ILWU Longshore Workers: Keep Up the Fight Against C&H Union Busting!

July 24, 2026 - For the past six weeks C&H Sugar has pulled out all stops to break the strike by ILWU Local 6 warehouse workers at its operation in Crockett. ILWU Local 10 workers who unload the sugar at Crockett have stood with Local 6 on the picket lines from the beginning. C&H is now replacing their jobs with scab labor. On Tuesday, longshore workers at the Oakland, Sacramento and Stockton ports showed in action the kind of fight it will take to beat the C&H union busters. At 10 a.m., they walked off the job, jumped in their cars and drove to Crockett. Building pickets that kept the scabs out, they shut down C&H’s operations for 24 hours.

In the late afternoon, cops from the Contra Costa County Sheriff's department, armed with tear gas canister guns, came out and declared the pickets at one gate an “unlawful assembly.” Some picketers were thrown to the ground, others manhandled, and ten ILWU members and strike supporters on the lines were arrested. The PMA got an arbitrator to order longshoremen back to work. The ILWU leadership beat a retreat, telling longshoremen to return to work for the night shift.

There is no question that the union is in a tough spot. The billionaire Fanjul brothers who own C&H have spent millions to break the strike and bust the ILWU. They have flown in scabs and put them up in hotels, and hired their own private strikebreaking security cops and high-priced lawyers to file legal actions against the ILWU. But to stand down now will be seen by C&H as evidence that the union isn't prepared to go the distance to defend itself.

As in any other battle the balance of forces is critical. ILWU members demonstrated their resolve to back up the C&H strikers. Don’t let the leadership fritter that away. Union members need to fight now to turn things around. The union flexed its muscle on Tuesday, showing longshore workers’ power to choke the vital West Coast supply chain. There must be a fight for pickets that have the numbers to shut C&H down!

There is no guarantee the union will win. But one thing’s for sure: if the ILWU doesn't throw everything it has at the C&H union busters it will surely lose. The ILWU wouldn't even exist if the leaders of the 1934 strike hadn't mobilized other unions and strike supporters on their side against strikebreaking company thugs, cops and National Guard troops. Now, ILWU members need to fight to change the leadership's course before it is too late.

Filipino organizations have gone all out to stand with the ILWU, drawing the connection between the ILWU’s fight against C&H and the murderous conditions faced by sugar workers on the Philippine island of Negros. Other leftists have mobilized to reinforce the pickets. If the ILWU shows it means business it can draw in other unions and strike supporters from around the Bay Area.

The U.S. rulers are on a rampage around the world while squeezing more out of the workers at home. If the ILWU, a powerhouse of the labor movement, loses this fight it will be open season on every other union in the region. Build mass pickets to shut C&H Crockett down tight! Let’s win this one!