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In the News
Matt Hardy explains how pro wrestlers unionizing could put smaller companies out of business
May 19, 2026 // Jake Skudder for Figure Four Weekly
Hardy would go on to say that getting unionization would be great for the performers at bigger companies, as it could also mean that the independent contractor status at smaller promotions might have to TRULY be independent contractor deals: “As far as being able to have some sort of unionization, where there was some sort of control and people were regulated, that would be great. The smaller companies, I feel like they would have to kind of carve out their own niche where you would have to be independent contractors, but you would truly be independent contractors. I feel like myself and Jeff, we are like the epitome of independent contractors right now at TNA. As long as we do their TV dates, we’re all good. We can do whatever we want.”
Seattle Art Museum Workers Move to Unionize
May 19, 2026 // Rhea Nayyar for Hyperallergic Seattle
Over 100 staff members across departments at the Seattle Art Museum (SAM) have announced their intention to unionize in a recent letter to the Director and CEO Scott Stulen and the museum board, urging leadership to voluntarily recognize the union by Wednesday, May 27. Going by Seattle Art Museum Workers United (SAMWU), the employees have affiliated with Washington Federation of State Employees/AFSCME Council 28, which also represents workers at the Tacoma Art Museum, as first reported by the Seattle Times. Dated May 13, the SAMWU letter to the museum was signed by 59 current employees working in visitor experience and memberships, collections care and art handling, curatorial and exhibition projects, events management, institutional giving, and education, among other departments.
Labor leaders call collective bargaining veto a ‘betrayal’ by Virginia governor
May 19, 2026
“I remain committed to continuing to work with the General Assembly, unions, localities and public servants across the Commonwealth to develop a public sector collective bargaining system that works for Virginia,” Spanberger said in a statement. “However, I believe additional amendments are needed to the enrolled bill currently before me.” During the Jim Crow era, Virginia banned public sector collective bargaining in 1948 in response to a group of Black workers organizing a union at the University of Virginia hospital. Before Virginia passed a law that permits local governments to enact their own collective bargaining system in 2021, the state was one of only three that have blanket bans on collective bargaining for public sector workers. Even after the law passed, collective bargaining for state government workers remains illegal.
UAW forum generates heated exchanges between gubernatorial opponents
May 19, 2026 // Craig Mauger, for Detroit News
Two of the top candidates to be Michigan's next governor, Secretary of State Jocelyn Benson and former Detroit Mayor Mike Duggan, repeatedly clashed Monday night over how they've raised money to support their political ambitions. The exchanges, which might preview the race ahead this fall, played out at a forum organized by the United Auto Workers inside a union hall in Dearborn. About 150 people were in the crowd for the event that featured Duggan, a former Democratic prosecutor and current independent candidate for Michigan's top office, and two Democratic contenders, Benson and Genesee County Sheriff Chris Swanson.
LIRR resumes trains after tentative deal ends three-day strike
May 19, 2026 // Elijah Westbrook for CBS News
A deal was reached just before 9 p.m. Monday after intense negotiations throughout the weekend. The strike officially ended at midnight, but train service didn't resume until noon Tuesday. The MTA's strike contingency plan remained in effect for Tuesday's morning rush, including the limited free shuttle bus service.
Higher pay, fewer trips: What Seattle’s gig law got wrong
May 19, 2026 // Anthony Velasquez for Pacific Research Institute’
According to researchers at Carnegie Mellon University analyzing Seattle’s law in a National Bureau of Economic Research study, the average base pay per delivery jumped from about $5.37 to $12.52, but tips fell so much that more than one-third of that gain disappeared, and monthly earnings for highly active drivers were virtually unchanged after the first month. When the city raised the required base pay per delivery, platforms adjusted pricing and interfaces to offset the higher cost. Delivery fees went up, and customers tipped less and, in some cases, ordered less often.
Delaware Wells Fargo Branch Employees Latest to Remove CWA Union
May 19, 2026 // Author for National Right To Work Foundation
Employees at a Wells Fargo branch in Wilmington, Delaware, have successfully ousted Communications Workers of America (CWA) union bosses from their workplace. The effort to remove the union was initiated when bank employee Nancy Horsky filed a petition with the National Labor Relations Board (NLRB), seeking a “decertification” election to remove the CWA as the bargaining representative at her Wells Fargo branch. Horsky filed the petition for her coworkers with free legal aid from the National Right to Work Foundation.
‘We can shut down the city’: Lurie’s budget cuts spark a showdown with labor
May 19, 2026 // Joe Fitzgerald Rodriguez for San Francisco Standard
Mayor Daniel Lurie may be setting the stage for a once-in-a-generation showdown with San Francisco’s public-sector labor unions. Faced with a $643 million deficit and the threat of hundreds of millions more in federal cuts, Lurie is slashing city jobs and squeezing public services — moves that are fueling anger among the unions he’ll soon face across the bargaining table.
N.Y.C. Hotel Housekeepers Will Earn Over $100,000 Under New Contract
May 19, 2026 // Patrick McGeehan for New York Times
“They’re going to try to offset that by raising rates,” he said. But how successful they would be is unclear, given that New York City already has the highest average room rates of any big city in the United States, at about $335 a night, Mr. Pequeno said. In the past year, New York hotels have also had the nation’s highest occupancy rate, at about 84 percent, he said. The agreement between the hotel workers and the industry comes about six weeks before the expiration of the current 14-year contract. For more than a year, union officials had been preparing for a strike in early July, just before the celebration of the 250th birthday of the United States and the final of FIFA’s World Cup tournament at MetLife Stadium in New Jersey.
The Union You’ve Never Heard Of Is Following A Blueprint You Should Know
May 18, 2026 // author for Labor Relations Institute
In 2021, IATSE members authorized a strike by 98.7%. What followed was four years of increasingly coordinated action across entertainment unions. WGA, SAG-AFTRA, IATSE, and the Teamsters built a solidarity coalition that showed up at each other’s picket lines in 2023, during a 148-day WGA strike and a 118-day counterpart for SAG-AFTRA. During contract negotiations, this coalition has been using pattern bargaining, and “wins” by one union become the baseline for those that follow. Each contract raises the floor for the next negotiation, and whether that method is sustainable for the industry isn’t relevant here. What matters is that other unions are watching, and they love to copycat each other.
Spanberger vetoes bills allowing public employees to collectively bargain working conditions, wages
May 18, 2026 // Charlotte Rene Woods for Virginia Mercury
Spanberger first sought amendments to Senate Bill 378 and House Bill 1263, which one of the bill’s carriers, Senate Majority Leader Scott Surrovell, D-Fairfax, characterized as “a total rewrite.” On Thursday, Surovell confirmed the governor told him in a private call she planned to veto the measure. The proposal, backed by the Virginia Service Employees International Union (SEIU) and various labor groups, would expand on a 2020 law that permits local government employees in Virginia to opt-in to collective bargaining if their localities allow it.
How Teachers’ Unions Became Political Big Spenders
May 18, 2026 // Frannie Block for The Free Press
A new report out today accuses both the American Federation of Teachers (AFT) and the National Education Association (NEA) of spending tens of millions of dollars on electing Democratic political candidates, and prioritizing politicking over the needs and interests of their union members. The report, conducted by the Network Contagion Research Institute (NCRI), Gevura Fund, and Rutgers University, among others, found that of the NEA’s $450 million annual disbursement budget from fiscal year 2025, less than $46 million, or 10 percent, was spent on activities directly representing the union’s constituents.
AFP Mobilizes Grassroots in Key Districts to Oppose the Faster Labor Contracts Act
May 18, 2026 // author for Americans for Prosperity
“This bill puts a 100-day stopwatch on one of the most consequential decisions a workplace ever makes — and then hands the final call to a stranger who has never set foot inside the building. That isn’t fairness, and it isn’t faster bargaining. It’s rushed bargaining, with an outside arbitrator deciding pay, schedules, and working conditions for people whose jobs and businesses they don’t know,” said Austen Bannan, labor policy fellow at Americans for Prosperity. “Workers deserve a contract they can actually live with — not one written under an artificial clock that benefits union leadership the moment the ink dries, because that’s when dues start flowing. AFP activists are showing up in Nebraska and Pennsylvania this week to tell Reps. Bacon, Bresnahan, and Fitzpatrick what real workers in their districts are saying: oppose this bill, and don’t sign the discharge petition,” Bannan continued.
DOL gets flexible on overtime
May 18, 2026 // Sean Higgins for Competitive Enterprise Institute
The Fair Labor Standards Act (FLSA) requires that workers be paid time-and-a-half once a work week exceeds 40 hours. However, employers may exempt workers classified as managerial who meet a salary threshold. In 2023, The Biden administration raised the income threshold from $35,500 to $44,000, and planned to increase it again to $59,000 annually by 2025. This was intended to expand the number of people receiving overtime. The administration’s union allies and labor-sympathetic lawmakers have long argued that companies abuse the exception by designating regular employees as managerial to get out of having to pay them overtime. Raising the threshold was meant to prevent this. This one-size-fits-all approach did not necessarily benefit all workers.
New Yorkers bracing for commuter chaos as LIRR workers remain on strike
May 17, 2026 // Ivan Pereira, Michael O'Keefe, Ayesha Ali, Bill Hutchinson for ABC news
MTA Chairman Janno Lieber told reporters Sunday that the MTA refuses to make a deal that forces riders and taxpayers to fund wage increases for workers who, he contended, are already the highest-paid railroad employees in the nation. Nearly 300,000 daily commuters are affected by the strike, according to the MTA.
Penn State faculty vote to unionize in one of Pennsylvania’s largest union elections
May 16, 2026 // Rachael Lardani for WGAL
With the election decided, the next major step will be negotiating a first union contract between Penn State faculty and the university. Organizers say they hope the agreement will address workplace conditions, faculty voice in governance and support for the university’s academic mission. SEIU Local 668 represents about 25,000 public-sector workers across Pennsylvania’s 67 counties. This comes as the university moves forward with plans to close several branch campuses, including Penn State York and Penn State Mont Alto.
Commentary: Josh Hawley’s Pro-Union Bill Would Let Washington Write Your Contract
May 16, 2026 // C. Jarrett Dieterle for Reason
A Hawley-backed bill, known as the Faster Labor Contracts Act (FLCA), seems to be picking up steam and may soon pass the House of Representatives. Unfortunately, the FLCA is a trifecta of bad public policy: It suffers from constitutional infirmities, revives a corrupt government agency, and takes away the voice of both businesses and workers. Earlier this Congress, Hawley introduced the FLCA in the Senate, alongside one other Republican senator and three Democratic senators; he has since picked up another Republican and 10 more Democrats. Companion legislation in the House has 99 cosponsors, 17 of which are Republican.
EdSource workers strike over unfair labor practices
May 16, 2026 // author for NewsGuild-CWA
Unionized staff at EdSource, the largest education newsroom in California, are on strike today, May 14, 2026 to protest unilateral changes to healthcare benefits and management’s lack of progress toward a fair contract.
Editorial Board: The federal government’s most efficient use of $600 ever?
May 15, 2026 // Editorial Board for Washington Post Opinion
As part of the Trump administration’s effort to modernize government websites, OLMS has added a new “Visualization” column. All the reports are available the same as before, but now some also have a more user-friendly version. The data are searchable and sortable, and users can view multiyear comparisons, with charts, at a glance. This fix has made it much easier to see, for example, that the Amalgamated Transit Union has 18 vice presidents, and they all make more than $215,000 a year.
Monitor: Shawn Fain, staff unfairly blamed UAW treasurer over investments
May 15, 2026 // Liam Rappleye for Detroit Free Press
Reports of the mismanaged finances were leaked to the news media in 2025, prompting a request from U.S. Rep. Tim Walberg, R-Tipton, a few months later to explain, as news agencies had reported, how the union had missed out on approximately $80 million by failing to reinvest the strike fund. Mock had largely been blamed for the misstep as the top steward of union funds, but Mock has also been the target of retaliation schemes in the union, something the monitor has reported on in-depth before. This finger-pointing over the investment flub was retaliatory, too, the monitor concluded in his latest report issued on Thursday, April 30. According to the 82-page report, numbers were "exaggerated," and blame was placed unfairly