Walmart Downplays Upcoming Black Friday Protests, Citing Outside Influence
The Retail Action Project (RAP) urged supporters to "show solidarity" for Walmart employees on Black Friday in what it called the "first-ever sit-down strike at Walmart" sponsored by OUR (Organization United for Respect) Walmart. RAP was organizing protesters from New…
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York, offering bus transportation on Black Friday to the Walmart in North Bergen, New Jersey, where it said associates from across the country are planning "even bigger actions to take on Walmart." The actions are intended to support workers who are "standing up for a better future," RAP said Thursday. The pitch letter cited a BuzzFeed article about Walmart workers who sat down in aisles of a Southern California store for about two hours Nov. 13 to draw attention to what they've called “unfair labor practices." Walmart spokesman Kory Lundberg told us: “This is the third year we’ve seen [OUR Walmart] do the same thing.” That a group like RAP would recruit people to go to the demonstration “underscores that the people taking part in this are not Walmart workers,” Lundberg said. “They’re not people who work with the company and not people who are associated with the company,” he said. On whether there will be repercussions for workers who participate in protests, Lundberg said that will be handled on a case-by-case basis. For workers participating “off the clock,” the retailer largely respects the rights of its workers to express themselves, he said. “We’re going to do our best to minimize the disruptions to our customers and our associates from these demonstrations that are mainly made up of folks that don’t work for the company,” he said.