prop 22 gig

belated 12/20 ca legis got rolled on soda tax with THREAT of prop?!

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mta 1/22 sys collapse panel Lawrence Abbott- Labor Organizer and California Move to Amend Affiliate Coordinator

prop 22 uber 204m vs union 16m$ East bay

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1 26 2020 California Proposition 22 - Wikipedia

Proposition 22 was a ballot initiative in California that became law after the November 2020 state election, passing with 59% of the vote and granting app-based transportation and delivery companies an exception to Assembly Bill 5 by classifying their drivers as "independent contractors", rather than "employees".^[1][2][3][4] The law exempts employers from providing the full suite of mandated employee benefits (which include time-and-a-half for overtime, paid sick time, employer-provided health care, bargaining rights, and unemployment insurance) while instead giving drivers new protections:

120 percent of the local minimum wage for each hour a driver spends driving (with passenger or en route), but not for time spent waiting
$0.30/mile for expenses for each mile driven with passenger or en route
health insurance stipend for drivers who average more than 15 hours per week driving
requiring the companies to pay medical costs and some lost income for drivers hurt while driving or waiting
prohibiting workplace discrimination and requiring that companies develop sexual harassment policies, conduct criminal background checks, and mandate safety training for drivers.^[5][6][7][8]

The initiative became state law after passage in November 2020, was challenged in California state courts in 2021, and was upheld on appeal in 2023 and by the California Supreme Court in 2024.

Background

In 2019, Assembly Bill 5 was passed, and it was designed by lawmakers to require companies to classify ride-hail drivers and other gig-economy workers as "employees".^[7][9] It requires companies to classify all workers as employees unless companies can prove that the workers: are not directed or controlled by the company during their work time, and their work is not the company's "core" business, and the worker has their own business doing that type of work.^[7]: 1 ^[9] Lyft and Uber refused to comply with this law, and stated a desire to keep drivers classified as independent contractors.^{[10][11][8][12}]

In August 2020, the California court ordered Uber and Lyft to comply with the law within a 10-day deadline.^[13][14]: 1 The companies said they would shut down their operation in California if drivers had to become employees.^[2][15][16] On August 20, the deadline day, the companies asked for an extension. The court granted an extension until November 4, 2020, on the condition that Uber and Lyft CEOs provide a sworn testimony by October 4 confirming their plan to comply with AB 5.^[15][2][17] The companies indicated they would no longer shut down.^[18] The ride-hail companies, joined by DoorDash and Instacart,^[2] supported Proposition 22 for the November 3, 2020, ballot election, which was held one day prior to the extended AB 5 deadline on November 4.^[17]

In an opinion piece in The New York Times, Uber's CEO Dara Khosrowshahi advocated for the legal creation of a third employment classification between the current mutually exclusive classes of "employee" and "independent contractor", claiming it was necessary to allow gig workers to have the flexibility and freedom to fit work into their schedules, while also allowing companies to provide some benefits for them without being forced into the full requirements associated with "employee" classification. According to Khosrowshahi, the employee classification does not allow schedules chosen by the employee, or under 40 hour schedules like the "independent contractor" classification does.^{[19][2][20][16}] He also called for benefits funds, which would pay workers extra cash for each hour worked, that they could use for the benefits they want, (like health insurance or paid time off), while allowing them to work for multiple different companies, all of which would give them cash for this benefit fund based on the hours worked for each company.^{[19][2][7][16}]

Driver earnings

In July 2020, before Prop 22 passed, the California Legislative Analyst's Office stated in an analysis of the Proposition: "Most drivers work part time and many drivers only work for a short time or only drive occasionally." and "Most drivers probably make between $11 and $16 per hour, after accounting for waiting time and driving expenses."^[5][21]

Projected effects

...

Support

Lyft, Uber, DoorDash, Instacart, and Postmates contributed over $205 million into campaigns supporting Prop 22, making it the most expensive ballot measure in California's history.^[25][26] This included major funding for the Yes on Prop 22 campaign,^[27] and promoting the proposed legislation directly to customers when using their app.^[28][29] Beyond in-app messaging, this investment manifested itself in billboards, digital, print, and radio ads, as well as dozens of lobbyists and voter mailers. Several critiques have been made claiming that these initiatives carried messages that were misleading to persuade voters, with many advertisements informing voters that a "no" outcome for the proposition would put drivers' occupations in jeopardy, among other messages.^[30]

Some of the companies also forced their workers to support and promote the legislation: Uber sent its drivers in-app messages forcing them to click on either "Yes on Prop 22" or "OK", Instacart ordered its workers to place pro-Prop 22 stickers in customers' shopping bags, and DoorDash forced delivery drivers to use bags saying "Yes on 22".^[31][32]

Title litigation

The ballot title, written by Attorney General Xavier Becerra, is "Exempts App-Based Transportation and Delivery Companies from Providing Employee Benefits to Certain Drivers. Initiative Statute". The Yes on Prop 22 campaign challenged this description as non-neutral in court, but their arguments were rejected by a Sacramento Superior Court judge.^[33]

Opposition

The No on Prop 22 campaign was funded by the California Labor Federation,^[34][35][36] with support from UC Berkeley Labor Center.^[37] The campaign received around $19 million in support, mostly from labor groups.^[38] Driver groups Rideshare Drivers United,^[39] Gig Workers Rising, We Drive Progress, and Mobile Workers United, spoke out against Prop 22.^[23][24] Editorial boards from The New York Times and Los Angeles Times also called on voters to reject Prop 22.^[23]

The proposition would add protections specific to app-based workers, different from other independent contractors, but these protections would only apply during the time the worker is "engaged" in fulfilling a specific request and not while the worker is logged in to the app and available to fulfill a request.^[40]

https://abc7news.com/post/california-props-propositions-prop-22-campaign-donations/7625556/

11 2020

Top donors for the propositions ranged from for-profit companies, to non-profits and individual contributions. DaVita, Inc., a healthcare company, donated money against Prop 23. The $66 million sum was the most amount of money donated by a single donor out of all propositions on the ballot this year, and most likely helped push the vote against the measure.

For Prop 22, Uber Technologies, Inc., Doordash, Inc. and Lyft, Inc. donated a total sum of over $150 million. Uber successfully won a lawsuit filed last month by drivers with the company that complained the entity was pushing in-app ads pressuring drivers to support the measure.

lil sis}:

ur work also helped broader national campaigns aimed at the investors, bankers, insurers, and attorneys behind the fossil fuel industry. Our research on Liberty Mutual’s director Jay Hooley’s board membership with ExxonMobil contributed to action backed by a range of groups, while our profile of the law firm Paul Weiss aided the growing #DropExxon campaign among law students. More recently, we began what will surely be a long project of mapping out the Biden administration’s ties to the fossil fuel industry - in this case, revolving around Ernest Moniz’s influence on Biden energy transition team.

On top of all this, we continued mapping the power in many other ways, from examining the antics of Puerto Rico’s debt vultures and Act 22 investors, to scrutinizing the powerful law firm running Trump’s Justice Department and the efforts of Uber and Lyft to stifle gig worker rights in NYS (see coverage in Vice and the Markup).

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bs see alford, usual suspect on props?

for immediate release: Jul. 15, 2020

Contact: Stacey Wells, (866) 450-2648

press@yeson22.com

In Case You Missed It: National Black Chamber of Commerce Endorses Prop 22 – Save App-Based Jobs & Services Act

“(Proposition 22) would maintain access to flexible work opportunities for low income individuals by protecting their right to work as independent contractors”

SACRAMENTO – The National Black Chamber of Commerce (NBCC) has endorsed Proposition 22 on California’s November 3 ballot. NBCC is dedicated to economically empowering and sustaining African American communities.

NBCC joins a broad coalition of more than 75,000 California drivers plus social justice advocates, business and community leaders, and public safety organizations in support of Prop 22. This includes the California-Hawaii State Conference of the NAACP, the California National Action Network and the California Urban Partnership.

In their joint letter dated July 14, co-founders Harry Alford, President and CEO, and Kay DeBow, Executive Vice President, write:

“There is more than just convenience when it comes to rideshare. Rideshare operators are true entrepreneurs.”

“We are being threatened with Assembly Bill 5 (AB5). This threatens to take away the right of Californians to work as independent contractors with flexible schedules with app-based platforms and would force them to become employees with flat wages and set schedules. An employee model would also greatly limit the availability of these services, resulting in lost work opportunities and reduced access to rideshare and delivery services that many minority communities have grown to rely on.

“The solution would be Proposition 22. It would maintain access to flexible work opportunities for low income individuals by protecting their right to work as independent contractors with flexible schedules with app-based rideshare and delivery platforms.”

“By promoting worker flexibility, this ballot measure will protect the availability of rideshare and food and package delivery services that millions of Californians rely on every day.”

“Entrepreneurship is the key to wealth and the above is a shining example of how it can work in today’s economy.”

People of color and disadvantaged communities have been disproportionately ravaged by the double blow of the coronavirus pandemic and resulting economic meltdown. App-based driving has provided opportunities for all Californians, and particularly low-income and minority Californians, to work and earn income quickly and easily. It has been especially important during these troubling times when millions have been furloughed or lost their jobs.

Furthermore, app-based driving provides opportunities to work for thousands of individuals who have trouble finding traditional employment, especially now.

Prop 22 will protect access to this very important work and provide new wage and benefit guarantees.

A study by the Berkeley Research Group confirms an employment model would further eliminate up to 900,000 app-based jobs, a reduction of between 80-90 percent of drivers currently driving today. These job losses will come at the worst possible time when California is facing high unemployment and when app-based work opportunities will provide a lifeline for people to earn income. In addition, by a 4:1 margin app-based drivers want to remain independent contractors, despite efforts by politicians to force them to become employees.

Working with app-based rideshare and delivery platforms, with their high flexibility and low barrier to entry, has proven to be a key form of work for many lower-income families needing access to income during this current pandemic.

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1220 merc

p.A6

Political influence

End campaign spending by foreign-influenced U.S. firms

By Michael Sozan

Although the aftermath of the presidential election has dominated headlines since Election Day, California saw a development that strikes at the heart of its own self-governance. Foreign-influenced U.S. corporations spent tens of millions of dollars to help pass Proposition 22, invalidating a California law and allowing the companies to classify their workers as contractors instead of employees.

One of these corporations - Uber - is partially owned and controlled by the government of Saudi Arabia. Another corporation - Lyft - is partially owned by a Chinese conglomerate. This means that Saudi Arabian and Chinese investors played a role - at least indirectly - in determining the fate of important California policy. The time has come for state and federal leaders to pass common-sense laws to stop foreign influence in our elections via American corporations.

Ten years ago, the U.S. Supreme Court issued its disastrous ruling in Citizens United, giving corporations the right to unlimited political spending. Since then, independent groups unrelated to political parties have poured more than $7 billion into federal elections, according to the nonpartisan Center for Responsive Politics. This includes secret "dark money" that cannot be traced to its source and is often routed through so-called nonprofit organizations like the U.S. Chamber of Commerce or the NRA, which get large contributions from corporations. More than $750 million of dark money was spent in the 2020 election alone.

Foreign-influenced U.S. companies allow a pathway for foreign entities to achieve, either directly or indirectly, what they are barred from doing as governments or individuals: spend money in U.S. elections.

Setting their sights on California in 2020, Uber and Lyft joined forces with DoorDash, Instacart, Uber-owned Postmates and others to devote a staggering $203 million to support Prop. 22. This spending spree made Prop. 22 the most expensive ballot measure in California's history.

This is part of a larger trend that Californians have witnessed. First, the rise of super PACs and a deluge of corporate and secret political spending, which have made politicians less accountable to everyday voters. Second, a political system further warped by foreign interference in the 2016 and 2020 presidential elections, as well as President Donald Trump's unconstitutional solicitation of foreign assistance for his failed reelection.

Foreign investment in our economy is not always bad. In fact, approximately 35% of all U.S. stock is now owned by foreigners. Yet challenges arise because foreign investors' interests can diverge from Americans' interests.

Perhaps it's not surprising that ExxonMobil's CEO once remarked, "I'm not a U.S. company and I don't make decisions based on what's good for the U.S." If that is the case, ExxonMobil and foreign-influenced companies like it should not be permitted to spend political dollars to sway U.S. elections.

The good news is that a popular solution exists that is gaining momentum: a ban on election-related spending by foreigninfluenced U.S. corporations. For example, if a single foreign entity (government, company or person) owns more than 1% of a U.S. company, that company would be prohibited from spending money in elections. Often, investors who own at least 1% of a major corporation are among the largest shareholders, with at least tens of millions of dollars of stock. The prohibition would also apply if a group of foreign entities owns at least 5% of a U.S. company. Most of America's largest publicly traded corporations exceed the 5% threshold, although many smaller companies do not.

California should follow the lead of federal, state and local lawmakers to enact foreign ownership thresholds. Reps. Ja- mie Raskin, D-Md., and Abigail Spanberger, D-Va., filed federal legislation that would accomplish this.

Similar legislation is pending in several states, such as New York and Maryland.

And a commissioner on the Federal Election Commission, Ellen L. Weintraub, has led a sustained quest to update regulations to include this policy solution.

Californians - especially those in marginalized communities - know that their preferred candidates or policies cannot be accurately reflected when elections are heavily influenced by runaway corporate spending and foreign investors to whom CEOs owe a fiduciary duty.

In order to help strengthen our democracy and promote economic patriotism, it is time to prohibit political spending by foreign-influenced U.S. corporations. Michael Sozan is a senior fellow for the Center for American Progress.

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rolls back new deal? (which // left out blk brn workers

https://www.democracynow.org/2020/12/8/prop_22_uber_lyft_gig_workers

transcript coming, she says PR firm foia'd her?!

ride-hailing companies Uber and Lyft scored a major victory with the passage of Proposition 22 in California, and worker rights advocates fear they will push similar measures in other states. Prop 22 will exempt companies in the so-called gig economy from having to classify their workers in the state as employees rather than as independent contractors. Uber, Lyft and other companies that rely on gig workers spent more than $200 million to promote Prop 22, and a survey of California voters who voted “yes” on the measure showed 40% thought they were supporting gig workers’ ability to earn a living wage, even though critics say the measure will do the opposite.

:{:{}:

“The law will now exempt drivers like me from basic wage and labor protections afforded to most workers in the state in the middle of a pandemic and recession,” says Cherri Murphy, a Lyft driver and organizer with Gig Workers Rising. We also speak with Veena Dubal, professor of law at the University of California, Hastings, who says measures like Prop 22 pose “extreme danger” to American workers. “If this spreads past California, we are headed for an even worse situation of inequality than we are already experiencing,” Dubal says.

:{:{}:

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https://www.democracynow.org/2020/12/8/prop_22_uber_lyft_gig_workers

...

GOODMAN: This is Democracy Now!, democracynow.org, The Quarantine Report. I’m Amy Goodman, with Juan González, as we look now at how ride-hailing companies Uber and Lyft scored a major victory against worker rights in the election with the passage of Prop 22 in California, and how they’re now pushing similar measures in other states.

During the campaign to pass Prop 22, Uber and Lyft spent a record-setting $205 million to bombard voters and their own workers with misleading advertisements and messages that promised minimum wage, healthcare and protections that are typically consistent with a full-time job. One ad appropriated the words of the legendary poet Maya Angelou as it showed images of Black and Brown workers getting ready for their morning drive to pick up passengers.

MAYA ANGELOU: :{:{Lift up your eyes upon}:

This day breaking for you.

Give birth again

To the dream.}:

:{:{Women, children, men,}:

Take it into the palms of your hands,

Mold it into the shape of your most

Private need. Sculpt it into

The image of your most public self.

Lift up your hearts

Each new hour holds new chances

For a new beginning.}:

AMY GOODMAN: One survey of California voters who voted yes to Prop 22 showed 40% thought they were supporting gig workers’ ability to earn a living wage. But the measure will actually stop gig workers from being eligible for job protections and prevent them from accessing the benefits of being on the payroll, such as contributions for Social Security and Medicare benefits and overtime pay. Prop 22 overrides AB 5, a major labor law passed in California in 2019 that extended employee classification to gig workers. Now critics worry the proposition could have dire implications for labor rights across the country.

The proposition was also backed by DoorDash, Instacart and Postmates, which Uber now owns. It was also pushed by Tony West, the brother-in-law of Vice President-elect Kamala Harris, who is Uber’s chief legal officer.

For more, we go to California. In Oakland, we’re joined by Cherri Murphy. She is a Lyft driver and organizer with Gig Workers Rising. She wrote a piece guk for The Guardian headlined “Uber bought itself a law. Here’s why that’s dangerous for struggling drivers like me.”

And Veena Dubal joins us, professor of law at University of California, Hastings, who writes extensively about the gig economy and says, during the campaign for Prop 22, she was one of many critics subjected to online and offline attacks, including a massive Public Records Act request for her emails and text messages from one of the campaign’s PR firms.

We welcome you both to Democracy Now! Cherri Murphy, let’s begin with you. You’re a Lyft driver for a few years. This was billed as a way to bring financial security to people like you. Is it financial security that you’re in fact getting, or do you feel that this is subverting your ability to make a living and be secure?

CHERRI MURPHY: Amy, thanks for having me.

As you mentioned, along with Lyft, Instacart, DoorDash and Postmates, these app companies spent more than over $200 million, some say $220 million — the most spent in any ballot campaign in U.S. history — to purchase Proposition 22 in California. And with its passage, the law will now exempt drivers like me from basic wage and labor protections afforded to most workers in the state, in the middle of a pandemic and recession. And because of that, we will be afforded no paid sick leave, no family leave, no workmen’s compensation, no unemployment insurance, no overtime, and no protective equipment in the middle of a pandemic. Most of the drivers are communities of color. Fifty-six percent of them are immigrants. No protection from discrimination based on immigration status or historical traits to race.

JUAN GONZÁLEZ: And, Cherri Murphy, what’s your response to what these companies are constantly promoting in their advertisements, that these kinds of jobs offer a freedom and flexibility that normal workers would not be able to have, a way to realize your economic dreams?

CHERRI MURPHY: So, these billion-dollar corporations can afford to provide workers flexibility and benefits, like I mentioned, unemployment insurance. And there is nothing in the law that is taking away the drivers’ flexibility. But during the campaign, it was a major threat from these companies, because they know that it scared drivers. We had a UC Berkeley economics professor, in fact, say that these companies would still need the type of flexibility considering. And there’s nothing flexible about cutting wages and healthcares for workers or weakening safety regulations or chipping away workers’ rights, or even putting drivers and riders at risk. These companies fought hard and ruthlessly to get here.

In your show, you mentioned that in the wake of George Floyd and Breonna Taylor, these companies included various platitudes about their commitment to racial justice in the Black community. And many of us know that their lip service was in support of Black lives, and complete of hollow words by well-paid public relations teams and absent of any real change. And we rejected these attempts, because we know that racial justice is economic justice, and we saw this as an attempt to dodge their responsibility for the exploitation of Black and Brown workers every day. Many of us know that this fight is not only about police killings and terror, but it’s about every institution that exploits and abuses Black and Brown people. And when it comes to Lyft and Uber and their corporate cronies, they’re experts.

JUAN GONZÁLEZ: I’d like to, if possible, bring in Veena Dubal, the professor of law at the University of California, Hastings. I wanted to ask you about the role of these corporate Democrats with some of these key gig economy firms. I think of, for instance, David Plouffe, who used to be one of Obama’s closest friends and aides, who first went to work for Uber, then eventually left Uber and went to work for Mark Zuckerberg’s charity. You also had Anthony Foxx, the former Obama secretary of transportation, who became a top official at Lyft. There’s Matthew Wing, who was a spokesman for Andrew Cuomo, who also became the spokesman for Uber. All of these corporate Democrats’ top aides going to work for these firms in the gig economy.

VEENA DUBAL: Yeah. It’s striking that the law that is probably the most dangerous law to workers that we’ve seen since Taft-Hartley, that it was architected and heralded by corporate Democrats and not Republicans. It is a far-right law. The way that it was passed was anti-democratic. It is extremely, extremely dangerous to the future, poses an extreme danger to American workers. And yet, you are exactly right that the people behind it, including Tony West, who is now being potentially considered for attorney general, were corporate Democrats.

AMY GOODMAN: So, can you talk, Professor Dubal, about what you think was most misleading about this campaign? I mean, 58% of Californians voted — or, of those who voted, voted for it.

VEENA DUBAL: Yeah.

AMY GOODMAN: And talk about it being used as a model. You see this as one of the most serious attacks on labor in all of your studying of labor law in the United States.

VEENA DUBAL: Yes. So, the reason that it is such a huge attack on labor is because it dismantles — it’s this corporate fantasy that they’ve been trying to accomplish for the past century. It dismantles all of the New Deal protections. Workers no longer have access to a minimum wage, to overtime compensation, to unemployment insurance, to workers’ compensation, to all the things that we know — you know, the very limited protections that working people have in the United States. Those are all completely gone. And these are the workers who most need those basic protections, as Cherri articulated. These are low-wage, mostly people of color workers.

During the campaign — and I should say, these $200 million, they were spent on a variety of things, but they were mostly spent on bombarding the California electorate, or the voters of California, with misleading advertising on YouTube, on Facebook, on Instagram, on — you know, even when you were searching on Google, sort of the ad that popped up — emails, in-app messages. I mean, just constant bombarding, bombardment of messaging, that was just inaccurate. In California, it is legal to be misleading in political advertisements.

And probably the most misleading thing that I saw was that the advertisements alleged that workers would be making a minimum wage. And that is the most important thing for your viewers and listeners to understand about Prop 22 and the danger that it poses, is that it takes away access to a time-based minimum wage, so people are no longer getting paid for all the time that they work. They are only getting paid when they have an assignment. So, all of the risks and liabilities traditionally associated with doing business are now on the workers themselves. Drivers like Cherri cannot, therefore, predict how much they will make in a given day or a given week. It is at the whim and whimsy of both demand and the corporations themselves.

And if that spreads to other sectors, we are going to face increasing inequality, increasing precarity, the growth of the contingent workforce. It is going to make it extremely, extremely difficult for working families to survive, to put food on the table. And, you know, as we all are anticipating, we may be facing a big economic depression in the coming years. And this is the absolute worst time for workers to not have access to just that very basic protection that we’ve come to understand is a limited right that Americans have, that’s just a time-based minimum wage.

JUAN GONZÁLEZ: And, Cherri, I’m wondering if you could talk about the experiences, especially during the pandemic, of Uber or Lyft drivers and others in the gig economy?

CHERRI MURPHY: Yeah, certainly. So, what I know is, is that my views of Lyft were shifting prior to COVID-19. The past three years, Lyft has been my primary source of income, and I’ve driven over 12,000 rides. And over the years, as the numbers of bonuses decreased while the demands to complete rides increased, making major cuts to take-home pay, it was becoming increasingly difficult to sustain a living. And signs of a good deal, with that so-called flexibility, became painfully clear. And my views of Lyft were shifting.

And so, COVID-19 and the Black Lives Matter movement have pulled back the curtain and showed Americans diseases for which there still is no vaccine. And I know about COVID-19. While we were seeking solace in our troubled land of Lyft and Uber, were nowhere to be found. Drivers attempted to secure masks, hand sanitizers, sick time off, unemployment insurance and other protective measures, and we found obstacles and lack of transparency processes. I couldn’t even find a place that was open at the time. So I know what it’s like to work for Lyft and Uber and these corporate greed app-based companies.

I’ve worked long hours with no guaranteed wage, no work breaks, no restroom facilities, no overtime, no protective equipment, no paid sick time. I know what it’s like to always have the looming threat of an accident with no coverage, or a deactivation based on retaliation or discrimination, with no protections, no remedies in place. I know what it’s like to be in the middle of a pandemic now, when you have your employer who’s denying you unemployment insurance in the middle of a pandemic. I know what it’s like to have your company threaten to shut down because they can’t get what they want. There are stories of drivers who have lost their lives in an effort to pay their bills. There are stories of drivers who were symptomatic of the virus but yet continued to drive for fear of financial ruin.

AMY GOODMAN: Cherri , Prop 22 eliminates required sexual harassment training and Uber and Lyft to investigate customers’ and drivers’ harassment claims?

CHERRI MURPHY: Yes, it does. It eliminates required sexual harassment training, as well as the obligations on Uber and Lyft to investigate both customers’ and drivers’ harassment claims. And a lot of us know that there are at least 6,000 claims for 2017 and 2018 that went untouched. What’s even more disturbing, as Veena mentioned, is that these companies are promising to roll out this model nationwide, foretelling a grim future for gig workers across this country.

JUAN GONZÁLEZ: And, Veena Dubal, about this effort to roll it out nationwide, there has been discussion of trying to get a federal law passed. Could you talk about that?

VEENA DUBAL: Yeah, they have announced that they are ready and willing to take this really dangerous law to the federal level. They are already trying to replicate it in a number of states, including New York state. They have — rolling out advertisements, similarly misleading advertisements to the campaign in California. And, you know, over the past — since Lyft hit the streets of San Francisco in 2012, 2013, over the past seven years, almost a decade, they have — at the company’s behest, a number of bills have been written, and even introduced, to do exactly what Prop 22 does, which is create a substandard category of worker under the U.S. law.

And I think they think they have a blueprint now. They got this passed in California. And as we all know, what happens in California tends to spread all over the country and even the world. And so, I think that we are going to see a flood of misinformation in states and on the federal level about what gig work is, the kinds of benefits supposedly that it offers. We’re going to hear a lot of dishonest representations of what freedom and flexibility it offers and how people need this work.

And it’s so important for people to understand, for voters, for Americans to understand, that this law takes away all of the hard-won protections that workers have. We are at a point in technology and history where we should be expanding workers’ rights. And instead, this law has completely stripped them away.

AMY GOODMAN: And, Veena Dubal, in just 30 seconds, if you can explain what happened to you as you campaigned against Prop 22, the mass investigation that was done of you?

VEENA DUBAL: Yeah. I had extreme forms of harassment from the PR campaign, which is — again, this proposition, it passed as a result of disinformation and harassment. It was very Trumpian in that sense. I got massive text and email Public Records Act requests. I was constantly harassed online and offline. Someone put my home address up on Twitter. I was doxxed. It was a lot of misinformation on the right-wing blogosphere. It was really something. You know, they were scared of what I had to say. And I will continue to say it, because if this spreads past California, we are headed for an even worse situation of inequality than we are already experiencing.

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===

:{:{}:

guk ref

https://yyy.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2020/nov/12/uber-prop-22-law-drivers-ab5-gig-workers

:{:{}:

uber bought itself a law. Here's why that's dangerous for struggling drivers like me

Cherri Murphy

The company, along with Lyft and DoorDash, spent more than $200m to deny drivers the wages and benefits we’re entitled to

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mktwatch

Election Day nears, California voters are being bombarded with ads featuring smiling Black and brown faces championing Proposition 22, the initiative by Uber Technologies Inc., Lyft Inc. and other gig companies that seeks to exempt them from a state law requiring them to treat drivers and delivery workers as employees.

Outside Uber’s UBER, -0.84% headquarters in San Francisco on Thursday, however, hundreds of Black and brown workers from throughout the state converged for a No on 22 protest, with drivers being joined by other union members, such as janitors, nurses and teachers, as well as elected officials. They want gig companies to stop exploiting workers, and from using the initiative to lock in “a caste system that will have recourse for generations to come,” said Cherri Murphy, a Lyft driver and Gig Workers Rising organizer, as she addressed other protesters.

A majority of gig workers in California are minorities and immigrants, studies and the gig companies themselves say, and the companies have spent a record amount — more than $190 million — supporting the proposition and publicizing the support of different groups in the Golden State, including civil-rights organizations. Many of the people featured in the mailers and TV ads have been paid anywhere from $500 to a couple of thousand dollars by the “yes” side, which has also paid modeling and casting agencies, according to state records.

More on Prop 22: How Uber and Lyft’s business model could be changed on Election Day

The Yes on 22 website includes a list of 34 “community advocate” groups that support the measure, but it is unclear exactly how gig companies garnered that support, and the extent of it. The most prominent example is the NAACP, with the statewide group and several local chapters named in the list.

The head of the state NAACP, Alice Huffman, was featured in an Uber email campaign to its users titled “Why communities of color support Prop. 22.” But CalMatters reported that Huffman owns a consulting business that was paid more than $1 million by different campaigns, including Prop. 22, this year. The state NAACP has not returned a request for comment.

In the Yes on 22 campaign’s expenditures reported to the California Secretary of State, payments to Huffman’s consulting firm, AC Public Affairs, were identified as payments to “campaign consultants.” The campaign has disclosed $3.97 million in payments to more than two dozen campaign consultants, roughly a fourth of what their opponents have spent in total but less than 3% of the money that the Yes on 22 campaign has collected.

George Holland, president of the Oakland, Calif., branch of the NAACP, told MarketWatch the measure has raised a dilemma for his local chapter, which has chosen to stay neutral on the proposition.

“Some people just want to have temporary employment, but some are working full time,” he said. “It’s very difficult to take a side. We’re damned if we do, damned if we don’t.”

Opponents not only decry the initiative — any amendments to which would require a seven-eighths majority in both houses of the state Legislature— they also call out the gig companies’ campaign tactics, which have included antiracism Uber billboards and paying for the proposition to appear in “progressive” mailers — saying the minorities and immigrants who comprise the bulk of the gig companies’ workforces are being denied minimum wage, health benefits and other protections to which employees are entitled.

See: Protesters call Uber’s antiracism billboards ‘hypocritical and offensive’

The gig companies’ campaign is “a wolf disguised in sheep’s clothing,” said Shamann Walton, a member of San Francisco’s board of supervisors, during a virtual press conference organized by the No on 22 campaign last week. “It is infuriating hypocrisy. They claim to be an equity campaign. We know what it will do is undermine [the racial equity] we’ve been fighting for.”

The Yes on 22 campaign lists a few dozen supporters it calls “community advocates,” and uses the names of those groups prominently in its many mailers to California residents. But one of those groups, Black Lives Matter Sacramento, was taken off the list after MarketWatch brought to the campaign’s attention that its leader, Tanya Faison, said she was an individual supporter of the initiative but that the rest of the group was not. A spokesman for the campaign said the inclusion of the group was due to a miscommunication with Faison. When reached by MarketWatch, Faison said she had no comment about her support for the initiative.

Nearly a couple of dozen community advocacy groups on the list have not returned requests for comment. And at least a handful of other organizations have been impossible to contact: one appears to be defunct; one does not have any online presence or listing; another seemed to exist only as a Facebook FB, -0.64% group. The Yes on 22 campaign has provided contact information for a couple of these groups, but they have not responded to requests for comment.

Some advocacy-group leaders say they support the initiative because their communities need the gig economy for extra income — or any income — especially during the coronavirus crisis, or to serve neighborhoods that have traditionally been underserved.

“I live in a neighborhood where taxi cabs don’t come but Uber and Lyft LYFT, 0.23% show up,” said the Rev. K.W. Tulloss, president of the Baptist Ministers Conference of Los Angeles and Southern California, who said he couldn’t recall exactly how he was asked to support the measure. He added that he has also driven for Uber in the past few years to help supplement his income, so “I stand with the drivers who desire to have autonomy and be independent contractors.”

Likewise, Bay Area-based Black Women Organized for Political Action said in a statement that “Our PAC board deliberated on this position and ultimately surveyed our membership and drivers within our circle of family, friends and colleagues who happened to be largely African-American. Most felt strongly that they wanted to remain as independent contractors/freelancers with this freedom to work when they choose to do so.”

Cassandra Jennings, president of the Greater Sacramento Urban League who said she volunteered to support the campaign after “talking to a couple of people in the industry,” echoed that sentiment.

“The gig economy is for people who don’t want to work 9 to 5 and want to do things differently,” Jennings said. “Drivers tell me they’re happy with what they’re making, that they’re making it work doing it part-time.”

As for the drivers working full-time, “they shouldn’t be exploited,” she said. “The question is: How do you provide an opportunity for both to exist?”

The companies tout schedule flexibility as their main selling point, and warn that hundreds of thousands of people in the state could lose their ability to make money if they must be considered employees instead of independent contractors. Over the summer, Uber and Lyft even threatened to leave California when a judge ordered them to immediately comply with state law and classify their drivers as employees.

See: Uber and Lyft granted emergency stay, shutdown averted in California

“Uber and Lyft leaving California would hurt us more,” Tulloss said.

Labor experts and others say nothing is stopping the gig companies from hiring their drivers and couriers as employees, and giving them the choice to work full- or part-time, in shifts. In fact, such an example exists among the app-based platforms: Instacart has a hybrid workforce, with both workers it considers employees and independent contractors.

“There is no reason why these companies cannot treat their workers as employees,” said William Gould, professor emeritus at Stanford Law School and a former chairman of the National Labor Relations Board. “And, if they get away with this, other companies will be induced to expand the ranks of this underclass.”

In an interview with MarketWatch before last week’s protest, Murphy (who paused driving for Lyft in April because of the pandemic) said the companies “paint misclassification and exploitation as if it’s the best thing for Black and brown workers. They’re not going to talk about letting drivers fend for themselves when the pandemic first hit.”

Meanwhile, the drivers who took part in a caravan from Southern California last week before gathering at the protest in San Francisco, as well as their supporters, were clear about where they stand.

Carlos Ramos, a Lyft driver from Bakersfield, slammed the gig companies’ tactics and the money they have spent: “They can’t take our democratic process and pervert it,” he said.

Jennifer Esteen, a registered nurse for the city of San Francisco and vice president of organizing at SEIU Local 1021, compared today’s gig-worker battle to farmworkers standing up to big agriculture in the 1960s.

“Workers move this country,” she said. “Workers make everything possible… If Prop. 22 passes, all [workers] are at risk.”

Asked for comment about Thursday’s protest, a spokesman for the proposition’s campaign said, “By passing Prop. 22, California voters can protect the app-based jobs that hundreds of thousands of Californians depend on to earn supplemental income and the services that millions of California families rely on for safe, affordable, and reliable transportation and delivery, now more than ever during the pandemic.”

Prop. 22, which appears to be the most expensive California ballot initiative ever, is backed by more than $190 million from Uber, Lyft, DoorDash, Instacart and Postmates, according to the most recent state records. By contrast, labor unions and other organizations funding the opposition have poured about $16 million into their campaign.

Reporter Elisabeth Buchwald contributed to this article.

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ref

https://calmatters.org/politics/2020/09/california-naacp-president-helps-corporate-ballot-measure-campaigns/

no lnx

california NAACP president aids corporate prop campaigns — collects $1.2 million and counting

BY LAUREL ROSENHALL SEPTEMBER 25, 2020

OCTOBER 23, 2020

Alice Huffman, President of the California State Conference of the NAACP, speaks as part of a coalition in support of proposition 13 at the California Capitol on January 8, 2020. Photo by Anne Wernikoff for CalMatters

Alice Huffman, a political consultant and president of the California NAACP, has been paid more than $1.2 million so far this year by ballot measure campaigns that have been endorsed by the state NAACP.

IN SUMMARY

Alice Huffman, who is both a professional campaign consultant and long-time NAACP leader, was especially sought after this year as political campaigns respond to the national reckoning over race.

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Update: Campaign finance filings on Oct. 23, 2020, show the political consulting firm owned by California NAACP president Alice Huffman has been paid an additional $510,000 by ballot measure campaigns since this article was published. That includes an additional $340,000 from No on Prop. 21, $150,000 from No on Prop. 15, $10,000 from Yes on 22 and $10,000 from No on Prop. 23.

Read through the voter handbook for California’s November election, and a name pops up over and over again: Alice Huffman. As leader of the California NAACP, Huffman has weighed in with positions that critics say run counter to the historic civil rights organization’s mission to advance racial equality in education, housing and criminal justice.

Should voters raise commercial property taxes to pour billions of dollars into schools? Should they make it easier for cities to pass rent control ordinances? Should California outlaw the use of cash bail?

No, no and no, Huffman argues in the ballot handbook, where she is repeatedly identified as president of the California State Conference of the NAACP (National Association for the Advancement of Colored People).

What the guide doesn’t tell voters is that Huffman’s political consulting firm has been paid more than $1.2 million so far this year by ballot measure campaigns that she or the California NAACP has endorsed. She’s been paid by campaigns funded by commercial property owners fighting the tax increase, corporate landlords opposed to expanding rent control and bail bondsmen who want to keep the cash bail system.

Huffman’s dual roles as both a paid campaign consultant and leader of a vaunted civil rights group amount to an unusual — but legal — arrangement. Though she has held both positions for many years, Huffman was especially sought after this year, as political campaigns respond to the national reckoning over race and frame many of their messages with themes of justice and equity. The small firm Huffman runs with her sister is being paid by five ballot measure campaigns this year, public records show — more than it has taken on in previous elections. Many of them are funded by corporate interests at war with labor unions.

While it’s common for political campaigns to hire strategists to help them communicate with specific constituencies, those consultants usually do not come with a brand as well-known as the NAACP is for its work fighting discrimination over the last century. Huffman’s approach — making money from the campaigns that also wind up with an NAACP seal of approval — is stirring controversy in some Black communities. Critics say it appears the endorsement of the renowned civil rights organization is essentially up for sale.

“I feel like it’s a conflict of interest and I think it’s misleading to the public,” said Carroll Fife, an officer of the Oakland chapter of the NAACP who disagrees with the state organization on several ballot measure endorsements. “It’s unfortunate. Politics is gross.”

Fife works as the executive director of the Alliance of Californians for Community Empowerment, a nonprofit that is campaigning for Proposition 15 to raise commercial property taxes and boost funding for schools. She also supports Prop. 21 to make it easier for cities to expand rent control, and says both measures would help California’s Black communities. Two-thirds of Black households in the state are renters, census data shows, and many Black students are concentrated in high-poverty schools.

Huffman declined to be interviewed for this article, as did other members of the California NAACP executive board.

In the ballot handbook, Huffman argues the measures would hurt low-income Californians because commercial property owners would pass their higher costs onto consumers and small-business tenants, and expanded rent control could shrink the supply of affordable housing. Huffman’s Sacramento-based firm, AC Public Affairs, has been paid $590,000 so far by the No on Prop. 15 campaign and $280,000 by the No on Prop. 21 campaign, public records show.

“She has the right to make money as we all do,” said Anthony Thigpenn, a community organizer in Los Angeles who heads the California Calls advocacy group and supports Prop. 15. “But when it’s something that’s using a community-based organization’s brand, and particularly when it’s taking positions… that are not in the interest of the communities that organization has advocated for and championed, that is disappointing and sad.”

Thigpenn said he believes increasing commercial property taxes with the so-called “split-roll” approach in Prop. 15 is a matter of racial justice.

“Black communities in California suffer most from the lack of funding for schools and community colleges, which are typically gateways for people to have career paths and livable wages and good jobs,” he said.

Well-known in Sacramento as a political powerhouse with a career that’s spanned some 50 years, Huffman worked for then-Gov. Jerry Brown in the 1970s. She became close with Willie Brown during the 1980s and 1990s, when he was Assembly speaker and she was a lobbyist for the California Teachers Association. She opened her public affairs firm in 1988, and was elected president of the California NAACP in 1999. Her firm helps political campaigns build coalitions and get their messages out through media, advertising and a newsletter called the “Minority News.” Many of the messages feature Huffman and her role with the NAACP.

Over the years, Huffman’s consulting business and the California NAACP’s endorsements have aligned many times. As she was paid by Indian tribes, pharmaceutical companies and cigarette makers trying to pass or defeat ballot measures in the early 2000s, the California NAACP endorsed those campaigns. The same thing happened in 2018, when Huffman’s firm was paid nearly $900,000 by the campaign fighting a rent control measure, and $90,000 by dialysis companies opposing an initiative that would have increased their cost of doing business.

Both measures failed in 2018 but are back on the ballot this year, and the campaigns trying to defeat them have again hired Huffman. Michael Bustamante, a spokesman for the campaign against the Prop. 21 rent control measure, said Huffman is motivated by what’s best for Black Californians.

“In 2018, she was passionate in her opposition to Prop. 10 because of what it would do to the African American community,” he said, referring to opponents’ argument that more rent control would drive up the cost of housing by discouraging developers from building.

“Over and over again she talked about how homeownership… enables African American families to get a toehold to better their future.”

“I feel like it’s a conflict of interest and I think it’s misleading to the public.”

CARROLL FIFE, OAKLAND NAACP OFFICER

Bustamante, who is also a spokesperson for the campaign against raising commercial property taxes, said in a statement that “the NAACP took its position in opposition to Prop. 15 based on clear facts that they outlined in their March 2nd report,” which says social justice advocates should be concerned that the measure would increase costs for consumers and doesn’t do enough to protect small businesses.

Campaign finance records show the anti-Prop. 15 campaign made its first payment to Huffman’s firm, of $70,000, on Feb. 25.

The campaign funded by dialysis companies opposing an initiative that would require their clinics to have a doctor on site hired Huffman to educate African American voters “about the dangers of Prop. 23,” said campaign spokesperson Kathy Fairbanks.

“Prop. 23 is particularly dangerous for communities of color because they suffer from kidney disease and need dialysis at higher rates,” she said in a statement. “Prop. 23 would force the shutdown of many clinics, jeopardizing the life-saving dialysis patients need.”

Huffman has told reporters in the past that she only takes on political clients whose campaigns are aligned with the California NAACP’s positions. But it’s not clear how the organization arrives at endorsement decisions. Its website doesn’t explain a procedure and hasn’t posted ballot measure endorsements since the 2016 election. CalMatters contacted its six statewide executive committee members including Huffman; three of them declined interview requests and three did not return messages.

Fife, the Oakland NAACP officer, said her local chapter doesn’t know how the statewide conference decides what to endorse.

“It’s not transparent,” she said.

The president of the San Jose chapter of the NAACP said he had been reprimanded by the state conference for recently writing an op-ed supporting Prop. 15, the split-roll property tax measure. Rev. Jethroe Moore II said he wrote the piece to express his personal opinion, and was surprised to see his affiliation with the San Jose NAACP included when it was published.

“These are my personal beliefs,” he said. “Alice is the president of the statewide NAACP and all the branches understand they have to support the positions that they take. I accept my responsibility for stepping out as an individual person in the community to take my stand as an American citizen.”

Huffman’s been re-elected president of the state conference several times, according to her bio. Delegates from local NAACP chapters vote for state officers every other year, the group’s bylaws state.

The national office of the NAACP did not respond to several requests for comment. In the past, it has criticized state chapters for advocating for energy policies that benefit their corporate donors at the expense of the safety of Black neighborhoods. The New York Times cited Huffman’s signature on a 2018 letter opposing a renewable energy program as part of a trend that led the NAACP national office to publish a report on the “Top 10 Manipulation Tactics of the Fossil Fuel Industry.”

Racial equity has emerged as a theme in several campaigns on the California ballot this fall, including some that the NAACP has not weighed in on. Prop. 17 would grant voting rights to people who are on parole following a prison sentence. Though it was a priority for the Legislature’s Black caucus — because African Americans make up 26% of the parole population but only 6% of California adults — the NAACP has not publicly endorsed Prop. 17.

On the other hand, the NAACP has endorsed the campaign aiming to maintain the cash bail system that some advocates see as unfair to many people of color. The No on Prop. 25 campaign, funded by the bail bonds industry, is asking voters to overturn a law that would end the use of money in determining who goes free while awaiting trial. It has paid Huffman $45,000 so far this year.

State Sen. Steve Bradford, vice chair of the Black caucus, said he’s surprised both that the California NAACP is opposed to eliminating cash bail, and that it has not taken a position on whether parolees should have the right to vote.

“I would hope that in the next 40 days they would weigh in strongly because the NAACP was founded on securing the right to vote for people of color,” said Bradford, a Los Angeles Democrat who describes himself as a longtime NAACP member.

Bradford said he supports Prop. 25 to eliminate cash bail because “it’s created somewhat of a debtors prison where poor folks are in jail, while rich folks can post bail for more serious crimes and be scot-free until their day in court.”

Alice Huffman, leader of the California NAACP, speaks at the Capitol to oppose a proposition that would raise commercial property taxes to help fund schools. Jan. 8, 2020. Photo by Anne Wernikoff for CalMatters

Though ending the use of money bail has been a goal for progressives, the final version of the California law wound up splintering the left because it leaves a lot of discretion to judges. In the ballot argument against Prop. 25, Huffman argues that the risk analysis that would replace bail in determining if someone has to be locked up before trial amounts to “computer profiling [that] has been shown to discriminate against minorities and people from neighborhoods with higher concentrations of immigrants and low-income residents.”

Huffman has also appeared in ads urging voters to support Prop. 22, a campaign funded by Uber, Lyft and Doordash that seeks an exemption from state labor law allowing them to treat their drivers as independent contractors instead of employees. She was featured in an email Uber sent to its customers titled “Why communities of color support Prop. 22.” And she wrote an op-ed in the Observer, a Black newspaper in Southern California, saying the Legislature failed Black and Brown gig workers by passing the labor law that Prop. 22 seeks to change.

“In the face of such indifference to the economic wellbeing of people of color, the only response is action,” she wrote. “If the politicians won’t stand up for us, we have to stand up for ourselves by passing Prop. 22.”

Huffman’s public affairs firm has been paid $85,000 so far by the Yes on Prop. 22 campaign.

“Alice Huffman is working with the Yes on Prop. 22 campaign to support outreach efforts in communities of color because of the significant impact the loss of app-based rideshare and delivery services will have on Black and Brown Californians,” campaign spokesperson Geoff Vetter said by email.

“As a Black woman, I know well that the Black community is not a monolith.”

APRIL D. VERRETT, SEIU LOCAL 2015 UNION PRESIDENT

Though Huffman spent much of her career with the teachers union, her consulting work now consists largely of helping corporate campaigns that are fighting against organized labor. Unions are against changing the labor law with Prop. 22, and for raising commercial property taxes with Prop. 15, adding new requirements on dialysis clinics with Prop. 23 and ending cash bail with Prop. 25.

April D. Verrett, president of the SEIU Local 2015 union that represents nursing home workers, said she has never been involved with the NAACP and doesn’t expect all Black voters to see issues the same way.

“As a Black woman, I know well that the Black community is not a monolith,” she said.

Still, in her mind, several questions on the ballot — money for schools, overhauling the bail system, repealing the ban on affirmative action and granting voting rights to parolees — should galvanize voters who want to advance racial justice.

“All of these inequities disproportionately affect people of color,” Verrett said. “Our country seems to want to have a real conversation about race and inequities. This election in California gives us an opportunity to really begin changing things.”

But ballot measures can be confusing, and deciding how to vote on them is difficult for many voters, said Jessica Levinson, a professor at Loyola Law School of Los Angeles.

“Endorsements really matter because you can’t look at a living breathing candidate and assess them,” she said. “So voters use helpers to try to figure out (how to vote) — and a lot of voters just look to a couple of people or organizations that they trust and that is how they make their decision.”

While it’s legal for campaigns to pay for endorsements, Levinson said, voters should be told when that’s the case. Otherwise, she said, “it robs voters of a meaningful ability to assess how they’re going to vote, if these endorsements are just paid for.”

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FROM PROP NODE

PROP 22

Californians Approve Measure Stripping Labor Rights from Gig Economy Workers

https://www.mediamatters.org/bret-baier/foxs-special-report-airs-biased-segment-shill-californias-prop-22

note gun to head soda tax, juul fail on local prop b/c of bad PR at inopportune moment? jiu jitsu hijack our anti-corp power

relentless ads on roku "free" tv:

an 1020 also lyft and doordash

Expert: Uber-funded ballot measure in California would create 'permanent underclass of workers'

Nicole Karlis

Those who took high school civics may recall that our democracies lives on fractions. A majority vote — one-half plus one — is what it takes to pass a bill in most legislative bodies....

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920

https://www.cnet.com/news/uber-lyft-doordash-181-million-campaign-war-chest-goes-heavy-on-ad-blitz/

kerr

https://www.cnet.com/news/uber-lyft-doordash-181-million-campaign-war-chest-goes-heavy-on-ad-blitz/

no lnx pix of ads

jimin Song says working for Instacart saved her life. Two years ago, she was trapped in an emotionally abusive relationship that culminated with her partner pulling a gun on her. She needed to get out quick and make some money while taking care of her two kids. So she signed up to be a shopper for the grocery delivery company and still does the work today.

Song's experience made its way to Instacart's corporate headquarters, and the company asked to feature her in a promotional video on becoming a shopper.

"They liked my story," Song said in a phone interview. "I think that's why they used me as an example, to show that people are in tough situations and they may need this job."

Now, Song has become one of the "paid spokespeople" for the Yes on Proposition 22 campaign funded by Uber, Lyft, Doordash, Instacart and Postmates. In one political ad for the California ballot measure, she sits in the driver's seat of her car with a face mask on. In another, she talks about her hectic schedule being the mom of two kids.

Incorporating workers, like Song, and their stories into ad campaigns is now commonplace in the pitched battle over Proposition 22, which could change the business models of the five gig economy companies in the country's biggest state. At stake is whether gig workers will be reclassified as employees as dictated by California law AB5 or if they'll remain classified as independent contractors.

AB5 requires companies to provide gig workers benefits such as minimum wage, health care and sick leave by making them employees. That could add tens of millions of dollars in costs each year to the gig economy companies' bottom lines, according to analysts.

Proposition 22 is designed to establish a carve-out for the companies. The proposition suggests creating an alternative to the law that maintains workers as independent contractors but adds benefits such as expense reimbursement and a health care subsidy.

The proposition is jointly sponsored by Uber, Lyft, DoorDash, Instacart and Postmates, which have contributed $181 million to the campaign, making it one of the most expensive ballot measure campaigns in US history. The No on Proposition 22 campaign, which is backed by unions and labor groups, has raised $5.6 million.

With the Nov. 3 election less than seven weeks away, both sides are focusing on ads. Facebook, Instagram, Google and local TV channels have been blanketed in messages, including those featuring Song for the Yes campaign.

"Now, politicians are trying to take away our ability to do independent work," Song says in one ad. "It would force me to choose between my job and my children."

The Yes on Proposition 22 campaign paid Song $1,290 for being involved in at least one of these ads, according to public records from the California secretary of state. It also paid at least two other gig workers, Kiesha Broussard and Isaiah Navajo, $590 each for their involvement in advertisements. (CNET couldn't find contact details for either Broussard or Navajo. The Yes campaign didn't respond to a request for contact details for the two workers.) More ads featuring roughly a dozen other drivers have also popped up, but public records for those expenditures haven't yet been posted by the state.

"You have to imagine these companies are going to plow a lot of money into this thing."

Steven Passwaiter, VP of Kantar's Campaign Media Analysis Group]

These people are considered "paid spokespeople" because they've received money for being involved in the ads, according to a spokesman for California's Fair Political Practices Commission. However, the campaign isn't required to disclose this in the ads themselves because the payments are less than $5,000.

"Every driver who appears in our ads is a volunteer," a spokesman for the Yes on Proposition 22 campaign said in an email. "The listed expenditures are reimbursements for travel time, expenses and mileage."

Uber, Lyft, DoorDash and Postmates (which was acquired by Uber in July) didn't respond to requests for comment. Instacart referred CNET to the Yes on Proposition 22 campaign.

The million-dollar ad machine

Uber, Lyft, DoorDash, Instacart and Postmates hired Chris Mottola Consulting to create some of the ads featuring Song and other gig workers, according to public records. The firm was founded in 1985 by Chris Mottola, a former political consultant for the Republican party.

Mottola has created ads for political candidates, including the late Sen. John McCain of Arizona, former US President George W. Bush and former New York City Mayor Rudy Giuliani. On his LinkedIn profile, Mottola says the author and journalist Carl Hiaasen once described him as the Freddy Krueger of politics.

Many of Chris Mottola Consulting's ads appear to be aimed at tugging on the heartstrings of viewers. On its website, the firm says the best commercials "tell the story of victims, villains, heroes and actions in an honest and self-effacing way." The consultancy didn't respond to phone or email requests for comment.[pix]

s of Thursday, the Yes on Proposition 22 campaign had spent more than $1.7 million to feature ads on Facebook, according to Facebook's ad library. It's spent $980,800 to display 183 of its political ads on Google. According to Google's ad analytics, the campaign's spending had remained relatively steady throughout 2020 until it spiked in mid-August, when it rose from an average daily expenditure of about $10,000 to a peak of $162,800 on Aug. 15. The most recent reported daily expenditure, from Sept. 5, was $84,900.

"You have to imagine these companies are going to plow a lot of money into this thing," said Steven Passwaiter, vice president and general manager of Kantar's Campaign Media Analysis Group, which is the research company's nonpartisan political advertising intelligence division. "One would expect that it's just going to get bigger and bigger and bigger until we get to Nov. 3."

It's unclear how much the Yes campaign has spent on TV ads, and the campaign's spokesman declined to answer questions about TV and radio spending. But Passwaiter, who's analyzed Yes on Proposition 22 ad spending for Kantar, said "compared to what they're spending on TV, [digital ad spending is] a small fraction."

The No on Proposition 22 campaign is also raising its ad profile, but it's spending far less. Google's Transparency Report, which tracks political ad spending on its platform,doesn't show any ads from the No campaign.Starting in June, the campaign began featuring ads on Facebook and has spent about $47,000 on the social media site as of Thursday, according to Facebook's ad library. Very few of the No campaign ads feature produced videos but instead have static interfaces that say that "Prop. 22 hurts app-based drivers" and that Democratic presidential hopeful Joe Biden agrees.(Biden urged Californians to vote against the proposition in a May tweet.)