Posts tagged Bill Clinton
Commentary: Ivy Leaguers Aren’t Auto Workers
July 21, 2025 // In general, NLRB decisions are fake law made by fake judges who have to interpret a poorly written statute from 90 years ago that is based on assumptions about industrial organization that no longer obtain in the United States. But the NLRB remains powerful nonetheless, and its decisions matter. That’s why Russell Burgett, a doctoral candidate at Cornell University, which is private, is asking the NLRB to overturn the 2016 Columbia ruling. He isn’t a member of the Cornell graduate students’ union, a UE affiliate, and he said in charges filed with the NLRB on Monday that his choice not to join makes it harder for him to complete his education.
Commentary: Biden Values Public Unions Above Public Service
December 12, 2024 // “It’s time for America to get back to work and fill our great downtowns again with people,” he said. “The vast majority of federal workers will once again work in person.” Yet it never happened. The White House issued various directives, and every political appointee I know was routinely in the office . But despite this widespread discontent among his own appointees, Biden never got the workers back. One reason is that civil servants overwhelmingly view the return-to-office push as a bad-faith political stunt designed to assuage critics in Congress or provide economic benefits to cities. The belief that regular presence in an office is beneficial, expressed by many managers in the private sector, doesn’t have much traction.
Teamsters President Sean O’Brien eviscerates the Democratic Party: ‘They have f**** us over for the last 40 years’
October 8, 2024 // 'I'm a Democrat but they have f***** us over for the last 40 years and for once we're standing up as a union saying what the f*** have you done for us?' O'Brien said in scathing remarks. 'I'm getting attacked from the left you know and since I've been in office over two and a half years we've given the Democratic machine $15.7 million. 'We've given Republicans about $340,000 truth be told, so it's like you know people say the Democratic party is the party of working people, but they're actually bought and paid for by big tech,' O'Brien explained.
Op-ed: The Price of Bent Unions Is Red Unions
March 2, 2024 // It’s important to point out that the lesson of this pattern isn’t that corrupt unions are somehow “better” than their ideologically fanatical alternative. Every political activist, no matter how wrong on policy, deserves to have money that he or she voluntarily contributes to advocacy groups be used for the purposes for which it was contributed, rather than lining the leaders’ pockets. (Inclination to this sin does not distinguish by party or ideology, it must be said.)
Starbucks proxy war shows Big Labor’s new tactic
February 23, 2024 // Crucially, the new SEC rule allows the SOC to push for huge changes to the Starbucks board with comparatively little skin in the game. Starbucks has a market capitalization of $105 billion. The SOC owns 161 shares of Starbucks, a stake worth approximately $16,000. Thanks to the universal proxy rule, the SOC can use Starbucks’s own proxy materials to promote its hostile takeover attempt without bearing the costs of its own solicitation. The Starbucks proxy fight is one part of SOC’s broader scheme to impose Big Labor’s agenda on every publicly traded American company. The SOC’s coalition includes some of the most militant and disruptive unions in the country: the Service Employees International Union, Communications Workers of America, and the United Farmworkers of America. These unions regularly engage in strikes, protests, boycotts, litigation, and other tactics to bend workers and employers alike to their will.
Will Starbucks’ union-busting stifle a union rebirth in the US?
August 28, 2023 // Many baristas say one Starbucks strategy in particular has discouraged workers from unionizing. In May 2022, Schultz announced that Starbucks would give certain raises and benefits to workers at its more than 9,000 non-union stores, but not offer those raises and benefits to its unionized workers. Starbucks insists it would be illegal to impose any raises or benefits on its unionized stores without first negotiating about them, but the NLRB’s general counsel asserts that this policy constitutes unlawful discrimination against Starbucks’ unionized workers. Under this policy, Starbucks has given its non-union workers, but not its unionized ones, a more relaxed dress code, increased training, faster sick leave accrual and, most important, credit card tipping. (Workers at the first few Starbucks stores to unionize had asked early on for credit card tipping.)
Unions’ 2024 maneuvering leaves some feeling conflicted
June 27, 2023 // Organized labor is dear to the president’s political heart and is set to play a major role in next August’s Democratic National Convention, particularly as union considerations were one of the decisive reasons why party leaders chose Chicago to host the event over Atlanta, another finalist. But that rosy depiction, somewhat by design, glosses over the full picture. Not every union — despite what Biden told reporters last Saturday — is behind him. The United Mine Workers of America and United Auto Workers are among the notable holdouts. Their leaders have expressed harsh words about some of the administration’s policy decisions (more on that lower down.) Additionally, the selection of Chicago for the convention reopened old wounds for some union hands, given the heavy involvement of Illinois Gov. JB Pritzker, a billionaire heir of the family that controls the Hyatt hotel chain.
United Airlines pilots union moves closer to strike
June 5, 2023 // The strike vote comes weeks after United AIrlines pilots picketed major airports across the nation, demanding pay increases. Unions representing Southwest Airlines and American Airlines pilots have each authorized a strike this summer
Labor union challenges constitutionality of debt limit law
May 10, 2023 // The union’s lawsuit, filed in the U.S. District Court for the District of Massachusetts, says the debt limit statute allows the president to cancel government spending that’s been approved by Congress, and that violates the separation of powers. The lawsuit states that the union does not seek to challenge the “controversial proposition” that Congress can limit the country’s debt. But it contends that “Congress may not do so without at least setting the order and priority of payments once that limit is reached, instead of leaving it to the President to do so.” “Nothing in the Constitution or any judicial decision interpreting the Constitution allows Congress to leave unchecked discretion to the President to exercise the spending power vested in the legislative branch by canceling, suspending, or refusing to carry out spending already approved by Congress,” the lawsuit states.
Biden’s new charter school rules prioritize teachers’ unions over children
May 16, 2022 // The Biden administration’s proposed regulations would create roadblocks that would make the federal funds hard to access and charter school expansion more difficult. Additionally, the changes would work against charters serving students in urban communities and communities of color, as the proposed rules would require charters to be “racially and socio-economically diverse” — regardless of community needs.