University Of California Workers Could Launch Strike To Reject Repression Of Student Protests

From May 13 to May 15, members of the United Auto Workers (UAW) Local 4811 will be holding a strike authorization vote for a potential strike in response to the University of California’s crackdown on peaceful pro-Palestine student protesters.

On May 3, the union local filed Unfair Labor Practice (ULP) charges against the University of California (UC) system, in response to various UC campuses sending police officers to brutalize student protesters staging Gaza Solidarity encampments.

Last week, the administration at the University of California, Los Angeles (UCLA) sent in the Los Angeles Police Department (LAPD) to clear out the Gaza Solidarity encampment staged by student protesters peacefully demanding that their university divest from Israel. The encampment had been under several rounds of attack from violent Zionist counter-protesters, who released bags of mice and cockroaches near the encampment and deployed fireworks and pepper spray against students. University officials did not respond to these attacks; instead, in the pre-dawn hours of Thursday morning, LAPD armed with riot gear swept into the camp, deploying rubber bullets and flashbang grenades against the pro-Palestine student protesters.

UCLA student organizers reported that at least five people were shot in the head with rubber bullets, landing students in the hospital with serious injuries. Over 130 arrests were made and LAPD demolished the encampment.

Similar repression also occurred by police against students at the University of California San Diego encampment on Monday, May 13, with hundreds of police officers invading the camp in riot gear and arresting 64 protesters.

By Global News Service

From the Peoples Dispatch / Globetrotter News Service

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