Detroit Postal Workers Push to Dump DeJoy and His Ten-Year Plan
On less than 24 hours’ notice that the Postmaster General and members of Congress might be showing up at our post office, we were able to print 300 flyers and recruit 20 people to hold a picket line welcoming the guests. Photo: Jim West, jimwestphoto.com
Last fall, the Detroit local of the Postal Workers (APWU) stepped out with a rally and flyer calling on workers to defend democracy and warning of a possible coup. National APWU picked up that flyer and copied it in a national publication.
Now we can only hope that the national union will begin to echo our call from the heartland to Dump DeJoy.
(Read more about Postmaster General Louis DeJoy’s new 10-year plan to raise prices, slow the mail, and pave the way for privatization here. —Eds.)
Thanks to email from a friend, we learned it was possible that DeJoy was coming to tour the main post office in Detroit on May 7, along with two U.S. Congressmembers, Rashida Tlaib and Brenda Lawrence. Even on less than 24 hours’ notice, we were able to print 300 flyers and recruit 20 people—postal workers and our allies—to hold a picket line welcoming the guests. As it turned out, DeJoy did not come, but he sent his number one man in Michigan to head the delegation that toured the plant.
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While those of us outside leafleted the employees, Detroit APWU President Keith Combs accompanied the tour inside. He was able to challenge all the lies management put forward and to insist that the Congresswomen see the whole plant… including dismantled sorting machines ready for recycling, and the large open areas where they sat in the past.
Our flyer simply said “Dump Dejoy and His 10-Year Plan” on the front. On the back, we printed the flyer “The Postal Service: What Now?” created last year by a group of postal organizers working together around the country. In two columns, it contrasts “Postmaster General Louis Dejoy’s Vision” with “A Public Vision.” People loved this flyer. It makes clear the difference between a business plan to produce profit and a plan to maintain and expand service… putting “service” back in the U.S. Postal Service.
Hopefully this kind of event will be repeated all across the country and the rank and file can force the national union leaders to echo our demand: DUMP DEJOY.
Jane Duggan is a retired postal mechanic and local union officer.