Disunion

To the editor:

Frantz Fanon, the Afro-Caribbean psychiatrist prominent in Algeria’s independence struggle, said it all!

When the oppressed achieve victory, they turn around and do the same thing to their oppressors. However, in the case of Local 37’s Retiree Association, which has been put under administratorship for failing to file tax returns, all of the cast are oppressed.

Lee Saunders, the president of the American Federation of State, County and Municipal Employees, should know better. As an African-American man, he has undoubtedly confronted prejudice, discrimination and rejection. How he could now turn his back on his members’ legitimate efforts to make the ideals of the labor movement real, in part by fighting to retain traditional Medicare as opposed to the privatized Medicare (dis)advantage program formerly rejected by his union is unbelievable! 

Sure, the association was lax in not filing its tax forms, but all he had to do was to call them in and offer his assistance. The fact that Saunders is joined by Henry Garrido, the executive director of DC 37. as well as Gregory Floyd, president of Local 237 of the Teamsters, and Mayor Eric Adams is shocking. Poor and low income Black and brown people will lose the most when faced with limited networks and delayed and denied care. Our white colleagues will suffer too.

I am a 90- year- old person of color, a retired union member who has spent 73 years in the struggle for social justice for all and a supporter of the real union movement of yesteryear where members counted and were served. To all these Black men, I say when the roll is called up yonder, where will you be?

Evelyn Jones Rich