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LIVE: Vigil & Thirst Strike for Workers’ Rights at the U.S. Capitol
Source – Democratic U.S. Representative Greg Casar
A T%exas Congressman held a “thirst strike’ Tuesday on the steps of the Capital calling attention to a need for a federal heat rule to protect workers.
Democratic U.S. Representative Greg Casar, whose district includes parts of Austin and San Antonio, Texas, said he would not drink water for eight hours while standing on the steps of the U.S. Capitol building, as temperatures in Washington rise to almost 90 degrees Fahrenheit (32°C).
Actually, this journalist lives just about 90 minutes away from Washington D;.C.. and the temperature is 92 degrees Fahrenheit (33.3 degrees Celsius) as I file this story.
On Monday, according to Reuters, over 100 Democrats signed a letter to President Joe Biden’s administration, asking for federal workplace heat safety regulations.
At 10:25 a.m. EDT, Congressman Greg Casar TWEETED: “Just took my last drink of water before my thirst strike with the one and only, Dolores Huerta,” a well-known civil rights activist. #WorkersCantWait
“Today I’m on a thirst strike on the steps of the U.S. Capitol—not drinking water or taking breaks, through rain or shine, in solidarity with our nation’s workers,” Casar tweeted, (or do we now say “Xed?). “Currently there are NO federal protections for workers exposed to heat.”
“A basic thing like the right to a water break, a basic thing like being able to work and know that working is not a death sentence, is the baseline of what our democracy should be able to do,” Casar said Tuesday.
He cited a law signed by Texas Republican Gov. Greg Abbott last month that prohibits local officials from enacting rules on businesses that supersede state regulations, which Casar said will prevent water breaks.
Signed on June 23, the new law will take effect later this year and will nullify ordinances enacted by Austin and Dallas that mandate 10-minute breaks for construction workers every four hours. It also prevents any other local governments from passing similar worker protections.
Cesar, as well as over 100 Democrats also urged acting Labor Secretary Julie Su on Monday to move toward the “fastest implementation possible” amid the extreme heat, reports The Hill.
OSHA does not have a national heat protection rule
The climate crisis is obviously6 going to require that humans make some new rules that govern working outdoors when the temperatures are extreme like they have been for the past several weeks.
While the Biden administration has previously endorsed federal heat regulations and announced plans to develop a rule aimed at preventing occupational heat illness and death, the federal Occupational Safety and Health Administration (Osha) does not have a national heat protection standard.
Six out of every 10 construction workers in Texas are Latino, and labor advocates say that the law will hurt Latino and Black communities that are already disproportionately affected by extreme heat.
After the state’s second-hottest summer on record last year, Texas Democratic legislators introduced bills that would have set heat illness guidelines for Texas businesses and required mandatory breaks for government contractors, but those efforts failed to advance.
“In the midst of a record-setting heatwave, I could not think of a worse time for this governor or any elected official who has any, any kind of compassion, to do this,” said David Cruz, the communications director for League of United Latin American Citizens National (Lulac), a Latino civil rights group. “This administration is incrementally trying to move us backward into a dark time in this nation. When plantation owners and agrarian mentalities prevailed.”
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