Labor and BLM Demand: “Drop the Charges Against the Black Friday 14!”

Labor and BLM Demand: “Drop the Charges Against the Back Friday 14!”

by Jonathan Nack
November 17, 2015

OAKLAND – In an impressive show of solidarity, labor unions and Black Lives Matter activists staged a protest on Nov. 10th which targeted Alameda County District Attorney, Nancy O'Malley. They united in demanding that D.A. O'Malley, “drop the charges against the Black Friday 14!”

“The Black Friday 14” refers to activists who engaged in a civil disobedience action on November 28, 2014. The activists locked themselves together and shut down the West Oakland Bart Station. Their protest was part a wave of Black Lives Matter protests which swept the nation. The organization The Color of Change issued an open letter to D.A. O'Malley summarizing why all charges should be dropped. [ http://iam.colorofchange.org/petitions/drop-the-charges-against-the-blackfriday14 ]

Some two hundred energized protesters gathered at 1:30 PM outside D. A. O'Malley's offices, which are located in the Wiley W. Manuel Courthouse, 661 Washington Street, Oakland, CA. Speakers from unions, young leaders of the campaign to raise the Minimum Wage, and leaders from the Black Lives Matter movement, fired up the crowd. They declared that the struggles for economic justice and racial justice were two sides of the same struggle. The multiracial crowd responded with loud and spirited chanting. They repeatedly chanted optimistically, “I believe that we will win!” It was a largely youthful protest with a high energy atmosphere that was contagious.

Meanwhile, inside the courthouse, a delegation of top labor leaders occupied D.A. O'Malley's office to press the demand to drop the charges. Union leaders from UNITE HERE Local 2, UNITE HERE Local 2850, SEIU Local 1021 and SEIU USWW, AFSCME Local 3299, AFT Local 2121, UESF and UAW Local 2865 all took part in the sit-in inside DA O'Malley's office, reported the East Bay Express. [ http://www.eastbayexpress.com/SevenDays/archives/2015/11/10/black-lives-matter-and-labor-activists-protest-at-district-attorney-nancy-omalleys-office ] Despite disrupting the D.A.'s office for an hour, no arrests were made.

The coordinated action was a prelude to a larger rally that evening to raise Oakland's Minimum Wage to $15 dollars an hour. Well over a thousand workers, including fast food workers who had walked off the job, assembled at Oscar Grant Plaza, in front of Oakland's City Hall, for a rally that started at 4:30 PM. [ http://www.mercurynews.com/news/ci_29099962/oakland-more-than-thousand-fast-food-workers-and ]


For more info.: https://www.facebook.com/BlackFriday14-Supporters-853308031392081