Posts tagged AFGE
Federal shutdown heads for record-longest; local union says workers feeling financial pain
November 6, 2025 // Senators from both parties, Republicans and Democrats, are quietly negotiating the contours of an emerging deal. With a nod from their leadership, the senators seek a way to reopen the government, put the normal federal funding process back on track and devise some sort of resolution to the crisis of expiring health insurance subsidies that are spiking premium costs from coast to coast.
Furloughed federal workers face delays getting unemployment pay during shutdown
November 4, 2025 // The specifics vary. Massachusetts has a high-end weekly benefit of $1,105 per week for up to 30 weeks. In Mississippi, it’s no more than $235 weekly for up to 26 weeks. Roughly half the states pay less than $600 a week maximum, according to U.S. Department of Labor numbers. Not everyone gets the maximum weekly rate. Some states offer fewer than 20 weeks. And the limits can grow in some states when unemployment rates are particularly high. Around the nation’s capital, the maximum weekly payment is $444 in Washington, D.C., $430 in Maryland and $378 in Virginia. In Texas, where Avila-Thomas lives, the weekly maximum is $605, for up to 26 weeks.
Top labor groups break with federal union’s support of Republican measure to end shutdown
November 4, 2025 // But many of the top labor unions told ABC News that they continue to back the strategy taken up by Democrats, breaking with the American Federation of Government Employees (AFGE), which represents hundreds of thousands of federal workers losing out on pay and staring down the threat of layoffs. Many labor unions, a key bloc within the Democratic Party, support the push for an extension of Obamacare subsidies and remain eager to fight a president they view as an adversary of workers, some labor analysts and union officials said.
Democrats’ rift with unions erupts as shutdown pain worsens
October 31, 2025 // The White House on Thursday night released a video to social media in which the presidents of the Southwest Airlines Pilots Association, Allied Pilots Association and National Air Traffic Controllers Association endorse Republicans' stopgap government funding bill. "The biggest way to ensure the safety, security and reliability of our national air traffic control system is to pass a clean continuing resolution," said Jody Reven, president of the SAPA. The union leaders said a month of missed paychecks is distracting and stressful for Transportation Security Administration workers and air traffic controllers and will ultimately disrupt airport operations.
Union call to reopen government exposes pain point for Democrats
October 29, 2025 // Democrats wrestle with whether to extend health subsidies for millions or leave more than 1 million federal workers without pay
Largest federal workers union calls for an end to the shutdown, putting pressure on Democrats
October 28, 2025 // The country’s largest union representing federal workers is calling for lawmakers to pass a short-term spending measure to immediately end the government shutdown, urging Democrats to abandon their current position and join Republicans in supporting a stopgap solution.
Number of federal employees exiting government this year continues to grow
October 27, 2025 // The number of federal employees exiting the government this year continues to grow. The Partnership for Public Service has added thousands more to its running tally of how many feds have left their jobs since January. The latest estimate surpasses 211,000 employees who are either already gone, or who may exit soon.
Social Security Union warns of collapse due to government shutdown
October 24, 2025 // The union that represents Social Security employees in Maine is warning of the impacts as the government shutdown continues. The American Federation of Government Employees says the Social Security Administration is on the verge of collapse as workers are continuing to work without pay. The AFGE argues that employees should be allowed to work from home during the shutdown due to the costs of traveling to the office.
Interior Department reveals plans to lay off more than 2,000 employees
October 21, 2025 // According to the documents, the RIF would involve: 474 employees in the Bureau of Land Management 12 employees in the Bureau of Ocean Energy Management 30 employees in the Bureau of Reclamation 7 employees in the Bureau of Safety and Environmental Enforcement 143 employees in the Fish and Wildlife Service 272 employees in the National Park Service 7 employees in the Office of Surface Mining Reclamation and Enforcement 770 Interior headquarters and Interior Business Center employees 335 employees in the U.S. Geological Survey In an earlier filing last week, the department said it had been planning the staff cuts for months, and until they were blocked by a restraining order, officials had planned to abolish the positions “imminently” and issue RIF notices to the staff in those roles.
How are unions pushing back against Trump’s attacks on labor and layoffs?
October 21, 2025 // Unions are battling the administration in federal courtrooms nationwide, after filing dozens of lawsuits to try to halt attempts to shed hundreds of thousands of government employees, strip collective bargaining rights from over a million workers, and gut some federal agencies. On Wednesday, they made a significant breakthrough: Judge Susan Illston, of the US district court’s northern district of California, granted a temporary restraining order blocking Trump’s latest mass layoffs from the government shutdown.