FIRST IN SHIFT: Members of the House’s Labor Caucus are scheduled to meet Wednesday with representatives of the Starbucks unionization effort. Among the expected attendees is Jaz Brisack, the Rhodes scholar and Western New York barista who has become a prominent voice of the organizing push.

“It’s really been transformational that people are going to look a bit harder at needing a voice at work,” caucus co-chair Donald Norcross (D-N.J.) told Weekly Shift. “The opinion of labor and unions has completely changed” during the pandemic, he said.

Norcross said the caucus has previously invited other worker groups for similar confabs, though the Starbucks drive has garnered particular notice for its recent string of successful union elections, rapid expansion in stores throughout the country and the company’s hardball opposition.

“Every time they fight this, they make it worse for themselves, because they unite their employees,” Norcross said, adding that he’s personally started to boycott the company.

Where the organizing efforts stand: Last week, three additional stores in the Buffalo area voted to unionize — bringing the total to six out of seven contests — and additional elections in the cities of Seattle, Boston, Rochester, N.Y., and Knoxville, Tenn., are on the horizon.