 So, back in December of 2021, the very first Starbucks store in the company's history voted to form a union in Buffalo, New York. And as of today, 366 stores have voted to form unions, which is a rate of progression that is genuinely astounding. And it's even more impressive considering the ways in which the company has gone above and beyond to break up these unions, including the CEO himself going out of his way to denounce unions and scold workers for daring to even consider forming a union. As Julia Connolly of Common Dreams explains, Howard Schultz has played a central role in attempting to quash unionization efforts at the company's stores across the country. After workers in Buffalo launched efforts to form a bargaining unit in 2021, the Starbucks co-founder flew into the city to hold an anti-union meeting with employees just before they were set to vote on the issue. The CEO, who was scheduled to leave the company in April, has been personally named in some of the 75 complaints against Starbucks, filed by the National Labor Relations Board General Counsel, accusing the company of illegal union-busting tactics such as intimidation and retaliation. And we've talked about the myriad ways in which that Starbucks has tried to bust up these unions. That includes cutting benefits, cutting hours, so employees no longer qualify for benefits on top of that, firing employees, intimidating employees, offering exclusive new benefits packages to non-union employees, closing stores down. I mean, they've gone above and beyond, and they've been so shameless that the National Labor Relations Board quite literally demanded Howard Schultz, the CEO, to issue an apology to workers and explain to them what their legal rights are as employees. But what does Howard Schultz say about this unionization effort in his company? Well, he is dismissing it and essentially claiming it's not because of the bad working conditions and low pay and bad benefits. Just because these employees, you know, they're just angry at the world. That's literally what he said, quote, sometimes Schultz struggled to understand why his unionizing workers were so angry, quote, they're angry at the world, they're angry at their situation, which I understand Schultz said in an interview. Imagine being that stupid and having that much power. You don't know why your employees are unionizing, but yet you understand that they're angry, angry at the world and angry at the situation. If you put two and two together, you'd see that this situation has been created for them because of late stage capitalism and greedy employers like you, who exploit them, you become extremely rich, purchase mansions and yachts while they can't even afford rent, while they struggle to get by. And you just can't understand why they're fed up and they're unionizing. Howard Schultz is genuinely a dipshit and we already knew this, right? When he was flirting with the presidential run back in 2019, 2018 after, you know, thinking that Bernie Sanders would be the front runner, I think he made it very clear that he's out of touch and he's just stupid. Like I don't like to go out of my way to lob these ad hominem attacks at individuals, but I think he's actually stupid. So he's sitting here with his employees who he knows are angry and he just can't figure out why they're unionizing. He just talks at them and scolds them, but he doesn't actually listen. Now, on top of that, he's refusing to be held accountable for his union busting tactics. HuffPost reports Bernie Sanders, who chairs the Senate committee on health, education, labor and pensions, had sent a letter to the coffee chain on February 7th, asking that Schultz appear on Capitol Hill next month. But in a response Tuesday night, Starbucks offered instead to send another executive, AJ Jones, the second vice president and top spokesperson. What a weasley little coward. You see, he likes to talk tough and puff out his chest when he's talking down to his employees who he loves to exploit, but when it comes to answering questions before a senator, sorry, I'm going to send in a surrogate instead, who has all of these corporate talking points memorized. Despicable, just genuinely despicable. Now, Bernie Sanders responded to his refusal to show up. And just to be clear before we get to Bernie's response here, he wasn't subpoenaed, so he's not breaking the law by not showing up. But when a Senate committee invites you to testify, you should probably testify before them. But Bernie Sanders is tacitly threatening to subpoena him, since he didn't show up. Here's what Bernie Sanders said via Twitter. It is disappointing, but not surprising that Howard Schultz, the CEO and director of Starbucks, has declined an invitation from a majority of members on the help committee to testify at a U.S. Senate hearing to answer why the National Labor Relations Board has lodged over 75 complaints against Starbucks for violating federal labor laws. Apparently, it is easier for Mr. Schultz to fire workers who are exercising their constitutional right to form unions and to intimidate others who may be interested in joining a union than to answer questions from elected officials. If Mr. Schultz believes that a multi-billion-dollar corporation like Starbucks can break federal labor law with impunity, he is mistaken. As the chairman of the Senate Help Committee, I intend to hold Mr. Schultz and Starbucks accountable for their unacceptable behavior and look forward to seeing him before our committee. And there it is right there. We will see you before our committee. We invited you as a courtesy to be polite, but since you rejected our invitation, well, maybe we subpoena you and force you to testify here. So you personally can explain why you're breaking federal labor laws. So I love this story. I love that Bernie Sanders is holding his feet to the fire. Every single large multi-billion-dollar company who does this, they should be held accountable. And Starbucks, it's not like they're an exception to the rule, right? This is common. But they've been so shameless in their union busting that I think that it would be who've senators like Bernie Sanders, who are pro-union to make an example out of him in particular, because you can't get away with this. If you can get away with this, then what's the point of these federal laws? So kudos to Bernie Sanders for calling him out and shaming him. But next, we need to see the subpoena because this can't stand. He needs to answer for his law-breaking. If you or I broke the law as shamelessly as the CEOs, we would go to jail. But because it's a multi-millionaire, potentially a billionaire, I don't know how much he's worth. It's fine. He'll just send in a surrogate, not acceptable. Subpoena him and bring down the hammer, Bernie.