Vote Counting To Resume After UC Grad Students Occupy Union Offices

The elections committee for a union representing academic student employees in the University of California system voted unanimously on Tuesday to resume counting votes in a statewide contest to determine the union's leadership, after scores of demonstrators occupied union offices in Berkeley and Los Angeles.

Members of the Election Committee for the United Auto Workers Local 2865, which represents roughly 12,000 graduate students working as teachers, tutors, and researchers, had opted to halt the vote counting process on Saturday, following allegations of election fraud from two rival factions squaring off over leadership positions in the triennial election: the incumbent group, United for Social and Economic Justice, and upstarts, Academic Workers for a Democratic Union. Yet on Tuesday, it was announced that the count would resume on Thursday, following this week's sit-ins protesting the count's suspension.

"I'm excited to announce that the Election Committee met ... and was able to agree on a process for moving forward and counting all the ballots," said Travis Knowles, Elections Committee chair in a letter to union members. "I want to thank everyone for their patience as we worked with all parties to resolve this challenging, stressful situation."

As of Wednesday, an estimated 1,500 votes -- roughly half of all ballots cast -- remained uncounted, including ballots from UC Berkeley and UCLA. Those campuses had some of the highest voter turnout of any of the nine UC campuses involved, and at Berkeley students were expected to vote heavily in favor of breakaway group AWDU.

There are 80 positions on the Joint Council, which operates at the campus level, and ten on the Executive Board, which operates at the state level; all of them are up for grabs in this election cycle.

United for Social and Economic Justice currently holds eight of ten Executive Board seats as well as the majority of Joint Council seats, but AWDU is gaining traction on a handful of U.C. campuses.

Jennifer Tucker, a U.C. Berkeley graduate student and AWDU union unit chair, told The Huffington Post, "members and activists from around the state are extremely excited that through our efforts the election committee has decided to reverse course and begin the resumption of the vote count," adding that results from the recount could be available as soon as this weekend.

While members of AWDU crowed that their sit-ins have spurred the elections committee to resume counting votes, Local 2865 president Daraka Larimore-Hall, who is running for reelection on the United for Social and Economic Justice slate, blamed the rival group's "scorched earth" tactics for the suspension of the count in the first place.

"They released some our cell phone numbers, including mine, and I received messages threatening my job, my career and my reputation," he told the Santa Cruz Sentinel's Tovin Lapan. "Their playbook comes right from other bitter inter-union fights."

Members of AWDU, meanwhile, argue the vote was halted only after it became apparent their slate had a good chance of winning.

"As counting progressed late in the day on Saturday it became clear that Academic Workers for a Democratic Union might actually be in a position to win the majority of seats on the statewide executive board," Tucker told HuffPost.

When the count resumes on Thursday, an independent mediator will be on hand to help adjudicate any disputes as they arise.

Comments

[Jeb Sprague]

09:32 PM on 05/06/2011

It is hard to make heads or tails of USEJ's various accusations where they never point to any verifiable evidence or explain what bylaws were violated by the alleged AWDU activities. UAW 2865 is bound to a voting process that has already been agreed upon in our union's bylaws. Challenges were to be expected. Challengers (who are also essentially observers) were able to officially sign up across the state- this is to guard against fraud, vote tampering, failures to properly collect ballots, etc.

Both slates made various challenges or minor challenges- challenging ballots at some of the schools and on various grounds. This never broke any bylaws and was to be expected in such a politically charged environment. The next step was to arrive at a decision on these various challenges and finish with the counting.

Violation of UAW bylaws occurred when UAW local 2865 Elections Committee chair Travis Knowles with three out of six committee members present at the ballot count (all aligned with USEJ) abandoned the election and left the room. This violated Article 14, Section 7 of the UAW 2865 bylaws. More can be read about this incident here:
http://ucgradstrike.wordpress.com/2011/05/03/an-accurate-election-update-open-letter-to-the-uaw-2865-membership/ This was clearly done to stall the vote count, a political strategy, but one that violated the bylaws. I am happy to see the vote is back on. We should stand by the union either way the democratic vote turns.

[Justice Raptor]

06:57 AM on 05/07/2011

Well said Jeb. We should stand by the vote count whichever way the democratic vote turns. It might turn out that the current vote is tainted. In which case, big deal. Everybody votes again. The real question is how a group of people who have been divided along the same political lines for so long used to be able to work together but since September have not been able to. What happened? How did things get so heated? And how can we get back to being able to disagree and yet fight for better working conditions together nonetheless regardless of who is in power? How can we avoid this in the future? The answer is the same answer it has always been whenever unions have suddenly found themselves internally at odds even though the internal politics haven't changed, whenever lies and vitriol are being flung from side to side with no clue as to how it started, whenever a union which has seen unprecedented victories vis-a-vis an employer gets depicted as being weak. Look to new people in leadership. Somebody is not who they appear to be.

[Roi L]

06:26 PM on 05/06/2011

The most fantastic thing in this article is Daraka Larimore-Hall's complaint about members of the union sending him messages (!) and threatening his job as the president of the union (!!). Looks like Larimore-Hall, (or the Duke of Santa Barbara, as he probably prefers to be called) treats his office as a divine right, rather than a position he was ELECTED for, and that holds him accountable to his constituents.

[Gustavo Oliveira]

01:17 PM on 05/06/2011

Behind all the smoke and mirrors of personal accusations and arguments over challenged ballots, it all comes down to this:

USEJ = "business-as-usual is good enough"
AWDU = "our union must become more active to resist the budget cuts"

[katie1981]

04:12 AM on 05/07/2011

I'm sure you have a lot of strong feelings, but honestly this kinda statement is why people like me didn't pay attention before. And are going to stop paying attention again soon. This statement is just yucky. Almost every statement I've seen from both side says everyone agrees more needs to get done! I just read on another site about a USEJ-led foodbank initiative at UCSB to help grad students in need. That's awesome and inspiring.

Why aren't we hearing more about the cool projects each side is doing (or maybe even what our union _together_ is doing) instead of stereotypical, partisan, vague punchlines? It's just gonna make it harder to come together post-election. Unless people have given up on this?

[litoviaje]

12:22 PM on 05/06/2011

I think we should cut through the back and forth and get back to the real issue. Will all valid votes be counted? The challenges to Berkeley votes are laughable and amount to "I know you cheated, even though the only evidence I have is a doctored photograph." The challenges to one box of UCLA votes is more substantial, given that it contains votes with neither of the two envelopes required for valid votes in this election. These ballots have been treated as spoiled by unanimous decision of the elections committee in boxes from other campuses. The rules should not change. The challenged box from UCSD has ballots that lack one of the two envelopes. My personal opinion is that this box should be held back and counted only if it would have an impact on the election. This last box is a tricky call and I find reasonable arguments for and against counting it.

The rest of this back and forth is irrelevant to the issue at hand. The election committee should get its act together and count all valid votes immediately. Period.

[disenfranchised voter]

02:55 PM on 05/06/2011

The photograph is doctored?!?!?!?!? You've got to be kidding me. I would love to hear that explanation.

[joshua brahinsky]

05:16 PM on 05/06/2011

I think doctored is the wrong word - you are right - it is more that the explanation of it as a sign of corruption has no resonance with the testimony of the person pictured and any reasonable look at the evidence of the picture makes it clear that it is a ballot box being set up, not one being messed up. The analysis is a process of doctoring, but i don't think the photo is doctored itself. Actually a lie might be a better way to describe this process as the folks who sent out the photo knew perfectly well that it was not a picture of ballot manipulation, but they sent it anyways - odd no?

http://www­.awdu.org/­statement-­from-the-p­oll-worker­-accused-o­f-vote-tam­pering

[disenfranchised voter]

03:09 PM on 05/06/2011

I love how things changed from "count all votes" to "count all valid votes". If there is a picture of somebody (poll worker or not) opening the ballot box after polling has started (without anybody around to verify he was not causing mischief), then I would have to say that his action qualifies as tampering with the votes. Let's also take a moment to think about how funny the statement "the only evidence is a photograph" is.

[Bob Denton]

03:27 PM on 05/06/2011

Have you read through this particular issue? The photograph is clearly, on its face, a picture of a poll worker setting up a polling station in the morning. Shadows confirm it is early morning, as does the fact that no blue line has yet been drawn around the polling place. Furthermore, the poll worker himself came forward to confirm this. He is unaffiliated, and a volunteer.

You can read his statement and view the picture here:

http://www.awdu.org/statement-from-the-poll-worker-accused-of-vote-tampering

[katie1981]

02:08 AM on 05/06/2011

I'm really confused about a lot of the accusations of character attacks I've read here. Seems like there are both AWDU and USEJ people writing on here so maybe you can help those of us who really tuned in to these details understand the timeline better.

Didn't the USEJ attack on Charlie Eaton that his colleague Maggie talked about happen _after_ the election? I think it's important for those of us who maybe tuned in a little later to have a clearer timeline. I've read USEJ's emails from _before the voting_ and they never seem to mention anyone by name. They do mention a Charlie and Sara after the voting finished. The awdu flyers and awdu affiliated campus sites all seem to have a lot of personal attacks on specific people from _before_ the voting. Did USEJ attack anyone personally before this counting fiasco?

[joshua brahinsky]

02:45 AM on 05/06/2011

Yes the attacks on Sara came to us at Santa Cruz during and before the voting - the claim was that she was limiting voter participation when actually she was responsible for unprecedented expansion of polling locations to the sciences and family student housing. I must admit I am biased - living in family housing I was psyched and being Sara's friend I think I likely convinced her to expand the balloting to my neighborhood and lots of us here are in the sciences so we felt good about that too. But yes the attacks were quite nasty and very public - we spent hours debating whether we should respond at all since we wanted to defend our friend but hated the negative tone that these back and forths create. We decided to leave the rebuttal details to the blogs for people who really like to dig into the mess of it all. feel free to contact me for more details - josh brahinsky jbrahins(at)gmail.com UCSC Recording Secretary

[katie1981]

02:47 AM on 05/06/2011

But it was _after_ the voting finished? And she did only have one day on science hill? Yes...this is all very nasty. Let's count the damn ballots and move on. Especially as more and more I think the entire election is invalid from start to finish at this point.

[Justice Raptor]

02:52 AM on 05/06/2011

Sara used to be on the election committee. I am pretty sure she was on the elections committee when procedures for this very election where she is a candidate were being debated. Election committee people can't run for office during an election for obvious reasons. Probably this issue was raised when she resigned the committee to run in an election she had a hand in organizing. Best guess.

[Z Williams]

04:01 AM on 05/06/2011

Hi Katie,

I appreciate your interest and concern. AWDU did reference specific individuals in its campaigns from the start. I can't deny this. All I can do is explain why this was so.

AWDU specifically singled out members on our executive board, who, we should note, are public elected officials of our union, because AWDU perceived a problem with how the particular circumstances of these individuals related to their holding of elected office. In my view these criticisms were not *personal* attacks, but one's which had to do with perfectly relevant political and structural problems in the union.

Specifically, it is our understanding that some of these officials are no longer invested in graduate education. Because UAW staffers are represented by the bargaining unit for which they work and because one can maintain one's membership in good standing as long as one pays union dues, individuals can legitimately run for elected office without necessarily also working as a student-worker within the UC.

We think that it is important for our elected officers to have a stake in the UC system as students and student-workers in order to effectively represent us. When numerous elected officials drawing full-time salaries (not in accordance with Article 6 Section 1 of the Bylaws - note I'm not saying 'violation') no longer are students invested in making a living through the university, but are rather staff invested in making a career out of the union, we question whether we are really being represented.

[Coral Wheeler]

03:50 PM on 05/06/2011

"it is our understand­ing that some of these officials are no longer invested in graduate education"

- this is not an "understanding" unless you can read minds. It is an opinion. What's more, we are a union of TAs, Readers and Tutors, not grad students. How can AWDU make the above claim while simultaneously running a candidate for the executive board (Charlie Eaton) who has never even worked as a TA? I may not be a currently enrolled grad student, but at least I have worked in the bargaining unit. I point this out merely to highlight the hypocrisy.

"We think that it is important for our elected officers to have a stake in the UC system as students and student-wo­rkers in order to effectivel­y represent us."

- I am sick of AWDU members and supporters telling me I am not invested in the UC system. A union staff position is not an easy job. Having worked as a TA, an RA and a UAW 2865 staff member, I can honestly say that the level of work, stress, time commitment etc. of a union staff position far exceeds that of the other positions I have held at the UC. I became a staff person for UAW 2865 because I wanted to help TAs, Readers and Tutors (and students) at the UC. Please stop pretending like you have some secret window into my thoughts and you just know I'm in it for myself. That's why these are *personal* attacks.

[James Lamb]

01:58 AM on 05/06/2011

If they are paid by the giant, impersonal and distant union bureuacracy out of dues that are mandatory for me to keep my job and thus stay in school; if they make multiple times what regular academic workers like me make; if they are deeply in bed with a Democrat Party I deeply oppose and want no part in supporting; if I have paid dues for many years and never met any of them... How are the incumbents not highly paid, politically compromised out of touch bureaucrats?

[disenfranchised voter]

02:00 PM on 05/06/2011

Let me get this straight. You're saying that our union staff should not be paid for working a job that requires 40-60 hrs a week. I understand the argument that they are making a higher annual income than a normal TA working a 50% appointment, but shouldn't they be paid for the hours and hard work they put in? Our union represents 12,000 workers statewide, if you think an organization of that size can run solely on volunteers, think again. You also make it seem like we have an insane amount of paid staff. How many staff members are actually paid with our dues?

[joshua brahinsky]

04:53 PM on 05/06/2011

I am an AWDU supporter and very active in AWDU - we debated the question of paid staff for months and have not clearly resolved it although we agree that paid staff positions can be a problem, especially if they are not sufficiently accountable to elected leaders. (For instance, my understanding is that it is UAW policy to run staff hiring decisions through the eboard, but it is not the practice in our local.) So your point that running a union takes work is legit as far as I can see and the answer is not clear. However it has not been an issue in this election. What seems far more clear and has been an issue is the way staff are paid - it seems very simple to agree that our staff people ought to be paid in the same ballpark as their members - this has often not been the case in the recent history of our local and makes the impulse towards protecting staff positions and paid eboard positions a powerful one, perhaps more powerful than the impulse to take risks for the good of our members..

[disenfranchised voter]

02:44 PM on 05/06/2011

How many union meetings have you actually attended? How many hours have you volunteered to help out with the union before you decided that it needs to be dismantled and rebuilt? If you say anything more than 0, then your claim that you have never met one elected official is bogus. What do you expect them to do, come by your office every morning with a briefing on the daily agenda and ask for your aproval?

[James Lamb]

06:42 PM on 05/06/2011

Well if they are going to take my money and I have no recourse to keep my job and stay in school without funding them and their lifestyle then the burden is by far on them from my view. We are forced to pay dues to stay in school which makes the issue much more morally fraught. If having folks paid by the bureaucracy is normal fo unions that only speaks to the corruption of union culture in general as a coercive & bureaucratically and politically compromised institution rather than a voluntary one!

Whatever either slate says if I don't like what the leadership is doing I should have the right to deny them my financial support without the coercive mafia-monopoly threatening my job & schooling. Vote isn't enough and this whole election proves it! We deserve a CHOICE of whether or not to pay bureaucrats salaries or support the UAW bureaucracy AT ALL, which the more I learn about the corrupt union bureaucracy the more outraged I am to be forced to support it in any way as an absolute condition to continue my education! The whole thing stinks to high heaven! You all should earn my personal support if you want my money, not hold hostage my education to mandatory contributions to a Democrat Party lackey bureaucracy I respect and support less by the day!

[katie1981]

01:48 AM on 05/06/2011

Wow. Lots of comments/anger about counting ballots... I agree ballots should be counted(!), but what do those ballots even mean anymore? In my opinion they are really starting to mean NADA. Why? Because from what I've read here, on AWDU / USEJ blogs, and from talking with friends, it sounds like many people didn't get to cast a fair ballot in the first place.

The creepy photos of AWDU people stalking USEJ candidates, the AWDU flyers distributed that lied to say the USEJ candidate for pres made $70K (he posted his W2 showing ~$35K) and said he wasn't a student (when he is), the polling locations closed, open ballot boxes (although it sounds unintentional by the poor guy it is really sloppy and I'd never stand for this at my county-run polling location)...I dunno. How does this all add up to people deciding in a fair way for which side to cast a ballot?

Isn't the real issue whether folks think the last contract was good (on it it's own, or enough in current financial situations, whatever)...or whether it wasn't? All this discussion of who has more supporters at meetings seems totally irrelevant. I don't go to meetings. That doesn't mean I have a feeling pro or anti my union. It means I _hate_ meetings.

So yeah. I can't really get upset over this whole ballot-counting business anymore because I don't trust the ballots mean anything really about what people intended.

[Yossarian Lives]

03:10 AM on 05/06/2011

Hi.
I agree that the real issue should be about the last contract and about the future of this union, which I see as related issues. Our latest contract does not include raises that are likely to keep up with inflation, and despite the economic climate, that isn't acceptable to me. Our income is too modest to afford an effective pay decrease. Additionally, I don't believe we will be in the position to bargain more effectively next time unless we repair our union--without filling all the state-wide and on-campus positions, we don't have the networks in place to mobilize.

I'd like to clarify a few things. One, the $70K estimate for President Larimore-Hall which he rebutted with his w2: That was an estimate based on the previous president's income. In reality, we don't know how much Larimore-Hall makes as president, but it should be noted that the w2 he posted reflects his salary last year, and he didn't become president until January 2011.

Second, I campaigned on the AWDU slate in Davis, so I can't speak to everything that happened across the state, but from my observation the the main criticisms directed toward USEJ weren't personal attacks:

1) The leadership is overpaid.
2) Only current students should run for office.
3) Paid UAW International organizers shouldn't run for office.
4) Paid UAW International organizers shouldn't "take a day off" in order to circumvent the bylaws so they can campaign on behalf of the current leadership.

[katie1981]

03:36 AM on 05/06/2011

If those are the non-contract concerns then I believe others have addressed them all here in this blog and on USEJ.

1.) Someone wrote earlier the President and Vice President make _exactly_ the same salary so the w2 from when he was VP is the same. $35K for working full time for a CA wide union. i think this is double what parttime TAs make. Seems fair. And a great idea for a large union with tons of folks in and out.

In terms of your last 4 points.
1.) See above. I don't think that is getting overpaid at all.
2.) I agree, but people do take breaks all the time - like to have kids - so if someone is taking a break to help with the union it seems totally cool with me. someone wrote somewhere that AWDU charlie was never a GSI so I mean it seems like both USEJ & AWDU people are getting involved in their communities, doing other stuff so who cares? that's great!
3.) Do you mean people not from our union but from the larger UAW could run for office in our union? that seems bizarro? maybe a misunderstanding?
4.) Again is this people outside of our union or people who are getting paid by our union like president larimore-hall? I agree people shouldn't get paid to campaign, but you can't really restrict someone's right to campaign on their personal time. That's sort of 1st amendment territory.

[disenfranchised voter]

02:48 PM on 05/06/2011

So if AWDU members are elected to the leadership, their first course of action will be to reduce their salaries? (Which are already the same as TA salaries) Or should we only allow them to work part time, like a TA. That's it, You're right I want my union working hard for me....part time.

[Yossarian Lives]

04:24 AM on 05/06/2011

Katie, I'd also like to encourage you not to get too jaded about the election. It's been messy, and I don't think anyone is happy about that. Still, I believe that when it's all said and done, both sides will be able to agree that the election has been fair and that the ballots were counted appropriately.

[Eli Friedman]

01:41 AM on 05/06/2011

"USEJ" (hilariously nearly the only person in this extensive comment section taking a pro-USEJ position) has parroted the ridiculous party line: "however, it's important to note that the _only_reason the vote count was suspended in the first place was the fact that volunteers in the room felt harassed and intimidate­d."
This is such a joke. I was a volunteer in the room before and while the USEJ-affiliated election committee members unilaterally suspended the vote and then fled the room. While things had in fact been contentious when challenges were being filed on Friday, all day Saturday was incredibly calm, with people from both caucuses quietly tallying votes side-by-side. The argument that things were "too stressful" or that people were being "harassed" while votes were being tallied can not in any way be supported by anyone that subscribes to basic consensual reality. The suspension of the vote was undeniably because USEJ was afraid they were going to lose and then freaked out. Fortunately for our members, their impulsive behavior has backfired.

[katie1981]

01:52 AM on 05/06/2011

We should all try to calm down. Having followed much of this thread, albeit not all, I don't think this is factual. It seems like many people have been expressing a pro-USEJ, or even, a let's move forward and work together, belief.

[James Lamb]

01:34 AM on 05/06/2011

How are the incumbents not bureaucrats if they are paid (several times what we chump actual academic workers are) by the huge bureaucracy they are supposed to be representing us to?

This is all the more galling since dues are mandatory as a condition of my employment and thus my continued graduate education!

It seems like big union bureaucracies are often more about preventing rank and file militancy & activism than encouraging it, as in the founding days of the labor movement when there were no paid bureaucrats who spend most of their time with management & political party bosses, just members. Now it seems most are just another corrupt bureaucracy trying to prevent real change to protect their fat paychecks and in bed with big business, and especially political party fundraising!

Just like in Egypt, it seems like workers' first struggle must be against the official bueraucratic & politically compromised union hierarchies before we can even try to take on corporatist management and the governments of both political parties whose policies attack working people every day!

And in that struggle we know what side the paid bueraucratic 'leadership' is on! They represent the bureaucracy to us, not vice-versa!

[disenfranchised voter]

06:41 PM on 05/06/2011

Wow comparing UAW 2865 to Egypt's struggle for democracy. Put down the bong my friend.

[James Lamb]

07:51 PM on 05/06/2011

Wow! Calling dissent in a political organization I am forced to be in to have my job and be in school motivated by drug use bears no similarities to the arrogant corporatism of said autocracy!

Insulting membership makes one an admirable anonymous character indeed! I wonder if this clown has been living off my dues, too?

[James Lamb]

07:57 PM on 05/06/2011

Though this is exactly the kind of hubris, bad faith and iron law of oligarchy one would expect from a coercive, bureaucracy deeply in bed with the ruling state and federal political party.

If it ain't autocratic give me an option for exit! I don't want to fund this corruption any more!

[Nirshan Perera]

12:34 AM on 05/06/2011

Thank you for covering this story, Huffpo! If you do a follow up story, I hope you will examine, and perhaps investigate, the allegations and counter-allegations, narrative and counter-narrative, detailed in this comment thread.

[USEJ]

08:39 PM on 05/05/2011

AWDU supporters: Please explain to HuffPo Readers and members why your attorney objects to counting the ballots cast at UCLA & UC San Diego. A number of your posts read "count all the ballots". This seems contrary to what your attorney is saying.

[gastonpu]

08:58 PM on 05/05/2011

AWDU challenged boxes at UCLA and UCSD because they contained ballots that were not contained in the proper envelopes. The elections committee had previously considered ballots like these as "spoiled" for an important reason. I personally witnessed Larimore-H­all instruct a voter who had submitted a ballot without an outer envelope to submit another one because the previous one would be considered spoiled. Given that this occurred across the state, it is a substantia­l problem to consider spoiled ballots.

[USEJ]

09:39 PM on 05/05/2011

Wrong. AWDU challenged the ballot boxes at UCLA & UCSD for "strategic reasons" - at least that's what Kyle Arnone says...

[redteamo]

09:52 PM on 05/05/2011

Thanks for asking about the ballots at UCLA and UCSD. According to the election rules unanimously agreed to by the elections committee on April 25, all ballots without an outer envelope or without any envelope must be marked as spoiled and set aside. This is because without the outer envelope, there is no way to verify that the ballot was cast by a member in good standing, or that the vote was cast in addition to another vote from the same member. Also this is how the committee has already handled such ballots at all other campuses. There is no reason to treat such ballots at UCLA and UCSD any differently.

[Justice Raptor]

11:34 PM on 05/05/2011

What about the roster accompanying each box?
Was it not signed?

[USEJ]

11:35 PM on 05/05/2011

Now i get it: ballots challenged by AWDU *should* not be counted, and ballots counted by USEJ should *not* be counted.

riiiight.

imagine for just a second what would happen if, in a general election, an entire polling station/time slot just decided *not* to open. there would be an uproar - justifiably so.

that's what happened at Berkeley. and for y'all to play like that's *no big deal* but the challenges at UCLA & UCSD are *very serious* is just a weeeee bit disingenuous.

[Lucas McGranahan]

08:32 PM on 05/05/2011

The voting for contract ratification and elected positions should always be done by a neutral 3rd party. Clearly we don't all trust one another, nor does our membership have any particular reason to trust most of us. (However, I would like to move toward a union where the membership feels more directly engaged/invested/trusting, which which is why I support the AWDU slate.)

[Z Williams]

04:40 AM on 05/06/2011

I agree! The UAW international suggests that bargaining units bigger than 7k represented workers outsource elections. For whatever reason we did not do this, and clearly that was not a very good decision. Here's hoping we can work through this mistake and resolve our election fairly!

[Kyle J Arnone]

08:09 PM on 05/05/2011

The incumbent leadership and particular USEJ candidates (certainly not all candidates) have made it their duty, through rhetorical deception, to transform democracy into divisiveness, transparency into treason, and integrity into intimidation.

In USEJ accounts of the cessation of the vote count, all fail to mention that a USEJ challenger, supporter, and the incumbent unit chair at UCLA, issued ridiculous challenges amounting to the tabling of 2/3 or more of votes stemming from Berkeley! I respect the process of challenging votes, but it was clear to everyone in the room that the challenges were politically motivated and based on an assessment of the likely outcome at Berkeley, a campus which overwhelmingly supports AWDU.

The "call [on] AWDU to withdraw their challenges that...[are] blocking the vote count for hundreds of votes at UCLA, Davis, San Diego and elsewhere" fails to recognize that this was a strategic response to USEJ's challenges to Berkeley. We did this so that the Elections Committee couldn't rule on the validity of USEJ's challenges to the Berkeley ballots without also ruling on UCLA and elsewhere and sacrificing their neutrality.

So instead of acknowledging these circumstances, some USEJ leaders have instead chosen to characterize the vote count as a "circus-like atmosphere" filled with AWDU supporters "[submit any action here] ...in a physically threatening manner." As USEJ would have you believe, when the ringmaster is no longer master, everything becomes a circus.

[USEJ]

08:42 PM on 05/05/2011

Kyle: please explain to HuffPo readers and UAW members why you thought it was OK to secretly audio record the proceedings in the ballot count room. A number of USEJ supporters and people with common sense were/are profoundly offended by being taped without consent. It made sitting in the room a stomach-churning experience.

[Julia Tomassetti]

09:43 PM on 05/05/2011

Yes- because one has a reasonable expectation of privacy (only time really that CA wiretapping law requires consent of parties) in announcements of formal challenges to Elections Committee members, challengers, and a room full of attentive people, for registration in the minutes of official union proceedings. Always amused by the narcissism of those who feel that the laws must exist to prevent others from calling them out on their bullshit or simply from irritating them. I am sure that I am violating USEJ members' first amendment rights by criticizing them in this post. Without defending the recording, I must say that, unfortunately, from my experience with the union, I am beginning to sense that transparency and accountability is often a stomach-churning experience for USEJ members.

[Anne Kelly]

11:18 PM on 05/05/2011

The "strategy" was to apply the standards of USEJ's challenges to all campuses.

If you believe USEJ's challenges were sincere, then they should be applied everywhere and not just to campuses where you will overwhelmingly lose. Otherwise your challenges might be perceived as stealing an election!

[Bob Denton]

02:14 AM on 05/06/2011

I am a UAW 2865 member and voter and I have to say that the objection to recording the proceedings baffles me. My first reaction is: the proceedings aren't already being recorded? It is truly astonishing that an audio recording of election proceedings would be characterized as an "invasion of privacy."

The incumbents, including the president of the union, have revealed to the membership that they have no problem circulating total falsehoods regarding the vote, in an attempt to divide and confuse people. Of course they don't want their actions on tape!

[Jessy Lancaster]

07:54 PM on 05/05/2011

I am an AWDU member, and I was a member of the bargaining team during the contract negations USEJ so frequently likes to mention. USEJ claims they won an "excellent contract," but they didn't. Sure, nothing was taken away from us, but nothing was given to us either. The measly wage increase doesn't even keep up with the cost of inflation! One by one, all of the things our members told us were important were ceded to the UC. Where is the protection against increasing class size? Where is the protection that we will have secure jobs, and not work quarter to quarter wondering if we will be able to stay in school? Where is the affordable housing that we need so badly?

My opinions were in the minority on that body, and the contract that was accepted by the bargaining team does not reflect what the members at my campus thought was important. This is a clear example of how USEJ is out of touch with the members. We need leadership who are actively empowering members to take part in the decision-making and day-to-day operation of our union. Members are the highest authority, and it is from them that all of our power comes.

[Rob Ackermann]

08:20 PM on 05/05/2011

Members ratified the contract by roughly 2 : 1. I think the union membership thought the contract was great, considering the massive budget deficit at UC and all over california. We tripled childcare benefits! For the first time won partial fee remission for out of state students! Perhaps some campuses thought differently, UC Berkeley and UC Santa Cruz standout as "no" voters, however I believe most grad students UC wide are proud of our contract.

[USEJ]

08:27 PM on 05/05/2011

Fascinating. "nothing was given to us either". that's a factual statement. nothing is "given" in contract negotiations. Rights and benefits are won.

To wit: we are some of the *only* public employees in California - let alone the country - that will see *any* across the board salary increases this year. You complain that 2% is not enough. OF COURSE higher salary increases would be better. That said, in a climate where most public employees are facing furloughs, wage cuts, benefit slashing and worse...

2% ain't bad. not to mentiond expanding the childcare benefit (let alone *any* childcare benefit), and retaining and expanding the fee remissions (which now include partial remission of non-resident tuition and professional degree fees).

of course all our power comes from the members - no one disagrees with that. it's condescending to resort to such polemics, inductively arguing that USEJ opposes membership power. yeah right.

[Jessy Lancaster]

09:39 PM on 05/05/2011

True USEJ, whoever you are, nothing is given in contract negotiations. So I will say that almost nothing was won. Two percent is definitely not enough. California is a very expensive place to live, and the whole time I have lived here about half of my earnings have gone towards rent. It's not a stable and sustainable way to live. Both UPTE and AFSCME got wage increases in 2010/2011 (see http://www.upte.org/about/AnnualReport2010.pdf and http://atyourservice.ucop.edu/employees/policies_employee_labor_relations/collective_bargaining_units/service_sx/contract_articles/art_41.pdf)

Yes, the childcare benefit was increased slightly. But it still comes nowhere near what parents spend keep their kids in childcare. We should not tout this as such a victory, but think of it as a stepping stone towards having the UC cover all childcare costs (or pay us enough so that we can afford such care without a subsidy).

And finally, I would like to say that the way to win is with collective action proposed and planned by members, facilitated by the leadership, not planned by top leaders and handed down to the membership to execute. Adding names to a list is not the most convincing form of collective action, a la the Report Card or Budget Letter campaigns (which both could have been more effective if their delivery and media coverage was better planned).

[Charlie Eaton]

07:38 PM on 05/05/2011

How is it not top down and corrupt for incumbents to stop a vote count because they are afraid they will lose their positions? As a union, we need to be democratic and count every vote. That's the only way we can build the strength to reverse the cuts and transform our economy.

[USEJ]

08:10 PM on 05/05/2011

Charlie: Please explain to all the readers here why, if you believe every vote should be counted, AWDU has retained an attorney, who has authored a letter, arguing that many votes at UC San Diego and UCLA should NOT be counted.

[USEJ]

08:11 PM on 05/05/2011

Additionally, USEJ did not stop the vote count, or have any role in stopping the vote count. That was a decision of the elections committee, which as you know, is a non-partisan body.

[Kyle J Arnone]

08:20 PM on 05/05/2011

Dear person hiding behind the veil of USEJ,

It was not a decision "of the elections committee" but a decision of three members (of six present that day) who happened to be in the room as the elections committee chair moved to adjourn after caucusing with a USEJ candidate for Southern VP during the "break." It seems this is neither a decision "of the elections committee" nor "non-partisan."

[Charlie Eaton]

08:42 PM on 05/05/2011

So then you agree the vote count should not have been stopped?