It’s an EmMajority Report Thursday! She speaks with Joanna Wuest, assistant professor of politics at Mount Holyoke College and author of the book Born This Way: Science, Citizenship, and Inequality in the American LGBTQ+ Movement, to discuss her recent piece in Jacobin entitled “The Best Way to Secure LGBTQ Rights: Unions.” Then, she speaks with David Broder, historian and Europe editor at Jacobin, author of Mussolini’s Grandchildren: Fascism in Contemporary Italy, to discuss the recent EU elections, and the upcoming elections in the UK and France. First, Emma runs through updates on stalling ceasefire talks, Israel’s continuing aggression in Gaza and elsewhere, some surprisingly solid SCOTUS decisions, Congressional action, RFK’s floundering candidacy, serious global warming, growing union support in the US, and Louisiana’s Ten Commandments-Commandment for school classrooms, also parsing through the recent UNHRC report on the crimes of war, crimes against humanity, and crimes of extermination, gender and sexual-based violence, and use of starvation and collective punishment. Professor Joanna Wuest then joins, diving right into the inspiring queer advocacy work coming from the new generation of union leaders, before stepping back to tackle the (multi-decades) long standing relationship between labor and queer rights, with unions providing much stronger protections from discrimination and important economic security where the US government failed to do so. After touching on the deep history of the relationship between anti-LGBTQ scapegoating of educators, and where Ron DeSantis’ “Don’t Say Gay” policy stands within that context, Professor Wuest and Emma wrap up with the important role queer folks have played in the major Starbucks unionization push over the last few years. David Broder then walks Emma through what the EU Parliament actually is and does (not much), and contextualizes the broader results of the recent round of elections, before parsing through the more worrying results out of France and Germany, which saw strong gains from the far-right RN (of Marine Le Pen) and AfD. Expanding on the France of it all, Broder tackles French PM Macron’s absurd decision to respond to the right-wing gains by calling a snap national election, what it tells us about liberals’ continued preference of the far-right over the progressive left, and what it could mean for the future of Le Pen’s party, using Italy’s Giorgia Meloni as a parallel to Le Pen’s seeming liberal-appeasing-pivot to more conventional, pro-establishment politics. After discussing the more radical brand of fascism coming out of Germany’s AfD, Emma and Broder wrap up with a brief assessment of the state of the left in Europe, and the ongoing failure of the retreat to the center (as seen in the UK).

And in the Fun Half: Emma is joined by Matt Binder and Brandon Sutton as they admire some timely crowd work, watch Tim Pool complaint about Nick Fuentes tainting white nationalism with his anti-Israel views, and listen to Glenn Greenwald and Tucker Carlson pretend to be the first people ever to point out the absurdity of anti-BDS laws. Kerry from New York on Tim Pool, Miguel from Philly on Joe Biden, and the Burgumentum continues! Lilith from Washington on the role of Zionism in a two-state solution, plus, your calls and IMs!

Check out Joanna’s piece here: https://jacobin.com/2024/06/lgbtq-rights-unions-labor

Check out David’s book here: https://www.plutobooks.com/9780745348025/mussolinis-grandchildren/

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