End Poverty in California Launches New Campaign to Uplift Worker Voices

In the wake of last year’s election, many politicians, particularly on the Democratic side, are looking for better ways to connect with working-class voters. End Poverty in California has launched a new effort designed to bring the voices of working-class individuals to the forefront of policy making. Through video storytelling, digital amplification, and community-powered events, the campaign shares a simple message: show up for the working class, listen regularly, and develop policies that reflect their wants and needs. Spotlight spoke with EPIC President Devon Gray and Head of Storytelling and Narrative Greg Kaufmann about the new project. The transcript of that conversation has been lightly edited for length and clarity.

Always good to connect with you folks. Why don’t we start with this new project, #Listen2Workers

Greg Kaufmann: What we’re doing Bill, with all the talk in the media in the wake of last year’s election about the importance of connecting with working class people and the angst about how to do it, we have a simple, humble answer: Maybe try talking to working people.

Imagine that

Right. So, hence the name of the campaign, Listen to Workers. We launched in California on June 10 with six California legislators who’ve committed to speaking to workers and we’ve done a good dozen or more interviews with workers ourselves. And as much as you and I like to listen to a long interview, we’re splitting them up in sound bites for social media, because that’s what people like to listen to today.

And is the thought to expand outside California at some point?

Yes. We are going to start, probably in early July, some outreach to Congress and we’ve got Caring Across Generations and other national partners. We want listening to workers to be a normal part of doing business for any elected official. We think that’s just a good way to do your job.

And so, the process would be elected officials talking to workers?

Yep. Some of them have talked about going in person to interview a worker in their district. Some can do it on Zoom. Some will ask for editing support from us. I think we would love to see this evolve to where there could be listen-to-worker forums where you’d have a bunch of workers in a community asking questions of their elected officials and also giving them their ideas and experiences. But right now, we’re focused on one-to-one connections.

And are you guys suggesting topics or areas for them to explore or they’re on their own?

We have a set of questions that we use that are designed to really get to know someone beyond just the workplace—their home, their home life, and also of course what’s happening at work, their aspirations and how they feel about the job their representatives are doing in connecting with them. So far, most staff members who we’ve talked to would like to see our questions but we’re not telling them what to ask.

Devon Gray: I think one of the pieces that I’m excited about with this is that we are doing our own interviews that are separate from the legislator interviews. We want workers themselves to be able to just tell their story with the movie camera that we have in our pocket because we think that there’s a value in having a quantity of stories as well in order to break through what’s a very crowded media landscape. With respect to the legislators, we’ve been pretty intentional with the half dozen or so that we’ve included in the campaign. And these are folks who within the California context at least have a reputation and a track record of actually listening to workers.

I think there’s a value add in not just talking about people doing it but showing the work that already takes place in different contexts. These are pretty big champions for not just labor priorities but working families more broadly and people who are paid for work and people who go unpaid for work. There’s this prevailing narrative that folks who are invested in progressive policy are disconnected from working people. And we know that while there’s perhaps truth to that critique to a certain extent, in many cases, there are people who are I think doing a pretty good job at keeping up with the concerns and aspirations and solutions of working people and are actually legislating around it. Sometimes we just have to show the good examples that are already taking place. I think we have enough examples of people who do it the right way that we can make that a model that others can replicate.

And are these, at least at this point, Democratic legislators that you’re working with?

Gray: They happen to be. In California, that’s just the way the math works out.

Greg, I know you and I had talked about this idea when it was first germinating and there was the thought of making it bipartisan. Is that still the goal?

Kaufmann: Yes, definitely. We think it’s an important way for elected leaders to do their daily business and it should be a normal part of their routine. We know a lot of people are struggling out there who are working hard, and so you should be connecting with them directly to understand what the obstacles are they’re facing, the solutions they see themselves, and ideally craft an agenda that’s responsive to that. Given the constant chaos in our country, it’s easy to think that there’s not a convenient time to have a one-to-one conversation with a worker or a forum with workers. We’re making the point that it just has to be a normal part of what you do.

So, in addition to being a platform for workers, this is also a way of demonstrating best practices for other legislators.

Kaufmann: It is, 100%. We’ve visited close to 25 counties in California and we’re talking to workers all the time who are working really hard and not able to make ends meet. So, where we started was this idea that you work hard and you pay your dues and, and you achieve the American dream is dead in community after community after community. We really want those stories to percolate into the conversation as much as possible and also relieve some of the stigma that a lot of people feel as they’re “coming up short.” We’re trying to create an environment where they can see a supportive community, whether it’s online or just face to face, and see real possibilities for how they work with legislators.

Devon, you mentioned defining work. I’m wondering where you guys came down on that.

Gray: Not to get too into the weeds of how we think about the narrative piece of all of this, but we exist in an ecosystem that places human value on categories of deserving and not deserving but oftentimes based off of how people are perceived to be working or not working. We know that’s an incredibly flawed paradigm. Even the nature of defining earned income as something that makes one deserving or not deserving is inherently flawed and deeply, deeply dangerous because we know that there is so much work that everyone does in the course of their daily lives. Sometimes it’s compensated, sometimes it’s not compensated. We think it’s really important that the broadest definition of work is captured in not just the stories that we’re telling, but the policy prescriptions that we’re trying to advance as well.

Kaufmann: I think that’s one reason Caring Across Generations is an important partner. When you think about a parent who has to stay at home because childcare’s cost is prohibitive or somebody caring for elderly parents who can’t afford to bring in a nurse or somebody who’s caring for a family member with a disability, there’s so many examples of people who aren’t paid for their labor. And although this campaign is not tied to a specific policy agenda, we would like to, from the stories we hear along with our partners, develop one. You can see how the expanded Child Tax Credit was so important for people who are unable to work, and we’ve had a ton of guaranteed income pilots in California that have been important for people who are unable to earn income in the formal job market. I think there are going to be tons of stories where we can help people recognize that there are a lot of people who do unpaid labor and the policy implications of that.

I know it’s very early at this point, but have you been surprised at any of the common denominators that have emerged in the interviews that you’ve done so far?

Gray: To be fair, many of these conversations do feel quite reminiscent of the conversations we’ve been having in person with people up and down the state. So, there’s a lot of parallels. But I do think the frequency of frustration that workers of different stripes are expressing around not feeling heard by policymakers was not surprising perhaps, but I think the near uniformity of that sentiment was a little bit surprising. But again, that’s pretty reflective of things that we’ve heard over the last three years or so.

I think that there’s a real appetite for people to share their story. I think there’s power to be found in one telling their own story. And I think that comes through in a lot of the conversations that we’ve had so far.

Kaufmann: It’s stunning that no matter who we talk to, whether in this campaign or in any of our work, everybody talks about housing. It’s just so consistent and so frustrating to people. Another interesting thing to me was, so far, we’ve spoken mostly with union workers, but some of them are new to the union. It’s been interesting how many people didn’t know about unions or what they could do and were kind of surprised at the difference they could make in terms of the bargaining table and protecting them and allowing them to have more of a voice.

Anything that either of you would like to add?

Gray: One of the things that I’d reiterate is the real hope is that this becomes a decentralized campaign—people telling their own story becoming a regular practice within the broader polity. And to the extent that we’re able to have folks be able to do that proactively, I think that’s how we really break through and apply the natural pressure that comes from popular movements.

Kaufmann: We want to see it spread and I have a hope that national organizations and elected officials who have spoken to wanting to see more connecting going on with working class people see this as a kind of a no brainer, We have these social media platforms now. Everybody’s got way too much going on, but it doesn’t take a lot of time to carve out, to have a conversation with somebody and share that conversation and push for other people to do more of that as well. Our politics can’t be something that only exists when the conditions are ideal.

And Bill, actually that is one more common denominator, and I’m sure you’ve seen this in your work. People are very jaded that too many politicians come around at campaign time. It’s not that they don’t talk to them, it’s that they just talk to them when they need to. That’s why I say making it part of regular business is so important. People feel like props rather than actually being listened to.