Labor Day Solidarity Season Opens in DC

WASHINGTON (08-29) – Kicking off Labor Day weekend on August 28, the “Solidarity Season Rally and March” organized by the Metropolitan Washington Council AFL-CIO demonstrated the importance of workers by reminding everyone that “Workers make DC run and deserve better than mass firings, union busting, deportations, and occupation.” They demonstrated their “…support for Federal workers and labor rights, our opposition to union-busting” by highlighting “working-class solidarity over the billionaire ruling class.”

Promising that the action was only the first step in organizing not “…just for one day, but to build labor power across the district, in every shop floor, school, restaurant, and municipal and federal building.”

Opening the rally, speaker Sam Epps, President of the Metropolitan Washington Council AFL-CIO representing 150 local unions and 150,000 workers in DC and Maryland, called for “people power, union power and a free DC.”

Epps called for “workers over billionaires” during Solidary Season and to “fight for those who have been attacked by this administration.” He accused the Trump administration of having created the highest unemployment rate in the nation here in DC for the third month in a row, saying that it was a direct cause of the firing of federal workers and that they “deserve better than they have been treated.”

He further noted that no one should be getting arrested for being a delivery worker, while on the METRO or at traffic check points, calling it “wrong, period!” Those approving such tactics, he stressed, are on “the wrong side of workers and the wrong side of history.” Epps ended by saying that the way to stop this is through collective action.

“DC is not the crime-infested city this administration wants us to believe” is how Ottis Johnson Jr., National Vice President of the 14th District of the American Federation of Government Employees (AFGE) representing DC and Metropolitan government employees both here and in Europe, termed it.

He stated “this story line is a distraction meant to scare people and to pull union workers away from issues that matter to our members. It will not work, not today, not on our watch. AFGE will always fight for our members.”

“Whatever this administration throws at us, we are going to throw it back at them even harder,” he said. “We fight smart, we fight together, we fight with the law, we fight with the facts, and with our solidarity. They want headlines, we want results. They want photo ops, we want contracts that lift people up, they want us to be quiet, but we are just going to get louder.”

Epps closed by saying: “To the administration, hear this loud and clear, respect the workers who make America work. Because we are ready, we are organized, and we are coming. Let’s back get back to work and, release those Epstein files!”

At the close of the rally, the crowd of more than 400 hundred marched behind a large “Solidarity” banner from Dupont Circle across the city stopping first at Whole Foods where they loudly called for a boycott of Amazon and Whole Foods both owned by Jeff Bezos, and for “Workers over billionaires.” It was not lost on anyone that the billionaire Bezos recently spent between $47 to $56 million on his Venetian wedding to Lauren Sánchez. Disgusted protesters in Venice in June held “No space for Bezos” in reaction to treating their city as a wedding favor and for the vulgar display of excess along with Bezos’ attempted takeover of La Serenissima.

Next, the crowd of protesters marched to Washington’s ever-popular and tony French restaurant, Le Diplomate, where workers have been attempting to join Local 25 Union of hotel, restaurant and casino workers. Stopping outside the restaurant while occupying the busy street, they called on patrons to boycott the restaurant by leaving.

Le Diplomate is one of more than 40 in a portfolio owned by the STARR Group in three states, the District of Columbia and in Paris, France. According to the restaurant website, the group was founded by CEO Steven Starr in 1995 and is “one of the largest multi-concept and independent restaurant groups in the country.”

Earlier during the rally, one woman who has worked for four years in the kitchen at Le Diplomate, related her experience in Spanish by calling for respect for herself and other hourly workers. Accompanied by fellow co-workers, she said that “on occasions she has felt disrespected at work” and was once hit hard on the shoulder by a chef. She went on to say that the cost of a hamburger at Le Diplomate was more than she earns in an hour. So, she and her colleagues have decided to organize and join the union for a living wage and affordable health insurance and in fighting for a better future. She closed by relating that she is pregnant and now fighting for her baby’s future as well.

Protesters formed a picket line and marched for several minutes around the entrance of Le Diplomate effectively shutting it down during the busy dinner hour. Two counter protest waiters stood outside behind the police barricade holding “No Union” signs to little effect. Chanting loudly and carrying signs saying the restaurant is a non-union establishment, they also accused the chain of union busting tactics along with “unjust working conditions” and harassment of workers.

Report and photos by Phil Pasquini

© 2025 nuzeink all rights reserved worldwide