User:GoldRomean/Drafts/Kooper Karaway

Caraway has often been arrested for acts of civil disobedience. 398

He has protested during the Occupy Movement, for immigration reform, and for Black Lives Matter, among other things.

Early life
Caraway was born in a small town in Alabama, but moved often throughout his childhood, living in cities in Alabama, South Carolina, and Texas.

In the 2000s, as a high-school teenager, Caraway successfully organized protests, marches, and walkouts against frequent raids by Immigration and Customs Enforcement on his small town in Texas. When he turned 18, Caraway unsuccessfully ran for mayor of his town on a far-left platform.

After graduating high school, Caraway became a community organizer, focusing on police brutality in Dallas, also joining the labor movement there. Later, in 2016, Caraway moved to South Dakota as a state representative for the American Federation of State, County and Municipal Employees.

AFL-CIO
In January of 2019, Caraway ran for president of the Sioux Falls AFL-CIO, saying that he would turn the ineffective labor council into an organizing powerhouse that would be able to build a progressive movement. He was unanimously elected and became the youngest central-labor-council president in the United States at the age of 27. After taking office, Caraway and his team rewrote the organization's constitution, including an amendment that banned white supremacists and fascists from holding office in unions affiliated with the AFL-CIO. In addition, they also organized Sioux Falls' first Native American Day parade and stopped a bill designed to strip university professors of their collective-bargaining rights. Caraway also formed an International Solidarity Committee made up entirely of immigrant and refugee union members. The Committee gives immigrants and refugees their rights as workers and helps them organize into unions. The committee also educates American workers on labor issues elsewhere in the world.

On September 1, 2020, Caraway was sworn in as president of the South Dakota State AFL-CIO, becoming the youngest state labor federation president in the United States at the age of 29.

Controversy
In 2023, Caraway resigned from his job as the executive director of the Service Employees International Union's Connecticut State Council after pro-Israel activists accused Caraway of defending the actions of Hamas during their October 7 attack on Israel. At the All Out for Palestine rally held in October of 2023, Caraway made a controversial speech about Hamas, saying: “Our enemies are not in Gaza, our enemies are the CEOs who are cutting our pay and benefits. Our enemies are the politicians who lock our people up and leave them to sleep on the streets. Our enemies are not in Gaza. Our comrades are in Gaza." Since then, Caraway has received backlash from both Democratic and Republican politicians.

Personal life
Caraway's wife is also a labor organizer. She works for the United Food and Commercial Workers Union. Together, they have a 6-year-old daughter.