of extensive injuries from running into a wall,” Thomas said, adding that she would need to see the CT scans to make a more definitive finding. “I almost think one doesn’t have to be a physician to conclude that a person can’t get skull fractures on both the right and left sides of their head and from front to back by running themselves into a wall,” she said.

► From the Seattle Times — The wealthy ramp up spending while other Americans tread water, new study finds — The data, released by the Federal Reserve Bank of New York, also show that in the final three months of last year, lower-income and rural households faced higher inflation than higher-income households. The spending data focuses only on goods excluding autos, and does not capture likely spending by higher-income households on travel, restaurants and entertainment. The figures add support to the notion of a “K-shaped” economy, in which upper-income Americans are fueling a disproportionate share of the consumption that is the primary driver of the economy, while lower-income households see fewer gains.

► From Wired — How Data Brokers Can Fuel Violence Against Public Servants — Sherman analyzed 19 different consumer privacy laws and found that while they all give consumers the right to stop data brokers from selling personal information obtained from private sources, none give “public servants the right to legally compel state agencies to redact their personal data from public records,” and none prevent data brokers from selling data, including people’s home addresses, when they are obtained through public sources such as property records or court filings. Further, none include what is called a “private right of action,” which would allow individuals to sue over violations of their respective state’s privacy law.

► From the AFL-CIO:

 

POLITICS & POLICY

► From the New York Times — Some Federal Workers Furloughed in Partial Government Shutdown — At the Transportation Department, about a fifth of its more than 53,000 workers were set to be furloughed, according to its detailed plan published on Friday. The vast majority of the furloughed workers are from the Federal Aviation Administration, where about a quarter of employees were to be affected by the lapse. While the department made exceptions and will pay workers in air traffic control hiring, training and safety oversight, air traffic controllers are being required to work without pay. Employees at the Labor Department will feel an even stronger impact, with furloughs planned for almost three quarters of the staff.

► From the New York Times — Trump, in an Escalation, Calls for Republicans to ‘Nationalize’ Elections — Under the Constitution, American elections are governed primarily by state law, leading to a decentralized process in which voting is administered by county and municipal officials in thousands of precincts across the country…Mr. Trump’s escalated remarks about elections come at a moment when Democrats have outperformed the G.O.P. in a series of contests. New Jersey and Virginia elected Democratic governors in landslides in November, and on Saturday, a Democrat won a special election for a Texas State Senate seat by 14 percentage points in a district Mr. Trump had carried by 17 points in 2024, an enormous swing.

► From the AP — Yet another judge rejects Trump effort to block offshore wind, saying NY project can resume — Though all five projects have been cleared to resume, the construction pause has cost developers millions of dollars and, along with Trump’s sustained attacks on renewable energies of all kinds, injected uncertainty and additional risk into future projects. Such delays also mean additional costs for ratepayers, said Hillary Bright, executive director of offshore wind advocacy group Turn Forward.

► From the AP — What recent polls show about the challenges facing Trump this year — President Donald Trump might be bragging about his administration’s work on affordability, but recent polling suggests that Americans aren’t buying it as they grow increasingly frustrated with his leadership. Many Americans say Trump is focusing on the wrong priorities, according to multiple surveys, including a January AP-NORC poll, and they largely think Trump is neglecting the issue of costs at home. Compounding his problems, there are signs that frustration is rising over his approach to immigration, and some of his recent fixations, like taking over Greenland, are downright unpopular.

► From the Seattle Times — Democrats unveil WA income tax on people earning over $1 million — The bill, to be formally introduced this week in the state House and Senate, would impose a 9.9% tax on people earning more than $1 million a year, according to a draft of the final legislation and a summary circulated over the weekend and obtained by The Seattle Times…“We have an opportunity to improve our tax code by making it fall less heavily on both low-income people and on businesses that create jobs. This is an opportunity to do both of those things,” said Rep. Joe Fitzgibbon, D-West Seattle, the House Majority Leader, in an interview Monday.

► From the Tacoma News Tribune — OPINION: Washington can stop unfair surveillance pricing at grocery stores — Technology should make life easier, not more expensive. A bill under consideration in Washington state would ban surveillance pricing in large grocery stores, making it illegal to charge different people different prices based on personal or inferred data the companies have. It would also prohibit surge pricing on groceries, meaning no price hikes just because it’s busy or demand is high, and set guardrails on electronic pricing systems, preventing real-time, data-driven price manipulation.

► From the union-busting Columbian — Vancouver residents join voices decrying ICE during Latino Legislative Day at Capitol — Mora-Cheung is the director of organizing for La Resistencia, a grassroots group dedicated to shutting down the Northwest ICE Processing Center in Tacoma…“The horrors that we’re witnessing on a national level out in the street are just a pinnacle of what has been happening behind closed doors for decades,” Mora-Cheung said. She went on to detail a profit-driven model where the estimated 65,000 people detained nationally are treated as commodities worth roughly $200 a day. This structure, she argued, incentivizes cost-cutting measures that result in inedible food, medical neglect and a system designed to thrive on isolation.

► From the New York Times — After His Democratic Victory in Texas, a New Working-Class Star Rises — Mr. Rehmet, 33, started to think about politics — and to drift to the Democratic Party — only after he landed a job at a factory in his 20s and began reaping union benefits and workplace protections. He came to believe that more Americans should have the same. “If we had this, the middle class would be stronger,” Mr. Rehmet said in an interview last month in an empty union hall in Fort Worth, across from the Lockheed Martin fighter jet plant where he works as a machinist.

► From IAM:

 

INTERNATIONAL

► From Jacobin — Spain Shows Another Immigration Policy Is Possible — The extraordinary regularization measure is an effective admission of the cruelty of Spanish immigration legislation. As in other European countries, the status quo condemns thousands of workers to irregular status for years, without access to basic rights and with the constant fear of being detained and deported. This could be called an efficient system, if the goal was indeed to maintain a precarious, cut-rate workforce to fuel the lowest-wage sectors of the labor market. In Spain, almost 30 percent of hospitality staff and 20 percent of construction workers are migrants, many in irregular situations, and most foreign workers with university degrees work in jobs below their qualifications.

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