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In the News
The future of white-collar work may be unionized
October 10, 2025 // Tristan Bove for Washington Post
“The way layoffs happened at Google, where it wasn’t clear what the reason for people getting laid off was, definitely created a sense of job insecurity and mistrust,” says Parul Koul, a software engineer at Google and president of the Alphabet Workers Union. Another driver has been artificial intelligence threatening to replace entry-level knowledge work. Few white-collar industries epitomize the challenge of integrating AI into workflows more than the practice of law. While many legal experts say AI will have a transformative impact by automating repetitive research tasks, some also fear it will dilute entry-level associate roles at law firms.
Chicago Teachers Union undermines yet another charter school
October 10, 2025 // Hannah Schmid for Illinois Policy Institute
There are currently 559 students enrolled in ChiArts, according to the district’s enrollment report for fall 2025. Four-in-five students are Black or Hispanic. Last year, the Acero Schools charter network announced it was closing seven of its 15 schools. As with ChiArts, CTU made a show of claiming it supported the parents and students affected by the closing of the seven Acero schools after its actions to hurt the school staffing, flexibility and ability to plan. Ultimately, CPS board members – appointed by CTU crony Mayor Brandon Johnson – voted to transition five of the Acero schools into district-run schools by the 2026-2027 school year. The absorbed schools will no longer be charters.
Testimony: Rachel Greszler: Labor Law Reform Part 1: Diagnosing the Issues, Exploring Current Proposals
October 10, 2025 // Rachel Greszler for Heritage Foundation
SummaryToday’s challenges—from the rise of artificial intelligence to the expansion of independent work and the growing demand for flexibility, autonomy, and new skills—necessitate modernized labor laws that are pro-worker and pro-employer, regardless of the type of workplace. Heavy-handed government interventions and attempts to bring back the 1950s’ ways of work are not the answers. American labor laws should preserve the freedom, dignity, and opportunity that make American work exceptional.
Opinion: Time to Protect Workers’ Pay
October 10, 2025 // David Guenthner for Workers for Opportunity
The United Auto Workers bears no resemblance to the collaborative employee councils common in Germany. Another lesson from the proposed strike: If employers won’t protect their employees from unions, it’s a signal to every red-state governor and Legislature that they need to mount a more vigorous defense of workers’ paychecks.
Uniting Behind the American Franchise Act: A Bipartisan Effort to Clarify the Joint Employer Standard
October 10, 2025 // Lewitt Hackman for JD Supra
Seven Republican and seven Democratic Congressional members introduced the bipartisan act and limited its application to future proceedings only, preventing retroactive implications. If approved, the American Franchise Act only applies to joint employer matters regarding franchising; it is not a universal modification to all employer relationships.
NY sisters who own DQ franchise hit with $6M lawsuit for paying workers every 2 weeks — they helped change the loophole but it was too late for them
October 10, 2025 // Mike Crisolago for Moneywise
New York's Frequency of Pay law (2) requires “manual workers” to receive their pay on a weekly basis. It’s a law that the sisters said they’d never heard of, which is why they paid their employees biweekly — a process that they said was never flagged by anyone, including during an audit conducted by the state’s Department of Labor. Robey told CBS that the lawsuit was “ridiculous,” adding, “we knew we paid every employee every dime that they were owed." But her sister noted that the former employee, who’d been laid off, “would say all the time, 'I'm gonna get you, I'm gonna get you,' and she did.”
Commentary: AB 1340 Is a Death-Knell to Rideshare Independence for California Drivers
October 9, 2025 // Jennifer Oliver O’Connell for Independent Women's Forum
Long odds predict that, just as with the fallout from AB5, rideshare drivers will ultimately not like the end result. Just as California’s AB5 has infected the nation, with AB5-like restrictive measures being considered in Minnesota and New Jersey, this new California law is a bellwether to the erosion of the rideshare model in other states.
France learns (again) what sectoral bargaining means
October 9, 2025 // Michael Watson for Capitol Research Center
The public thought Truman hadn’t gone far enough. In 1946 it elected a Republican-majority Congress (the first since the Great Depression) and enough union-skeptical Democratic allies to pass the Taft-Hartley Act, with its limits on strikes for reasons other than immediate labor disputes, over President Truman’s (possibly entirely cynical) veto. The French political shutdown tactics would not be imported with the Burgundian wine and Normandy cheese.
Right to Work Foundation Urges Ninth Circuit to Reject CA Law Granting Union Bosses Massive Power Over Cannabis Industry Workers
October 9, 2025 // author for National Right to Work Legal Defense Foundation
The Foundation’s amicus brief argues in particular that the National Labor Relations Act (NLRA) preempts California’s “labor peace agreement” statutes. The NLRA is the federal law that governs most private sector labor relations. The four conditions mandated for cannabis companies under California law, “an agreement with a…union, a ban on disrupting union organizing, a ban on union members picketing, boycotting, or striking, and a clause granting union organizers access to employees at work” all concern activity that the U.S. Congress intended the NLRA to deal with – not state law.
Teamsters president notes ‘positive change’ with growing Republican union support in Senate testimony
October 9, 2025 // Eric Revell for Fox News
Rachel Greszler, senior research fellow at The Heritage Foundation, said the complexity of collective bargaining agreements means that both workers forming a union and the employer need ample time to consider their implications for the future of the company and its workforce. "When you have a first contract, especially if you have a company that has never been involved in negotiations or a union, that it's the first time that they're representing workers, they need to understand all the issues," she explained. She also said contracts like the United Auto Workers union's agreements with automakers such as Ford can run thousands of pages when accounting for memorandums of agreement, with several hundred items covered under the bargaining agreement.
Federal Judge Denies Anonymity To Fired Civil Servants Suing Over Mass Firings
October 9, 2025 // Leslie Bolden for Tampa Free Press
A federal judge in the U.S. District Court for the District of Columbia has denied a request from five former federal employees, who claim they were improperly terminated during a "mass firing" in February 2025, to proceed with their lawsuit anonymously. The plaintiffs, identified only as Civil Servants 1 through 5, are suing the Office of Special Counsel (OSC), alleging the agency unlawfully closed thousands of prohibited personnel practice (PPP) complaints filed by probationary employees without considering the individual merits of each case. They contend this action undermines workplace protections and violates the Administrative Procedure Act.
Video: Union president says federal government employees are “very traumatized” by the shutdown
October 9, 2025 // Everett Kelley for CNN
Everett Kelley, President of the American Federation of Government Employees, joined CNN's Pamela Brown to discuss how government employees are feeling about the ongoing shutdown in light of threats the Trump administration has made over their jobs
White House may nix pay for workers furloughed during shutdown
October 9, 2025 // John T. Bennett, Jessie Hellmann for The Hill
Mark Paoletta, the OMB general counsel, wrote that the 2019 law is “not self-executing” and requires further appropriations to pay furloughed workers as part of stopgap legislation to end the funding lapse. The memo, which is labeled “pre-decisional and deliberative,” says that the requirement for “excepted” employees to keep working creates “binding legal obligations” to pay those workers. On the other hand, Paoletta writes there is no such obligation for furloughed workers who were “not performing services for the government” during the shutdown.
A third of Colorado Springs School District 11 teachers strike
October 8, 2025 // Mackenzie Stafford for KRDO
"CSEA is throwing a temper tantrum because they've lost power," said Jason Dudash with the Freedom Foundation, "Most teachers are still in the classrooms, they're happy with this new arrangement not being any longer beholden to the union." Counter protestors argue that if the teachers on strike cared about the students, they would be in the classroom.
VOLUNTARY RECOGNITION IN POLICE COMMANDERS’ BID TO UNIONIZE
October 8, 2025 // author for Pittsburgh
Today, Mayor Ed Gainey and the Pittsburgh Bureau of Police’s 12 Commanders are pleased to announce that the Administration has agreed to voluntarily recognize the commanders in their effort to form a union. The Commanders unanimously opted to form a union with the International Brotherhood of Teamsters.
Senator Tim Scott Reintroduces the Employee Rights Act to Empower American Workers
October 8, 2025 // author
“The Employee Rights Act is the most comprehensive labor legislation of this Congress, from protecting the secret ballot and unionization elections, to safeguarding workers from harassment and protecting their privacy, to putting workers in control of their own destiny. It truly puts the American worker first. We applaud Senator Scott for his steadfast leadership and support of worker freedom,” said F. Vincent Vernuccio, President of the Institute for the American Worker. This legislation was cosponsored by Senators John Barrasso (R-WY), Kevin Cramer (R-ND), Mike Crapo (R-ID), John Hoeven (R-ND), Cindy Hyde-Smith (R-MS), Jim Risch (R-ID), and Tommy Tuberville (R-AL).
UMWA President Jerry Kerns II Faces Embezzlement Indictment
October 8, 2025 // author for National Institute for Labor Relations Research
Jerry Kerns II, President of UMWA Local 1582, will have to face a courtroom after being indicted on one count of embezzlement.
Commentary: When fighting Trump, take union claims with a grain of salt
October 7, 2025 // Jarrett Skorup for Washington Examiner
Government unions faced another momentous reform seven years ago when the Supreme Court ruled in Janus v. AFSCME. The court held that public sector workers have a First Amendment right to completely withdraw from union membership and dues. In essence, the court created a nationwide right-to-work law for all public sector workers, including teachers, police officers, firefighters, and all other federal, state, and local government workers. No longer would they have to join or pay a union to keep their job. Government unions hated this ruling, of course. In a desperate attempt to sway the Supreme Court, union-paid prognosticators predicted massive negative economic effects if the court ruled against unions.
Why some federal workers aren’t scared by the threat of shutdown layoffs
October 7, 2025 // Andrea Hsu for NPR
NPR has not learned of any layoffs due to the shutdown since congressional appropriations lapsed on Oct. 1, although many federal agencies have filed reorganization and reduction-in-force plans with the administration as a result of a February executive order and subsequent guidance directing them to do so.
Marriott, Hilton workers strike in Philadelphia
October 7, 2025 // Jenna Graber for Hotel Dive
Union employees at the Sheraton Philadelphia Downtown and the Hampton Inn Philadelphia Center City are calling for higher pay and improved benefits.