Mexico's president unleashes labor unrest at border plants

MEXICO CITY — A mass strike at 48 “maquiladora,” or manufacturer, plants in Mexico’s border city of Matamoros is heading for victory, bringing pay raises for laborers who make less than $1 an hour, or about 100 pesos a day, assembling auto components and TV sets for export to the United States - and causing jitters for the business community.

The labor battle broke out in mid-January after President Andres Manuel Lopez Obrador decreed a doubling of the minimum wage in Mexico’s border zones, apparently unaware that some union contracts at the maquiladora plants are indexed to minimum wage increases. The decree sparked a wave of walkouts involving about 25,000 workers.

The maquiladoras claim the strikes threaten the very existence of their industry, which has attracted over 5,000 mostly foreign-owned plants and 2 million jobs by paying very low wages. Union leaders say those worries are overblown, noting that workers at the border plants still earn far less than their counterparts in the United States.

Less than a week after the strike broke out, a majority of the export plants in Matamoros - 29 companies with a total of about 34 factories - have agreed to the union demands.

Lopez Obrador also has shown a certain fondness for militant union bosses like Mine Workers’ head Napoleon Gomez Urrutia and the head of the Electrical Workers Union, Martin Esparza, even though both have been accused of questionable financial deals and of holding more protests than negotiations.

But Zuniga brushes off suggestions that Lopez Obrador favors the miners’ union, and he dismisses accusations that he and other strike organizers are helping President Donald Trump’s campaign to bring manufacturing plants back to the United States.

“Unfortunately, people here in Matamoros live on very low salaries,” Zuniga said. “There is no plot, no conspiracy, other than to protect and help the workers.”

https://www.washingtontimes.com/news/2019/feb/3/andres-manuel-lopez-obrador-mexicos-president-unle/

Trump's secretary blasts leak of president's private schedule

President Trump’s executive assistant took the unusual step Sunday night of defending the president publicly against a report that he spends most of his days in unstructured “executive time.”

Madeleine Westerhout, the president’s personal secretary whose desk is just outside the Oval Office, called it a “disgraceful breach of trust” for a West Wing insider to leak Mr. Trump’s private daily schedules for the past three months.

‏Axios reported Sunday that the schedules show the president spends an average of 60 percent of each day in unstructured “executive time,” primarily in the White House residence in the morning before he arrives in the West Wing. The report said Mr. Trump spends much of that time watching TV, tweeting and talking on the phone.

“What these don’t show are the hundreds of calls and meetings @realDonaldTrump takes everyday,” Ms. Westerhout tweeted. “This POTUS is working harder for the American people than anyone in recent history.”

https://www.washingtontimes.com/news/2019/feb/3/madeleine-westerhout-trump-secretary-blast-leak-pr/

>>5021298 Democrats Offer Plan to Release All Child Traffickers at Border into U.S.

NOTABLE

THIS is the discussion to have with those not in favor of the border security.

THIS is what Dems want.

Indefensible.

>>5021448

Fire watch made for comfy bread in the olden days.

Here's the 'Just Stand" Super Bowl Ad REJECTED by CBS.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=DQP4jG2u2wE

>>5021518

The advertisement contains footage of American soldiers, military equipment, first responders, the graves of fallen soldiers, and is narrated by former U.S. Marine Mark Geist, who is a survivor of the Benghazi terrorist attack. It also urges Americans to stand for the flag in response to the controversy surrounding NFL players who knelt in protest during the playing of the national anthem.

“Don’t ask if your loyalty is crazy. Ask if it’s crazy enough,” Geist says in the advertisement. “When they question you running toward danger for those who are unable or unwilling, when they laugh at the thought of you willingly sacrificing your life for someone you may never know, stay that way.”

He continues: “Some people think you’re crazy for being loyal, defending the Constitution, standing for the flag. Then I guess I’m crazy. And for those who kneel, they fail to understand that they can kneel, that they can protest, that they can despise what I stand for—even hate the truth that I speak—but they can only do that because I am crazy enough.”

>>5021590

Northam down?

Fairfax next?

Who's at bat after Fairfax?