Jennifer Owens, jennifer.owens@thefightfor15.org, 312-218-8785
#MeToo, McDonald's
Fight For $15, TIME’S UP Legal Defense Fund Confront Sexual Harassment at McDonald’s
The Fight for $15, with support from the TIME'S UP Legal Defense Fund, announced Tuesday an effort to challenge widespread sexual harassment faced by McDonald's workers on the job across the country--including groping, propositions for sex and lewd comments by supervisors-- that is all too often ignored by management.
Press Conference Details:
WHEN: Tuesday, May 22, 2018 at 11am CT
WHERE: McDonald's Headquarters
WHO: Adriana Alvarez, Chicago McDonald's worker (MC)
Sharyn Tejani, Executive Director of TIME's Up Legal Defense Fund
Meredith Johnson, attorney at Altshuler Berzon
Amy Biegelsen, attorney at Outten Golden
Tanya Harrel, New Orleans McDonald's worker
Breauna Morrow, St. Louis McDonald's worker
Kimberley Lawson, Kansas City McDonald's worker
In the last several days, cooks and cashiers have filed 10 charges with the Equal Employment Opportunity Commission, alleging an array of illegal conduct in McDonald's restaurants across nine cities, workers said Tuesday. The TIME'S UP Legal Defense Fund provided financial support to investigate and file the charges, which will be officially announced Tuesday morning at a press conference outside McDonald's new downtown Chicago headquarters days ahead of the company's annual shareholder meeting. The workers who filed sexual harassment charges allege:
- Supervisors did nothing when a 15-year-old cashier in St. Louis complained of a co-worker who repeatedly harassed her using graphic, sexual language;
- Managers mocked a New Orleans woman who complained about a coworker groping her, telling her she was probably giving the worker "sex appeal" and that she should take it to the "next level" with him. When a second co-worker attempted to sexually assault her in the restaurant's bathroom, she did not report it because her first complaint was not taken seriously;
- Managers told a Durham worker they wanted to have sex with her, including one who suggested a threesome with her and a coworker and another who asked to have sex in his car. They made fun of her when she complained about a coworker who regularly propositioned her for sex; and
- A manager asked a Chicago worker if she wanted to see his penis and asked "how many dicks" she could take. He narrated lurid fantasies about what he would do if he got the worker or another crew member in the bathroom alone. She hesitated to complain because the general manager encouraged workers to flirt with customers, but when she did report the harassment, she was fired.
"McDonald's advertises all over television saying it's 'America's best first job,' but my experience has been a nightmare," said Breauna Morrow, the 15-year old who works at a St. Louis McDonald's. "I know I'm not the only one and that's why I'm speaking out, so others don't have to face the harassment I've gone through."
The charges were filed by workers in Chicago, Detroit, Durham, Kansas City (Missouri), Los Angeles, Miami, New Orleans, Orlando and St. Louis. They reveal instances when workers alerted management after experiencing sexual harassment on the job, yet their complaints were brushed off, went unaddressed, or, in some cases, they were mocked or met with retaliation, including termination.
"McDonald's has zero tolerance for any form of sexual harassment of any employee," the company's Operations and Training Manual reads. "Sexual harassment is prohibited because it may be intimidating, an abuse of power, and is inconsistent with McDonald's policies, practices and management philosophy."
The workers are demanding McDonald's effectively implement and enforce the zero-tolerance policy against sexual harassment outlined in its manual and in its franchisees' policies. They're also calling on the company to hold mandatory trainings for managers and employees and to create a safe and effective system for receiving and responding to complaints.
"The workers filing charges today want McDonald's to take sexual harassment seriously," said Eve Cervantez, an attorney with Altshuler Berzon who is working on the cases with financial support from the TIME'S UP Legal Defense Fund. "McDonald's is one of the largest restaurant chains on earth and should use its power and influence to guarantee a safe workplace."
The TIME'S UP Legal Defense Fund--housed and administered by the National Women's Law Center Fund LLC--connects those who experience workplace sexual harassment with legal and communications assistance and provides funding for legal representation in select cases, including the charges filed today.
"By funding the legal representation in these cases, we hope to help ensure that these charges will be a catalyst for significant change," said Sharyn Tejani, Director of the TIME'S UP Legal Defense Fund. "Few women working in low-wage jobs have the means or the financial security to challenge sexual harassment. As shown by these charges and thousands of intakes we have received at the Fund from women in every industry, those who report their abuse are often fired, demoted, or mocked--and since nothing is done to stop the harassment, nothing changes. McDonald's is perfectly positioned--if it chooses--to take the lead in an industry that's rampant with abuse."
In addition to the sexual harassment charges, the Durham worker alleged in her charge that she was discriminated against because she is Black. The worker said her shift manager is rude to Black workers and refers to them as "ghetto." When she reported a customer called her "burnt" and made a comment referring to lynching, the supervisor laughed, according to the charge.
Also Tuesday, a former Detroit McDonald's worker who was regularly sexually harassed by her shift manager said she was consulting with an attorney and was likely to file a suit.
The supervisor repeatedly asked her out, commented on her appearance and demanded she talk with him, she said at the press conference. On at least one occasion, he threatened to hit her with a frying pan for rebuffing his advances. He also drove to and parked in front of her house on one occasion. When she reported the behavior to the restaurant's manager, she was told she was "blowing it out of proportion." The harassment ended only when she quit.
"Even with this network of attorneys working together to give voice to women's stories, we expect that employees still face barriers to speaking out," said Amy Biegelsen, an attorney with Outten & Golden LLP who is also working on the cases with financial support from the TIME'S UP Legal Defense Fund. "Some employees may feel that they have to choose between standing up for their rights and bringing home a paycheck. Any undocumented workers may fear deportation if they speak out. Other employees might be afraid that they will not be believed, or will be ridiculed. All workers are entitled to their dignity as people, and to their rights under the law."
The charges announced Tuesday come two years after McDonald's workers in the Fight for $15 filed a series of sexual harassment charges against the company and show that despite the spotlight on the issue in Hollywood and the media, little has changed for the burger giant's frontline workers. Attorneys for the workers said they planned to ask the EEOC to consolidate or coordinate for investigation the newly filed charges, as well as some of the previously filed charges.
"The #MeToo movement may have changed things for actresses in Hollywood, but these new charges show that sexual harassment is still on the menu at McDonald's," said Adriana Alvarez, a McDonald's worker from Chicago and member of the Fight for 15 National Organizing Committee. "With support from the TIME'S UP Legal Defense Fund, workers in the Fight for $15 now have a powerful ally in our ongoing effort to make McDonald's restaurants safe places for all workers."
To help McDonald's and other fast-food workers who are harassed get the legal help they need, the Fight for $15 announced a hotline--844.384.4495-- for workers to have their charges reviewed by attorneys. The Fight for $15 and TIME'S UP Legal Defense Fund also encouraged workers to fill out the intake form on the TIME'S UP Legal Defense Fund website in order to be connected with legal information and attorneys.
Sexual harassment is rampant in the fast-food industry, according to a 2016 survey by Hart Research Associates conducted for the National Partnership for Women and Families, the Ms. Foundation and Futures without Violence. Forty percent of female fast-food workers experience unwanted sexual behavior on the job. The 2016 Hart Research survey also showed that 42 percent of women in the industry who experience unwanted sexual behavior feel forced to accept it because they can't afford to lose their jobs. It also reported that more than one in five women who face sexual harassment (21%) report that, after raising the issue, their employer took some negative action, including cutting their hours, changing them to a less desirable schedule, giving them additional duties, and being denied a raise.
"As the country's second-largest employer, McDonald's has a responsibility to set workplace standards in both the fast-food industry and the economy overall, said U.S. Rep. Jan Schakowsky (D-Ill). "The sexual harassment alleged by McDonald's cooks and cashiers in these charges is unacceptable. I applaud them for their courage in speaking out and urge corporate management to take immediate action so the women and men who are key to McDonald's billions in profits can come to work without worrying about being sexually harassed. And I thank the Fight for $15 and all those organizing to make sure that all workers receive good wages, good benefits, and the respect they deserve."
Fast food workers are coming together all over the country to fight for $15 an hour and the right to form a union without retaliation. We work for corporations that are making tremendous profits, but do not pay employees enough to support our families and to cover basic needs like food, health care, rent and transportation.
If Biden 'Must Step Aside,' Why Aren't Democrats Filling the Streets to Demand It?
So far, one journalist noted, "the loudest voices trying to force him out of the race are elites: major media columnists and wealthy donors."
The number of congressional Democrats urging President Joe Biden to drop out of the race for the White House grew on Tuesday, but many of their colleagues—along with other elected officials and voters—remain supportive of the aging Democratic leader's effort to beat former Republican President Donald Trump a second time.
Since Biden's poor debate performance last month sparked concerns about whether he can defeat Trump and effectively serve another term, the president has remained defiant, insisting that he is determined to stay in the race—as he made clear with a Monday letter to Democrats in Congress that he also shared on social media.
Not only does the movement to convince Biden that he "must step aside" before the Democratic National Convention in August appear to be failing, "it's failing in a very predictable way," according to David Dayen, executive editor of The American Prospect.
"Though polling has consistently registered massive public concern with Biden's age and his ability to withstand the rigors of a high-stakes campaign, let alone another term in office until he turns 86 years old, the loudest voices trying to force him out of the race are elites: major media columnists and wealthy donors," he wrote Tuesday. "They lack democratic legitimacy and the public's respect, even as they are expressing the popular will. And they have given Biden the opportunity to parry their attacks simply by employing the politics of resentment."
"There is one group trying to change this. A very new organization (it literally started last Friday afternoon) founded by a handful of Democratic organizers called Pass the Torch is trying to motivate ordinary Democrats to speak out about the need for a stronger ticket to defeat Donald Trump," Dayen pointed out. While the group has a petition and is talking with convention delegates, he added, "an effort like Pass the Torch will really only derive legitimacy from having a large number of rank-and-file voices behind it."
Reflecting on Biden and Trump's disastrous debate in a Tuesday opinion piece for Common Dreams, writer and retired mental health worker Phil Wilson asserted that "members of a sane society would be thundering angrily through the streets given the choice between a smoldering ghost and an aspiring Nazi monster."
Wilson continued:
Who chose these two? Why are 50 million people curled up on couches, wrapped around plastic bowls of popcorn while these terrible, inept, and heartless fools cough up lies and trivial asides? We reflect upon levels of dementia and Nazi wannabe evil as if they were existential givens. Of course we all must decide on November 5th which genocidaire we prefer, the one who bombed the children of Gaza or the one vowing to deport up to 20 million innocent people. Do we pick the one who can barely remember his own name or the guy with a swirling vortex of hatred orbiting his eyeballs?
"This election is a farce—the dying throes of a criminal society, the death spasms of a plundering oligarchy that once devoured most of the world and now cannibalizes its own," he concluded.
Also writing for Common Dreams on Tuesday, University of Essex professor Peter Bloom argued that "the recent Trump-Biden debate served as a grotesque apotheosis of 'great man' politics, laying bare the dangerous fallacy of entrusting democracy to the outsized personalities of flawed individuals."
"The future of democracy, in the U.S. and beyond, depends on our ability to move beyond the cult of personality and reclaim politics as a collective endeavor," According to Bloom. "The alternative—a continued descent into gerontocratic oligarchy thinly disguised as populism—is too dire to contemplate. As we watch two aged politicians compete for the chance to lead a nation in crisis, let it serve as a wake-up call. The era of great men is over. The real work of rebuilding our democracy is just beginning."
Biden's campaign and supporters continue to frame his reelection as crucial to the fight to save U.S. democracy—particularly given that a victorious Trump would be armed with new king-like powers, thanks to a recent U.S. Supreme Court ruling.
As John Nichols, a national affairs correspondent for The Nation, noted Monday, Biden himself "says that the country is at 'an inflection point,' where the future of American democracy is at stake."
"This requires more than putting in your best effort in a controlled setting," Nichols wrote, describing Biden's Friday rally in Wisconsin as "serviceable" but far from what is needed. "It requires an absolutely determined candidate and a big, bold, risk-taking campaign that inspires Wisconsinites, and voters nationwide, to defeat Trump and Trumpism. If Biden really is determined to stay in this race, he owes it to himself, his party, and his country to be all in."
The president has received similar advice from progressives in Congress. Since the debate, Sen. Bernie Sanders (I-Vt.)—who sought the Democratic presidential nomination in 2016 and 2020—has stood by Biden but also stressed that he must "do better," for which the senator has received some criticism.
Progressives in the House were noticeably quieter—as Slate's Alexander Sammon noted last week, "There's no real upside for Squad members to put themselves in the line of fire during an already bitter public deliberation"—until multiple members of the informal group confirmed support for Biden on Monday.
"The matter is closed," Rep. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez (D-N.Y.) told reporters Monday evening, citing her weekend conversation with Biden and his repeated statements over recent days that he has no intention of stepping aside. "He is in this race and I support him."
Rep. @AOC: President Biden has made clear that he is in this race. The matter is closed. Biden is our nominee. He is in this race and I support him. He is running against Donald Trump, who is a man with 34 felony convictions. Not a single Republican has asked for Donald Trump to… pic.twitter.com/MOvUu3VQU5
— Biden-Harris HQ (@BidenHQ) July 8, 2024
"Now what I think is critically important right now is that we focus on what it takes to win in November because he is running against Donald Trump, who is a man with 34 felony convictions, that has committed 34 felony crimes, and not a single Republican has asked for Donald Trump to not be the nominee," she continued.
Ocasio-Cortez explained that she has "communicated" to Biden that winning the election will require Democrats to "pivot and increasingly commit to the issues that are critically important to working people across this country," including rent and mortgage relief as well as the expansion of Medicare and Social Security.
"And if we can do that and continue our work on student loans, secure a cease-fire, and bring those dollars back into investing in public policy, then that's how we win in November," she added. "That's what I'm committed to and that's what I want to make sure we secure."
With lawmakers back on Capitol Hill following the Independence Day recess, Democrats in both chambers held caucus meetings on Tuesday. While Senate Majority Leader Chuck Schumer (D-N.Y.) told reporters, "As I've said before, I'm with Joe," Politicoreported that "many typically chatty senators almost entirely refused to talk with press about their caucus' conversation."
House Democrats met earlier in the day. Rep. Dean Phillips (D-Minn.), who ended his longshot primary challenge to Biden and endorsed him in March, told reporters, "If this has been vindication, vindication has never been so unfulfilling."
"I made my case eight months ago and I think it's time for others to share their perspectives," he said. "I'm deeply disappointed in a political system that has resulted in this dynamic that we now face."
Rep. Mikie Sherrill (D-N.J.) joined the small but growing contingent urging him to step down, saying: "I know President Biden cares deeply about the future of our country. That's why I am asking that he declare that he won't run for reelection."
As the Pass the Torch campaign highlighted on social media Tuesday, some congressional Democrats are worried that Biden remaining at the top of the ticket could have a negative downballot impact.
At least one congressman who reportedly urged Biden to exit the race over the weekend, Rep. Jerry Nadler (D-N.Y.), appeared to change course. He declined to comment on what he privately told Biden but said: "The president made very clear yesterday that he's running... We have to support him."
After House Democrats' meeting, Rep. Hank Johnson (D-Ga.) toldPolitico, "My personal takeaway is that Joe Biden has tremendous support from the Democratic caucus, and we're going to move forward."
Rep. Pramila Jayapal (D-Wash.), chair of the Congressional Progressive Caucus, suggested in a Monday statement that even as public and private conversations are taking place within the party about the best way forward, nobody should forget the core differences between what Democrats and Biden represent compared to Trump and his Republican Party.
"Make no mistake, the foundation of our democracy is at stake in this election," said Jayapal.
"Any reporter or pundit who is asking about or talking about the aftermath of President Biden's debate performance and his health," she continued, "should also be spending at least the same amount of time and energy talking to Republicans about why they are still supporting a convicted felon who incited an insurrection and wants to be dictator on day one."
"Republicans should be calling for Donald Trump to step down as a candidate for president," she added. "The press should be covering for the American people the dozens of lies he told at the debate and the horrific statements he continues to make about immigrants and women. They should be asking every single Republican member why they support the democracy-destroying Project 2025."
While Trump has recently tried to distance himself from Project 2025—spearheaded by the Heritage Foundation, one of the sponsors of the Republican National Convention in Wisconsin next week—the Biden campaign and other critics have called "bullshit" on the frequently dishonest former president's claims.
"After trying and failing to cover up his deep ties to Project 2025 authors and Heritage Foundation leadership, Trump is putting his MAGA besties on full display," Biden campaign spokesperson Ammar Moussa said of the convention sponsorship Tuesday. "Donald Trump can't hide from Project 2025—it's his agenda, his vision, and his dangerous and extreme plan for America's future."
New Ally Joins Fight to Defend Rooftop Solar in California
"It's outrageous that California regulators keep attacking rooftop solar and it has to stop," said one attorney in the case.
A leading U.S. green group on Tuesday joined the legal challenge to a California rule banning solar contractors from installing or maintaining photovoltaic battery storage.
The Arizona-based Center for Biological Diversity (CBD) joined an amended lawsuit filed in San Diego County Superior Court against a California Public Utilities Commission (CPUC) regulation enacted last year in accordance with the wishes of Pacific Gas & Electric and two other investor-owned utilities.
The amended lawsuit supplements a complaint filed by CalPIRG, the Solar Rights Alliance, the California Solar & Storage Association, and a solar contractor adversely affected by the new CPUC rule. Climate campaigners and Democratic state lawmakers have previously launched challenges to the regulation.
CBD said the new rule "would increase the cost and administrative burden of installing rooftop solar and storage, vital technologies that make communities more resilient to utility blackouts and the fossil fuel-driven climate emergency."
Roger Lin, a CBD senior attorney, said in a statement: "It's outrageous that California regulators keep attacking rooftop solar and it has to stop. They're undermining California's climate goals and putting clean energy further out of reach for working-class families."
"This licensing trick is straight from the utility playbook and will cause electricity rates to skyrocket while worsening the climate emergency," Lin added. "People are dying from extreme heat and California desperately needs smart, resilient energy solutions. Instead, the board is propping up a brittle electricity grid that devastates critical habitats and promotes environmental injustice."
The new suit came on the same day that the California Energy Commission (CEC) announced nearly $19 million in new grants meant to assist communities in their efforts to automate the approval of residential solar energy permits.
"We are thrilled to be able to disburse funds to over 330 cities and counties across California to make it easier for residents to go solar," CEC Chair David Hochschild said in a statement, calling the program "a win for residents, building departments, solar businesses, and our environment."
UN Experts Say 'Targeted Starvation Campaign' by Israel Has Led to Famine Across Gaza
The starvation of Palestinians in Gaza "is a form of genocidal violence," said 10 rights experts.
While the United Nations still has not formally declared a famine in Gaza after nine months of Israel's near-total blockade on humanitarian aid, 10 top U.N. experts on Tuesday said they have seen enough.
"We declare that Israel's intentional and targeted starvation campaign against the Palestinian people is a form of genocidal violence and has resulted in famine across all of Gaza," said the experts.
Michael Fakhri, special rapporteur on the right to food, was joined in the statement by other experts including Francesca Albanese, special rapporteur on the situation of human rights in the Palestinian territory occupied since 1967, and Paula Gaviria Betancur, special rapporteur on the human rights of internally displaced persons.
They said the recent deaths of three children in various parts of the enclave led the experts, who do not speak on behalf of the United Nations as a whole, to declare a famine has taken hold.
"Fayez Ataya, who was barely six months old, died on May 30, 2024 and 13-year-old Abdulqader Al-Serhi died on June 1, 2024 at the Al-Aqsa Hospital in Deir Al-Balah," said the experts. "Nine-year-old Ahmad Abu Reida died on June 3, 2024 in the tent sheltering his displaced family in Al-Mawasi, Khan Younis. All three children died from malnutrition and lack of access to adequate healthcare."
"With the death of these children from starvation despite medical treatment in central Gaza, there is no doubt that famine has spread from northern Gaza into central and southern Gaza," they continued.
At least 34 Palestinians in Gaza—the majority being children—have now died from malnutrition since October, when Israel began its bombardment of the enclave in retaliation for a Hamas-led attack and Defense Minister Yoav Gallant announced there would "be no electricity, no food, no fuel" allowed in to Gaza.
Israeli officials said in response to Tuesday's statement that it has increased the aid allowed into Gaza recently, but hundreds of delivery trucks remain stranded in Egypt and a floating pier built by the U.S. has not significantly improved the humanitarian crisis.
The U.N. experts said that with the first death of a child from malnutrition and dehydration, it should have been considered "irrefutable that famine has taken hold."
"When a two-month-old baby and 10-year-old Yazan Al Kafarneh died of hunger on February 24 and March 4, respectively, this confirmed that famine had struck northern Gaza," they said. "The whole world should have intervened earlier to stop Israel's genocidal starvation campaign and prevented these deaths... Inaction is complicity."
The Integrated Food Security Phase Classification, which is backed by the U.N., said last month that Gaza is at high risk for famine and that nearly half a million people were facing "catastrophic" food insecurity, with an extreme lack of food.
In May, Human Rights Watch co-founder Aryeh Neier, who had previously hesitated to say Israel was committing genocide in Gaza, said Israel's "sustained policy of obstructing the movement of humanitarian assistance into the territory" ultimately convinced him that Israeli officials are "engaged in genocide."
In March, the International Court of Justice ordered Israel to ensure its military refrain from violating the Genocide Convention by preventing humanitarian aid from reaching people in Gaza, saying that "the catastrophic living conditions of the Palestinians in the Gaza Strip have deteriorated further" and that "famine is setting in."
A woman named Ghaneyma Joma told Reuters on Monday at a hospital in Khan Younis that she feared her son would soon die of starvation.
"It's distressing to see my child... lying there dying from malnutrition because I cannot provide him with anything due to the war, the closing of crossings, and the contaminated water," she told the outlet.
The Council on American-Islamic Relations called on the U.S. government, the biggest international funder of Israel's military and a persistent defender of its actions in Gaza, to ensure that a cease-fire agreement is reached and that Palestinians receive necessary humanitarian aid.
"The intentional starvation of the Palestinian people in Gaza can only occur with the active complicity of the Biden administration in Israel's campaign of genocide," said Ibrahim Hooper, national communications director for the group. "This complicity must end, and the Palestinian people must be offered a future in which they are free of occupation and can live in dignity."