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SEPTEMBER 7, 2023
On the Prospect website
* Luis Feliz Leon on Stellantis's response to UAW members seeking a
raise
<[link removed]>:
We may move our factories to non-union states
* David Dayen on Google's efforts to keep the media out of its
upcoming trial
<[link removed]>
for its monopolization practices
* Elizabeth Meisenzahl on one company's switch to AI
<[link removed]>
just when its workers decided to go union
Meyerson on TAP
Voters, Shmoters
Wisconsin Republicans are poised to impeach a state Supreme Court
justice whom the voters just recently overwhelmingly elected.
Donald Trump couldn't persuade Mike Pence to overturn the 2020
presidential election, but when it comes to discarding the clear
decisions of voters, Wisconsin's Republican state legislators are made
of sterner stuff.
As
**The New York Times**has reported
<[link removed]>,
they appear to be dead set on impeaching newly elected state Supreme
Court Justice Janet Protasiewicz, not for anything she's done in
office-she hasn't really done anything yet-but because she will
shift the balance on the court from a MAGA-conservative majority to a
liberal one.
Protasiewicz was elected to the court this spring by a surprisingly
decisive 11-percentage-point majority. In a state as closely divided
between R's and D's as any, the scope of her majority was
remarkable, as she clearly managed to corral a large number of
Republican votes. That was chiefly because she made clear that she
supported a woman's right to choose, which the
**Dobbs** decision had negated in Wisconsin by reactivating the state
law banning abortions, which was enacted in 1849. Once Protasiewicz was
elected, that meant that the court would surely overturn that law by a
4-3 vote.
Protasiewicz also made clear that she didn't think the legislature's
gerrymandering could survive judicial scrutiny. The world-class
gerrymandering that its Republican members devised to give themselves
control of nearly three-fourths of the state's districts, even though
their party was losing most statewide elections, ran roughshod over such
niceties as majority rule and equal justice under the law.
In response to which, Republican legislators appear poised to go where
Pence feared to tread, and impeach and remove Protasiewicz from the
bench lest her legal scruples threaten their sinecures. They charge that
because she voiced her beliefs before she was elected, she should not be
permitted to weigh in on any cases that deal with topics on which
she'd expressed opinions. As the
**Times** article points out, her Republican colleagues on the court
have done that repeatedly; one of them has compared homosexuality to
bestiality and declared Christianity to be the only true religion.
More broadly, judges are appointed or elected primarily because of their
beliefs and secondarily because of their legal competence. Wisconsin
voters decisively elected Protasiewicz because of her support for a
woman's right to choose.
Which is why Wisconsin Republicans aren't really addressing what is
their root problem: the Wisconsin electorate. If they're serious about
impeaching Protasiewicz-and they are-they also need, at minimum, to
formally censure state voters. Completely negating the electorate's
power is a big deal, but it's only de facto. A proper de jure response
should also be required. How about suspending future elections?
Extending their terms in office by, say, 60 years? (Well, I guess the
current gerrymandering has effectively already done that.)
Protasiewicz is just a symptom. The voters are the root cause, and will
remain so as long as the state persists in holding elections. Clearly,
either elections or the voters themselves will have to go.
Maybe, like migrants, they can be bused to Chicago. Â
______________________________________________________________________
Speaking of narrow majorities, the Senate yesterday confirmed Biden
nominee Gwynne Wilcox to a five-year term on the National Labor
Relations Board.
Wilcox, whose two-year term to fill a Board vacancy just expired, had
had her confirmation vote held up by Senate Republicans' decision not
to submit a nominee of their own to the Board. (Customarily,
presidential and opposition-party nominees to the NLRB are submitted
together to the Senate, and Republicans had hoped that Senate Democrats
would keep deferring to that custom. If they had, that would have taken
Board membership down to just three members, which would have
constrained the Board from making some significant rulings.)
Senate Democrats did defer to that custom for many months, but as I
reported
<[link removed]> on
Monday, Senate Leader Chuck Schumer concluded he'd bring Wilcox's
confirmation up for a vote this week. She was confirmed by a 51-48 vote,
with the two Republican senators from Alaska (Lisa Murkowski and Dan
Sullivan) joining Senate Democrats-including Arizona's Kyrsten
Sinema-in voting yes. The one Democrat voting no was, you guessed it,
Joe Manchin, who made clear that his allegiance to coal doesn't extend
to miners.
~ HAROLD MEYERSON
Follow Harold Meyerson on Twitter <[link removed]>
[link removed]
As Auto Workers Contract Talks Heat Up, Stellantis Threatens to Move
South
<[link removed]>
Capital flight is playing a major role in the UAW negotiations, with
U.S. plants at risk of losing work to Mexico being used as leverage. BY
LUIS FELIZ LEON
Google Tries to Protect Its Monopoly Under Cover of Darkness
<[link removed]>
The search giant objects to a live audio feed of its historic
monopolization trial, which begins next week. BY DAVID DAYEN
Artificial Intelligence Emerges as a Union-Buster
<[link removed]>
How one employer used AI against workers even when the technology fell
short BY ELIZABETH MEISENZAHL
[link removed]
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