Belabored Podcast #106: Nurses on the Frontline, with Jean Ross

Jean Ross, co-president of National Nurses United, joins us to talk about the nursing strike in Minnesota. Plus: audio from NNU Executive Director RoseAnn DeMoro’s People’s Summit speech on why we need to fight neoliberalism now.

Nurses in the Bay Area at a Bernie Sanders campaign kick-off event in May (National Nurses United / Flickr)

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If you’re sick of neoliberalism infecting our politics, nurses have a cure in mind. At the People’s Summit in Chicago and on the picket lines in Minnesota they are organizing to help heal the country’s economic divides, revive the debate on single-payer healthcare, and fix the ailing democracy. We talk to Jean Ross, co-president of the National Nurses United, who is on strike in Minnesota to demand a fair contract and decent healthcare for the nursing workforce. We also hear from NNU Executive Director RoseAnn DeMoro speaking at the People’s Summit, which was hosted by the union, about the state of social movements today, beyond the Bernie candidacy.

In other news, we see teachers rising up in Mexico and mobilizing on the streets of North Carolina, teachers struggling with low wages in preschool, and student debtors pushing back against for-profit college scams. With recommended reading on piloting a universal basic income and Brexiting the European Union.

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News

After Teachers Union Protests Against Education Reform, Mexican Police Kill 8 Protesters in Oaxaca (In These Times)

200,000 Doctors to Join Teachers in Mexico National Strike (Telesur)

Michelle: The Victims of For-Profit Education Are Creating a Debtors’ Movement (The Nation)

Obama’s missed chance to help for-profit college students (Politico)

N.C. Teachers Arrested at Protest For More Education Funding (Education Week)

14 arrested at teacher protest in downtown Raleigh (The News & Observer)

Michelle: Inequality Is Even Seeping Into Preschool Classrooms (The Nation)

Conversation

Jean Ross, Co-President, National Nurses United

Major Strikes Involving 10,000 Registered Nurses in MN, MA, and CA Scheduled for Late June (NNU)

Striking nurses question Allina spending (Star Tribune)