Posts tagged Columbia University
‘Cronyism is alive and well’: With hundreds of thousands of dollars misused in their union, University workers allege mismanagement and retaliation
December 10, 2025 // Both Hannigan and Ventura said that the local’s general body has not been informed of the Department of Labor investigation—even after Molina received the subpoena. “There’s no transparency there,” Ventura said. “A lot of members don’t know what actually is going on in the union.” McAllister, a union member, said Molina “failed the membership” by not notifying them of the federal investigation. “He knew about what had transpired and he made no effort to speak about it at the general membership meeting,” McAllister said. “He failed us as a leader—I use the word lightly.”
Anonymous graduate student worker group files unfair labor practice charge against SWC-UAW
October 1, 2025 // Graduate Researchers Against Discrimination and Suppression, a new group, alleges that the union is halting bargaining for issues unrelated to employment.The group filed the charge amid stalled negotiations between the University and the union for a new contract after its first contract expired on June 30. The negotiations have halted over the University’s refusal to let the union broadcast bargaining sessions over Zoom for its members or let its president Grant Miner, who the University expelled in March, attend negotiations. The parties have not met since March. The union’s bylaws state that bargaining sessions must be “made accessible to the entire membership via Zoom or an equivalent platform.” The union conducted negotiations for its first contract in 2021 during the COVID-19 pandemic over Zoom and argues that its members who have fled the country fearing deportation by Immigration and Customs Enforcement, such as Ranjani Srinivasan, a Ph.D. candidate at the Graduate School of Architecture, Planning and Preservation, deserve to witness bargaining.
Columbia GRADS (Graduate Researchers Against Discrimination and Suppression) Hit UAW Union With Federal Labor Board Charges
September 25, 2025 // While federal law conditions union bosses’ monopoly bargaining powers on a nebulous “duty of fair representation,” union officials often ignore this duty and discriminate against those who oppose the union’s control.
Columbia GRADS (Graduate Students Against Discrimination and Suppression) Hit UAW Union With Federal Labor Board Charges
September 23, 2025 // GRADS’ charges list a number of outrageous bargaining items from UAW union officials, including: “proposals to force Columbia to limit campus police, security, and NYPD from doing their jobs;” “bargain[ing] over…so-called ‘Boycott, Divest & Sanction’ policies…of the entire university;” “termination of a dual-degree program between Columbia and Tel Aviv University;” and undoing discipline for students who have been suspended for “destroy[ing] campus property and disrupt[ing] the unit’s working conditions for extended periods.” “These and similar actions constitute bad faith bargaining…and violate the duty of fair representation that respondent union owes to all represented graduate students,” the charges state.
Op-ed: Celebrating the Decline of Big Labor
September 2, 2025 // New York and California have 17 percent of U.S. workers, but almost 30 percent of U.S. union members. The states with the lowest rates include the Carolinas, which do not allow collective bargaining in the public sector. More states should look to abolish public-sector collective bargaining, as Utah did this year. And more states should pick up where Republicans left off in the early-to-mid 2010s by passing right-to-work laws. The first order of business should be restoring Michigan’s law that Democrats repealed. In 24 states, private-sector workers can still be coerced to join or financially support a union.
Unions ‘Wait and See’ on Elections as Trump Upends Labor Arena
August 20, 2025 // That political uncertainty, coupled with a volatile economy and labor market, could have workers second-guessing whether they’re ready to stick their necks out for collective action, the data show. College athlete employment, protections for political protests, and higher penalties for labor law violations are just some of the issues that worker advocates may want to steer away from a Republican board. The average number of newly certified unions per month dropped 22.3% between January and July this year, compared to the last six months of the Biden administration, according to data from the NLRB’s monthly election reports.
With GLO push, RI becomes first state to explicitly codify student unionization rights in state law
August 11, 2025 // McKee signed House Bill 5187 on July 2, capping off a monthslong effort by Brown’s Graduate Labor Organization to codify federal labor organizing protections in state law. GLO leaders had worked with the Rhode Island AFL-CIO and state legislators to advocate for the bill’s passage since its introduction in January.
Under Trump, Student Labor Organizers Face New Challenges
August 7, 2025 // Anticipating a rollback of recent NLRB precedent, some unions have withdrawn petitions for recognition, looking for other paths to continue their work.
Will Sussman: Columbia Students Should Decertify Their Union
August 5, 2025 // Columbia students are fed up with their union’s focus on radicalism over bread-and-butter issues. “As a Jewish Israeli student at Columbia, the union has done absolutely nothing for me,” said Alon Levin, a graduate student in electrical engineering. “I have heard more blatantly racist and discriminatory language from them than anything that would remotely resemble aiding me in, say, addressing my cost of living or my health insurance concerns.” The problem with graduate student unions is not limited to Columbia, as I learned at MIT.
Cornell University Graduate Student Files Federal Charges Seeking End to Union Boss Control Over Graduate Students
July 14, 2025 // Student case attacks Obama-era federal labor board ruling that exposed graduate students to union boss power