House Democrats passed a long-awaited minimum wage increase on Thursday, but the tens of millions of workers who would get a raise under the legislation will have to wait. Senate Republicans and Donald Trump remain firmly opposed to raising the federal minimum wage over its current poverty level of $7.25 an hour.
“When we first went on strike for $15 and union rights seven years ago, we didn’t have any politicians behind our demands,” Rita Blalock, a North Carolina McDonald’s worker, said in a statement. “Now, we have the U.S. House with us, and we are going to keep doing what we did to win this historic vote today: joining together, speaking out and going on strike until workers in every corner of this country are paid $15 an hour and have the right to a union.”
In March, a survey found that the $15 minimum wage was popular with voters in Democrat-held swing districts. Despite that, six Democrats voted no on the bill; three Republicans voted in favor. The federal minimum wage has been stuck at the same level for a record-breaking length of time, while Republicans stand in the way of making work pay.