Sen. Bernie Sanders (I-Vt.) on Wednesday accused the nation’s largest dairy cooperative of closing the St. Albans Creamery to retaliate against its nearly 80 unionized workers for going on strike last year. Standing alongside workers outside the shuttered facility, Sanders called on the Dairy Farmers of America to reverse its decision, which he said would have wide-reaching implications for creamery workers, farmers and the state’s struggling dairy industry. “The bottom line is this plant it vital to dairy farmers, it is vital to this entire community,” Sanders said. “It must not be closed.” Kansas City-based Dairy Farmers of America, the nation’s largest dairy cooperative, announced in June that it would “idle” the creamery, which has been central to the Franklin County dairy industry for more than 100 years. It denied Sanders’ claims as “ridiculous and inaccurate.” The farmer-owned cooperative acquired the facility in 2019 through a merger with the St. Albans Cooperative Creamery. Local dairy farmers voted to join DFA in part because the larger cooperative promised to invest $30 million in the aging facility. Ted Westover speaking in St. Albans Credit: Kevin McCallum But last year, creamery workers represented by the Teamsters went on strike to demand better pay and working conditions, ultimately inking what they said was a fair contract. When they went back to work, however, the atmosphere at the facility had changed, workers said. Managers began implementing a host of “unwritten rules.” “It was difficult,” said creamery worker Ted Westover, who added that he had hoped to retire from the plant someday. “We want to go back to work.” Less than a year after signing the contract, the company decided to close the plant, which Sanders said struck him as an unlikely coincidence. “This decision by DFA to close this plant appears to be nothing more than illegal union busting,” Sanders said. Sanders offered scant evidence that the decision was retaliatory, however, instead urging DFA leadership to “do the right thing” and reopen the plant. “In the United States of America, you have a right to form a union and go on strike,” he said.“It is illegal for a company to punish workers because they exercised their constitutional rights.” A federal judge in Burlington on Monday issued a five-day restraining order blocking DFA from closing the plant. Members of Teamsters Local No. 597 carried a copy of the order as they sought to go back to work Wednesday. Sen. Bernie Sanders (I-Vt.) speaking to creamery workers Credit: Kevin McCallum Union president Curtis Clough held the order up to a security camera and read it aloud to a worker inside the building, who did not let union members in. Workers instead signed in sheet of paper indicating they had showed up for work that day. Another hearing in federal court is scheduled for Thursday. The union claimed in court that it had come into possession of an internal corporate memo that claimed idling the plant would, among other benefits, help “decertify” the union. DFA officials told the union and the judge the document was “fake” and perhaps generated by artificial intelligence. In a statement Wednesday, DFA said the document was “fraudulent” and “illegitimate” and filled with “clear inaccuracies,” and blasted the union for moving forward with a lawsuit based on it. DFA creamery in St. Albans Credit: Kevin McCallum “The decision to idle the St. Albans plant was not made lightly and came after a long and thorough review of multiple alternatives, as well as deep analysis of the region’s dairy market dynamics, operational considerations, and long-term business needs,” the company said. “It was completely unrelated to last year’s strike activity, and any suggestion that it was retaliatory is ridiculous and inaccurate.” The post Sanders Calls for the St. Albans Creamery to Reopen appeared first on Seven Days. ...read more read less