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April 4, 2023

Starbucks Worker Alexis Rizzo Fired After Leading Historic Union Organizing Campaign
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Starbucks has fired another worker who led a historic union organizing
campaign in 2021. Alexis Rizzo was a shift supervisor at Starbucks's
Genesee Street store in Buffalo, New York, one of the first two stores
in the U.S. to form a union. She was fired just weeks after the National
Labor Relations Board accused Starbucks of engaging in "egregious and
widespread misconduct" to prevent workers from organizing, and just two
days after former Starbucks CEO Howard Schultz testified to Congress
about the company's union-busting record. Rizzo worked at Starbucks for
seven years, since she was 17 years old. She told Democracy Now! her
firing left her "devastated."

Alexis Rizzo: "I'm going to be fighting tooth and nail to get my job
back. I think it's not at all a coincidence that this happened two days
after Howard Schultz had his ego bruised in front of the Senate. I was
fired that day. Two other partners in Buffalo were fired on the same
day. Another very vocally pro-union shift supervisor here was written up
on the same day. And I don't think that's a coincidence whatsoever. I
think Howard Schultz was trying to prove to us that he does still have
power over us, and this is how we can exercise it. But it's not just
that; for me, it's losing my whole life."

Click here to see our interview with Jaysin Saxton, another Starbucks
worker fired after organizing a union


.