CT Must Offset Federal Cuts to Public Benefits

Connecticut Voices for Children's new report, The Case and Policy Options for Connecticut to Offset New Federal Cuts to Public Benefits, was released to a crowded room of advocates and organizers at the 25th Tax & Budget Forum.

The report examined how the state’s fiscal controls and tax structure are hurting working class families by limiting sustained, meaningful investments in human needs. The report emphasized how Connecticut can move from temporary fixes to long-term policy choices that make affordability real and fully fund communities being devastated by the MAGA “One Big Beautiful Bill Act” enacted last July.

This Act provides tax cuts that heavily benefit high-income households. Those with incomes above $500,000 a year are estimated to receive 33% of the total tax cut, amounting to $1.5 trillion over the next decade.

The law pays for the tax cuts for high-income households by making about $1.5 trillion in cuts to public benefits, reducing essential support for low- and middle-income households. This includes nearly $1.1 trillion in cuts to health care benefits, including Medicaid; allowing a more than $300 billion expansion of the Premium Tax Credit for health insurance to expire; and cutting food assistance by about $190 billion.

At least150,000 people in Connecticut are expected to lose health insurance and 58,000 households are expected to have food assistance cut. At the same time, the top 10% of households are estimated to gain more than $9,200 each.

The report presented five policy proposals that would make it possible to address these extreme and devastating inequities including raising tax rates on high-income households (single tax filers above $500,000, and married tax filers above $1 million) or high-value estates (worth more than $15 million).

Together, the policy proposals would raise close to $500 million a year, providing resources for Connecticut to close the gap left by the cruel federal cuts to human needs.

Advocates are demanding that in these dire circumstances the Legislature and Governor stand up for the people of Connecticut in this session and make sure that basic needs are funded to address health care, housing, hunger and growing poverty.

Boycott forces Avelo to End Deportation Flights

A major victory was won last week when Avelo Airlines announced they are ending their contract to conduct deportation flights for ICE with DHS. On January 27 they will leave Mesa Gateway Airport in Arizona, where the flights departed.

Last April when news of the ICE flights surfaced in New Haven, outraged immigrant rights groups, state and local elected officials and clergy launched the boycott. It spread across the country and soon Avelo ws forced to end west coast flights.

Avelo claimed they contracted with DHS for financial reasons. The boycott showed that trying to profit from deportations and family separation does not pay off.

The New Haven boycott against it's “hometown airline” at Tweed New Haven airport was soon joined by 25 cities.

During a national day of protest last May, one of many vigils at the entrance to the New Haven airport was led by the New Haven Immigrants Coalition “to mourn and stay in solidarity with those who have been and will be removed without due process.”

A New Hampshire resident purchased two billboards near the airport saying “Does your vacation support their deportation? Just say AvelNO!”

The mayor of New Haven banned all business with the airline for City travel, as did the Wilmington, Delaware City Council

Attorney General William Tong began investigating Avelo's fuel tax break with the State. Upon hearing of the company's break with DHS Tong said, “If this means that Avelo is no longer electing to profit from Trump’s cruel and reckless deportation program, the separation of families, deportation of children and citizens, and denial of due process rights, then it’s about time.”

At a New Haven press conference attended by over 100 the day after the announcement, Kica Matos president of the National Immigration Law Center declared,“We organized, we protested, we boycotted, and we said we would not stop until Avelo stopped being complicit in human suffering. Today, we celebrate. Let this be a reminder that when we fight, we win.”

The rally also protested the cold blooded murder of Rene Good by an ICE official in Minnesota.

Yale: Pay Your Fair Share

by Rev. Scot Marks

As Yale and the City of New Haven negotiate a revenue agreement in the coming year, we must work towards a transformational investment in the city that gives all our residents opportunities.

In 2024 New Haven gave a $106 million tax break to Yale and Yale New Haven Hospital. With that money we could have hired 600 teachers, built three community centers and helped 100 families get into permanent housing.

$106 million is everything to New Haven, especially our children – and it's just 2% of what Yale's endowment made in the last year alone.

I arrived in New Haven in 1964, escaping the racial and economic exploitation of the North Carolina sharecropping system keeping families like mine impoverished.

In New Haven we met its own long story of racial and economic exploitation. The American Eugenics Society on Yale's campus led the country in establishing pseudo scientific theories that helped justify segregated development in New Haven.

Yale used the labor of enslaved people to build the campus's first building and its leaders crushed what would have been the country's first HBCU.

In a moment when a federal administration is attacking US cities, censoring our country's racist history and giving more to billionaires while we suffer from a cost of living crisis, Yale must join our community and city as partners in confronting its own history and the detrimental impact on many of our residents.

New Haven should have world class schools. Instead our schools badly need repair, our teachers are underpaid and overworked, and our classrooms are overcrowded. All this while our city hosts one of the best and wealthiest educational institutions in the world.

Our movement led the way in getting Yale to increase its voluntary payment to New Haven before. This July that contribution will drop from an annual $10 million to $2 million, and to $0 the following year. And it is not enough for Yale to renew – it is time to expand. It took over 10,000 people taking action for the last commitment and now we need to redouble our efforts.

Working Class Unity Inspires the Crowd at People's World Amistad Awards

 

By Jahmal Henderson

Solidarity in the resistance movement and celebration of collective action created a powerful and inspiring People's World Amistad Awards themed “Working Class Unity to defend our rights and fight for our future.”

On a beautiful winter evening in New Haven, community activists, labor leaders, students, comrades, teachers, elected officials and allies, gathered at the First and Summerfield Church, home to the offices of Unite Here in Connecticut for the 24^th annual People's World Amistad Awards.

That strengthening spirit was immediately felt upon entering the church, where solidarity and African rhythms filled the air, as dancers performed a traditional dance.  A beautiful 96 page greeting book helped set the atmosphere.

Adam Waters, president of Unite Here Local 33 of educators at Yale welcomed everyone to “The Ami's” and announced to cheers the majority of post docs have signed cards for union recognition.

Emcees Lisa Bergmann and Ben McManus kicked off the awards with a “Resistance 2025” slideshow highlighting the year's courageous actions, rallies, picket lines, and robust union and coalition solidarity.

An inspiring youth tribute marked the 106th anniversary of the Communist Party USA. The activist youth in their teens, 20s and 30s, some in the Young Communist League, lined up shoulder-to-shoulder to deliver a message of unity and organizing to change the conditions they face and make a better future.

“We pay tribute to the CPUSA, for its vision of equality and justice and its constant example of organizing with many other freedom fighters against fascism and for a better world,” they said to applause. “We step forward unapologetic and unafraid, bending the arc of history toward justice. Building a collective vision of solidarity and humanity and upholding the worth of each of us.”

The first Award was jointly presented to Norma Martinez-HoSang executive director, and Constanza Segovia organizing director, of Connecticut For All. Seth Freeman, a 2024  Awardee and president of the Congress of Connecticut Community Colleges (4Cs) presented the award, praising their leadership of the multi-racial labor community coalition united to end systemic inequalities and build power for racial and economic justice in Connecticut.

Drawing from her life, family, and educational experiences, Norma said that she “learned early on the critical importance of coalition building and fighting together for what people truly deserve”. She said this history is why the awards hold such a special meaning. “This celebration is not about the individual being honored but all the movements in the room committed to freedom and building a world in solidarity, peace and justice.” 

Constanza spoke about the profound importance of collective action and being part of the larger movement. She stressed, "The truth is that I’m nothing without all of you here, My work has no place if it’s not surrounded by the hundreds of thousands of workers that are members of our coalition, and I find great joy in that truth.”

IAM Local 700 president Wayne McCarthy received the Award from John Harrity, a 2003 Awardee and former president of the Connecticut State Council of Machinists. He praised Wayne for his leadership, as president at three different Pratt & Whitney plants over the years, and called upon everyone to follow this example and get involved.

After sharing his journey through the labor movement, Wayne detailed the historic 23-days in May strike at Pratt & Whitney that won job security, wage increases and improved benefits. The strike made a national impact defying the all-out attack on labor. He described how the 3,000 machinists stood firm. “Our resolve cannot be broken as the rain and cold weather eventually gave way to sunshine as we continued twenty three days on the picket lines in Middletown and East Hartford,” he said acknowledging his children who are among those members.

The final award was presented by 2024 Awardee and 1199 retiree Maribel Rodriguez to Tabitha Sookdeo, executive director of Connecticut Students For A Dream. Tabitha shared the story of her childhood in Guyana and the obstacles she overcame in the U.S., explaining how she channeled those challenges into powerful advocacy for undocumented youth and their families.

 

“Let us remember that the vast majority of our community is struggling with the effects of greed and a wave of authoritarianism, both local and global. Let us not be divided by identity, but be brought together by our collective struggle as working class people who simply try to make enough to provide for our children and for our aging parents who somehow continue to have to work as they get older and as wage inequality grows even steeper.”

“May we band together to care for one another as our communities come further under attack,” she said.  

 

A crowd of New Haven students and educators were called forward for recognition “In Solidarity,” with their work for immigration justice by Leslie Blatteau, 2023 Awardee and New Haven teachers union president.

Melony Yuda, a high school leader with CT Students For A Dream, emphasized student activism and the power of speaking out against injustice.

“When young people organize things change, conversations change, policies change, communities change, cause nobody knows what we need better than ourselves ,” she said as gifts of small plants were handed out.

The evening was highlighted with a multi-cultural concert of freedom songs and traditional African dance, performed by Brian Jarawa Gray and Friends.

Scotttesia Marks moved the audience with a beautiful rendition of Sam Cooke’s "A Change Is Gonna Come," followed by a lovely performance of Cambia todo Cambia by Teresa Quintana, an Awardee in 2024.

A powerful enactment of Paul Robeson’s "What is America to Me?" was followed by the event's Call to Action presented by Jahmal Henderson and Lisa Bergmann to a standing ovation.

​”We are the multi-racial working class. Our power is in our labor, that creates all wealth, and in our numbers when we are organized. Our vision of equality and working class democracy is our strength.,” said the call.

The People's World Amistad Awards continue to serve as a vital gathering for the movement around the state, strengthening a multiracial, working-class coalition dedicated to defending our rights and transforming our country by prioritizing people, peace, and planet before profits.

Educators Declare Contract Impasse and Demand Real Solutions for Students and Community

New Haven — Teachers in New Haven Public Schools called on city leaders Tuesday to resolve the teaching and learning crisis facing their students and families, on the eve of the legally-imposed deadline for a mutual settlement before the matter is referred to arbitration. .

The certified educators and members of the labor-community coalition held a press conference at City Hall to urge Mayor Justin Elicker to embrace the real solutions they’ve proposed for what union members and students need in contract negotiations.

Leaders of the New Haven Federation of Teachers (NHFT) have since late-September been in talks with district representatives to secure a new contract. For months, they have put forward numerous proposals to improve their students’ learning conditions by addressing the root causes of educator recruitment and retention shortfalls.

Many are still outstanding, forcing union leaders to declare impasse, noting that if the mayor does not direct school board representatives to reach a mutual settlement on the outstanding issues by Wednesday evening, a neutral, third-party arbitrator decides the final outcome.

In addition to refusing union members’ reasonable proposals for class sizes, special education supports, healthcare and salaries, city leaders are failing to meet the moment, said the New Haven Federation of Teachers.

The union emphasized that “After months of negotiations, the city leadership's inflexibility threatens to drive hundreds of hardworking educators out of the Elm City’s classrooms and deprive students of the learning opportunities they deserve.”

Tuesday’s impasse announcement follows months of active engagement by hundreds of educators, as well as their students and families, in support of securing a fair, honorable contract. These efforts to boost investments in New Haven public schools’ future by improving student learning have taken place while the city’s fund balance has exceeded $59 million. 

The previous week during public comment at the Board of Education meeting, speakers said prioritizing public education must include investments from the City of New Haven alongside continuing pressure to increase state funding. Speakers also emphasized that Yale University has a $44 billion endowment and should be expected to contribute in lieu of taxes enough funds to assure world class public education in New Haven.