62 Time February 15/February 22, 2021
DEEMED ‘ESSENTIAL,’ SOME TURN TO
UNIONS FOR PROTECTION FROM COVID-19
By Abigail AbramsCerue CoTTon never expeCTed To find her-
self on a picket line. As a forklift operator for
Cash-Wa, a regional food distributor in Fargo, N.D.,
she enjoyed the physical challenges and responsi-
bility of her job, and was used to working overnight
hours. Then COVID-19 arrived.
The coronavirus, which had seemed like a far-
away problem last spring and summer, began spik-
ing in her community in September. Cotton had
a newborn baby and two older children at home,
both of whom have asthma. She no longer felt safe
going to work. For months, Cash-Wa had failed to
require masks in its warehouses, enforce social-
distancing rules or screen employees. The compa-
ny’s only precautions, she says, were handing out
cloth masks and placing two bottles of hand sani-
tizer in the break room. By late November, Cotton
and her fellow workers—all deemed “essential”
under guidance from the federal government—had
reached a breaking point. They banded together
and refused to work for 24 hours.
“I was super nervous because it was my very first
time doing a strike,” Cotton says.
Nation
Workers
On the Line