Dori: Labor unions use LGBTQ community to bully NW supermarket chain

I have a serious question for the LGBTQ community, around here and elsewhere. Do you ever get sick and tired of groups that couldn’t care less about using you for their thuggish means?

There is a story that has been unfolding for several months in the Central District. I want to give credit to the Capitol Hill Blog, which has been covering this extensively for a long time. And by the way, they’re not the ones accusing the LGBTQ community of being used — I am. Because the more I look at this, the more I understand that groups like the LGBTQ community get absolutely used by other groups like organized labor.

There is a Northwest-based supermarket that has been planned for the Central District called New Seasons. When New Seasons opened up a Ballard location in May, they had all kinds of protesters because they are not a union shop. That makes labor unions resort to tactics that involve using anyone to extort demands and get their way. So the unions — in the guise of community groups — presented a list of demands to New Seasons and threatened to cause a stir on social media and in protests if New Seasons did not agree to the demands.

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New Seasons is based in Portland and was started by a couple of families nearly 20 years ago. They talk about their progressive values and say all the right things for this liberal region. But these community groups — which are driven by labor unions — gave the supermarket a list of demands and promised that if the demands were met, the campaign against the company would stop.

One of the demands is that New Seasons become a union shop. They also must disclose workforce demographics, let low-income customers use Fresh Bucks to buy produce, stock affordable staple foods, and donate some profits to affordable housing groups.

Everything on that list is a smokescreen except for the unionization. All of the other stuff is to make it look like they actually care about other people. But this is all about unionization.

What the unions have been saying about this grocery store is that New Seasons is anti-LGBTQ. What do they base that on? This is where it gets really fascinating. I want you to understand just how thuggish things are in our progressive city.

There is a charitable foundation based in Vancouver, Wash. called the Murdock Trust. The Murdock Trust owns 1.5 percent of this supermarket, which is nothing. The trust has been around for nearly 50 years, donating money to institutions like SPU, Seattle U, Reed College, the Northwest Association of Blind Athletes and a program that works with kids on the autism spectrum and gets them on horseback. In their mission statement, they aim to grant funds to institutions that “strengthen the region’s educational, social, spiritual, and cultural base.” This is a charitable foundation that has given hundreds of millions to wonderful causes over the last 45 years to colleges, universities, and other wonderful nonprofits.

The Murdock Trust has also given money to the Alliance Defending Freedom. We’ve had the Alliance Defending Freedom on the show a lot. When government tries to run roughshod over businesses that have some Christian principles, the Alliance Defending Freedom will provide pro bono legal work. One of the groups that the Alliance Defending Freedom has helped out is that Colorado cake Supreme Court case, where the baker did not want to bake a cake for a gay wedding because of his Christian faith.

Now that you know all the facts, is it maybe exaggerating to call the supermarket anti-LGBTQ? The supermarket has a long track record of progressive values. They have gotten awards for diversity, including in the LGBTQ community. They campaigned for marriage equality in Oregon.

But, now they are being attacked by a labor union that wants to thuggishly create a perception that is at best a gross exaggeration to use that as leverage. So you have the gay, lesbian, transgender community just being used. Is that an honest debate? Is that reflective of a city that says it values diversity and progressiveness? No. It is the labor left using thuggish tactics to try to force a private business to cave in. That’s how things are played out in this city. Find a group that identifies as marginalized, wrap them in your thuggish ways, and use them.

Labor unions control all of government around here. And then they hijack other groups that have the proper liberal buzzwords and use them to get their way. That’s business as usual in our progressive city.

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