By Joe Maniscalco

Vermont AFL-CIO leader David Van Deusen is sitting outside a tavern in Montpelier about to grab a beer when he starts talking about how important independent journalism is to the American Labor Movement.

By Joe Maniscalco

Frank Emspak has been making trouble for powerful elites his whole life. Sometimes as a pugnacious member of the United Electrical, Radio and Machine Workers [UE], other times as executive producer of Workers Independent News (WINS). Now approaching 80, Frank Emspak is still mixing it up and making trouble — and he’s urging today’s generation of workers to do the same.

By Steve Wishnia

U.S. labor law is supposed to protect workers’ right to organize — but employers regularly evade it by exploiting the slow-moving system and its weak or nonexistent penalties for violations, leading labor lawyers say.