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In the News
Faculty, staff union reaches agreement with City Colleges of Chicago, strike averted
October 20, 2026 // Natalie McMillan for CBS News
The Cook County College Teachers Union and the community college system reached a tentative agreement overnight Sunday into Monday. The new four-year contract was approved just before 4 a.m. Monday. The union said the agreement includes salaries that keep pace with inflation. The agreement also protects health insurance, and puts safeguards in place regarding artificial intelligence, according to the union.
Henry Ford Genesys nurses approve contract after 411-day strike
October 19, 2026 // Max Reinhart for Detroit News
The hospital said it has already begun implementing elements of a revamped staffing model, including giving frontline nurses greater say in decisions involving patient care, nursing practices, safety and their work environment. The contract ratification comes just days after the nurses submitted a petition to the National Labor Relations Board, seeking an election on removing Teamsters Local 332 as their bargaining representative.
VA allows union contract to expire for most employees
October 19, 2026 // Erich Wagner for Government Executive
Individuals hired as departmental police officers, firefighters and security guards, exempted from Trump’s anti-union orders, remain covered under the expired collective bargaining agreement, albeit only for “mandatory” conditions of employment.
Dattner Architects workers launch union drive
October 19, 2026 // Daniel Jonas Roche for Architecture,
Dattner Architects employees have requested a card-check neutrality agreement from office leadership for union recognition. This is to bypass an election by the National Labor Relations Board (NLRB).
Why more Pittsburgh-area librarians are becoming ‘steelworkers’
October 19, 2026 // Octavia Liku for Pittsburgh’s Public Source
A lack of administrative transparency, paired with over a year of grappling with short-staffing, wages as low as $13.22 per hour, changing leadership and expanding responsibilities, pushed workers to unionize, by a 13-3 vote, with the United Steelworkers (USW) in late July. The Cooper-Siegel staff enters the bargaining phase of their first contract amid rising tensions and concerns across the broader library workforce. They join more than 750 library workers across the country — including in Ohio, Illinois and New York — who have organized over the last 12 months as library wages lag way below other sectors and the soaring cost of living.
Commentary: What happens when environmental justice nonprofit workers unionize?
October 19, 2026 // Jason Collins for Nonprofit Quarterly
OVECU filed an unfair labor practice claim with the NLRB, which ruled that OVEC had unlawfully suspended and discharged one employee and discharged another because of their unionizing efforts, which was a protected concerted activity. In July 2021, workers voted in an NLRB-supervised election to certify the union. Four months later, in November, OVEC’s board voted 10-1 to dissolve the 34-year-old organization
Opinion: Mitch Carmichael: The 120-day clock that could rewrite your job
October 19, 2026 // Mitch Carmichael for Charleston Gazette Mail
The FLCA would set a timetable for negotiating a first contract after a union is newly certified or recognized. The parties would meet and begin bargaining within 10 days after the employer receives a written request. If they have no agreement after 90 days of bargaining, either party could request federal mediation. If mediation fails after another 30 days, the dispute will go to a three-person, federal-government arbitration panel. The panel’s decision would bind both sides for two years unless they agree in writing to amend it. That means a government panel, potentially unfamiliar with a particular West Virginia workplace, could decide matters as consequential as schedules, time off, health benefits and work rules. Unions and employers would have opportunities to present their positions, but neither would have the final say over terms imposed through arbitration. Nor would workers have an opportunity to ratify the final contract
State Health Dept. Sued Over Forced Unionizing of Michigan Home Caregivers
October 19, 2026 // AnnMarie Pariseau for Mackinac Center for Public Policy
The Mackinac Center Legal Foundation filed a lawsuit challenging Michigan’s effort to classify home caregivers as state employees for union representation. The lawsuit seeks to enforce the Michigan Constitution’s rules governing state employment and invalidate the election that certified SEIU Healthcare Michigan as the bargaining representative for home caregivers. The foundation represents James “Jase” Bolger, a former member of the Michigan Civil Service Commission. Bolger brings the lawsuit as a citizen, as the Michigan Constitution allows any citizen to sue to enforce its civil service provisions.
Minneapolis Worker Files Federal Charges Against Union for Unlawful Dues Demands, ‘Pay Up or Be Fired’ Threats
October 18, 2026 // Author for National Right to Work Foundation
William Kocke, an employee of CenterPoint Energy, has filed unfair labor practice charges against Office and Professional Employees International (OPEIU) Local 12. The charges state that OPEIU union officials ignored and obstructed Kocke when he attempted to exercise his right to refrain from union membership and his right to pay less than full union dues under the National Right to Work Foundation-won Communication Workers v. Beck U.S. Supreme Court decision. Kocke filed the charges at the National Labor Relations Board (NLRB) with free legal aid from the National Right to Work Legal Defense Foundation.
Commentary: New Jersey Takes Aim at Freedom of Its Independent Contractors
October 16, 2026 // Jennifer Oliver O’Connell for Independent Women
In 2019, the legislature voted in AB5, and it was quickly signed into law by Gov. Gavin Newsom. Enforcement went into effect in 2020, and as Karen Anderson, founder of Freelancers Against AB5, explained on her Substack, four years later, independent professionals are still experiencing the fallout.
Could SEIU Local 1000 get a last-minute deal? Mediations start ahead of strike
October 16, 2026 // Corey Schmidt for Sacremento Bee
SEIU Local 1000 is asking for a 20% raise across three years. Roy told The Bee this isn’t an end-all-be-all number and the union is open to discussions. It also wants improved health benefits and stipends for those required to work in person.
Big Labor’s bid for a red workplace
October 16, 2026 // Michael Watson for Capital Research Center
The culmination of these policies to make the workplace red is sectoral bargaining, which structurally forces all workers in an industry under the control of union cadres in the name of class consciousness. It would be a decisive Trojan Horse, entering the American workplace blessed by certain figures on the right disillusioned by the consequences of contemporary American labor relations.
Commentary: Idaho teachers union budget mess is its own fault – will members demand accountability?
October 16, 2026 // Chris Cargill for Mountain States Policy Center
During the debate, lawmakers and the public were told taxpayers weren’t subsidizing the union. Now the IEA is cutting staff and closing offices — and it says HB 516 is one of the reasons its operating environment has become more difficult. Six months ago, I wrote in these pages that Idaho hadn't banned unions. It had simply stopped doing their paperwork. Teachers remained free to join a union. Unions remained free to advocate for their members. Collective bargaining remained legal.
Huntington Beach Police Union Spends Big Against City Council Incumbents
October 16, 2026 // Noah Biesiada for Voice of OC
Spending is heating up in the race for Huntington Beach City Council after the local police officer’s association dropped nearly $100,000 in independent advertising targeting sitting council members who voted against their raises and supporting their opponents. The Huntington Beach Police Officers Association has spent over $100,000 on city council races as of Oct. 13 according to campaign disclosures. Most of that spending came through the police union’s political action committee, where they disclosed spending $16,000 apiece opposing Mayor Casey McKeon and Councilman Pat Burns just weeks after they voted against a nearly 18% raise for officers over the next three years.
New York City Carpenters Union Says Federal Oversight Has Ended
October 16, 2026 // Author for IndoNewYork
The council said the end of the long legal process gives it greater authority over its operations and removes prolonged external approval processes. It said internal compliance and investigative systems, along with safeguards for the union and its members, will remain in place. The announcement did not describe the specific action or date that formally ended federal supervision.
Kathy Hochul Chooses Kids Over the Teachers’ Union
October 16, 2026 // Danyela Souza Egorov for City Journal
Though most eligible students remain enrolled in public schools, the unions spent months running ads and organizing rallies against the program. They are plainly terrified of giving families the financial power to make educational decisions for their kids. Parents already have this power in the more than 30 states that offer some state-run school choice program. Until now, parents in New York did not. Thanks to Hochul, New York families will for the first time be able to decide for themselves the best way to educate their children. Catholic, Jewish, and other religious schools stand to benefit as well. This is the first program New York has allowed that helps cover the tuition in religious schools.
Yale Political Union votes to ban public-sector unions after debate with Freedom Foundation CEO Aaron Withe
October 15, 2026 // Aaron Withe for Freedom Foundation
Members of the Yale Political Union voted 35-25, to pass the resolution “Ban Public-Sector Unions” after Freedom Foundation CEO Aaron Withe argued the affirmative on Sept. 29. Founded in 1934, the Yale Political Union is one of the country’s best-known student debate societies. After Withe’s opening speech, students questioned him and debated the resolution before the house voted. Withe opened by quoting President Franklin D. Roosevelt, who wrote in 1937 that collective bargaining “cannot be transplanted into the public service.” The quote, Withe noted, came not from Ronald Reagan, Ron DeSantis or Scott Walker, but from FDR.
Grocery Worker, Age 86, Sues Union After He Was Fired for Refusing to Pay Dues
October 15, 2026 // Farida Jhabvala Romero for KQED
California is one of 24 states where unions can get private-sector employees terminated under common “union-security” contract agreements with employers, which require all members of a bargaining unit to pay dues as a condition of employment. Objecting employees can opt out of full union membership, paying instead generally lower fees for direct representation that don’t cover other union activities, such as political lobbying. Nationwide, 26 states have different “right-to-work” laws making union dues payment voluntary
Workers File Brief in Appeals Court Challenge to Biden-Era Labor Board Decision Preventing Halt of Union Dues Deductions
October 15, 2026 // author for National Right To Work Foundation
ith free legal aid from the National Right to Work Legal Defense Foundation, two employees have filed an amicus brief at the U.S. Fifth Circuit Court of Appeals in a case (Kroger Texas L.P. v. NLRB) challenging a Biden-era National Labor Relations Board (NLRB) ruling blocking employers from ceasing union dues deductions after a contract expires. The two workers, Brittani Butler and Cypress Meadowlark, are already challenging a separate but related NLRB precedent that restricts employees from stopping dues deductions when no union contract is in effect. Both had attempted to stop union dues deductions only to have those requests ignored by union officials, despite neither being subject to a union monopoly bargaining agreement.
Congress Just Learned an Important Lesson About Collective Bargaining
October 14, 2026 // Lindsay Mark Lewis for Progressive Policy Institute
Eight congressional employees negotiating with a strongly pro-union member of Congress took four years to get their agreement right. FLCA essentially gives private-sector workers and employers roughly four months before the process can move toward having outsiders determine the terms for them. And those agreements can be vastly more complicated than a congressional office contract.