Posts tagged Constitution
NLRB Challenges California’s AB 288 as Preempted by Federal Law
October 22, 2025 // The National Labor Relations Board (NLRB) has filed suit against the State of California and the California Public Employment Relations Board (PERB) seeking to block enforcement of Assembly Bill 288, a new law that would allow California to step into the NLRB’s shoes under certain conditions. The NLRB contends that AB 288 is preempted by the National Labor Relations Act (NLRA) and that it violates the Supremacy Clause of the U.S. Constitution. As discussed in our prior update here, California recently joined New York in passing legislation that would allow state agencies to assume powers delegated to the NLRB by Congress
Judicial Watch Urges Federal Probe of Minneapolis Schools’ Union Contract Over Constitutional Concerns
September 8, 2025 // Judicial Watch requests the Office for Civil Rights investigate Article 15 of the collective bargaining agreement between the Minneapolis Public Schools, Special District No. 1 (“MPS”) and the Minneapolis Federation of Teachers Local 59. The contract violates the equal protection clause of the Fourteenth Amendment to the U.S. Constitution. Article 15 exempts teachers of color from MPS’s seniority-based layoffs and reassignments, which means, when layoffs or reassignments occur, the next senior teacher who is not “of color” would be laid off or reassigned. The contract also mandates that MPS reinstate teachers of color over more senior teachers who are not “of color.” Prior to the contract, teachers were laid off or reassigned in order of seniority, with the least senior teachers laid off or reassigned first, without regard to race or ethnicity.
Judicial Watch Urges Federal Probe of Minneapolis Schools’ Union Contract Over Constitutional Concerns
September 5, 2025 // Judicial Watch announced today it wrote letters to the Offices of Civil Rights in the Departments of Education and Labor requesting they investigate the collective bargaining agreement between the Minneapolis Public Schools and the Minneapolis Federation of Teachers. The letters point out that the contract violates the equal protection clause of the Fourteenth Amendment to the U.S. Constitution.
Commentary: To Harvard and Back with Julie Su
August 18, 2025 // This year, Julie Su, Joe Biden’s pick for secretary of labor, became a resident fellow with Harvard’s Kennedy School, Institute of Politics. The Century Foundation also brought Su on board as a full-time senior fellow. These prestigious institutions seem to have overlooked key events in Su’s long career. Harvard, where Su, a Stanford grad, earned her law degree, hails the Biden nominee as “a nationally recognized workers’ rights and civil rights expert.” As California’s labor commissioner, Su was “widely credited with a renaissance in enforcement and creative approaches to combating wage theft and protecting immigrant workers.” In reality, her experience was a bit more extensive.
Court allows Trump to end union bargaining for federal workers
August 5, 2025 // Trump's order exempted more than a dozen federal agencies from obligations to bargain with unions. They include the Departments of Justice, State, Defense, Treasury, and Health and Human Services.
We’re Suing to Stop Unions from Stealing from Home Caregivers
August 4, 2025 // This isn’t the first time that Michigan caregivers have been targeted by unions seeking to skim dues off their stipends. Democrats put in place the same unjust policy in 2005, and the Service Employees International Union went on to take an estimated $34 million from home caregivers in just six years, before Republicans repealed it. But this time, caregivers like Tammy hopefully won’t have to wait for a change in power. The courts can protect them.
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.
Supreme Court clears way for Trump to downsize the federal workforce
July 10, 2025 // The labor unions and nonprofit groups that sued over the downsizing offered the justices several examples of what would happen if it were allowed to take effect, including cuts of 40% to 50% at several agencies. Baltimore, Chicago and San Francisco were among cities that also sued. “Today’s decision has dealt a serious blow to our democracy and puts services that the American people rely on in grave jeopardy. This decision does not change the simple and clear fact that reorganizing government functions and laying off federal workers en masse haphazardly without any congressional approval is not allowed by our Constitution,” the parties that sued said in a joint statement.
Federal lawsuit alleges discrimination against Vietnamese women nail techs
June 3, 2025 // Licensed barbers, cosmetologists, estheticians and electrologists can still work as independent contractors under state labor law without being subjected to a rigorous test. But exemptions under Assembly Bill 5 expired this year for manicurists. The change has left manicurists and nail salon owners alike confused as to whether non-employees can continue renting booths for their businesses — a decades-long industry practice.
Farmworkers in NY and CA File Federal Challenges Against Statutes Letting Union Bosses Seize Control Without Employee Vote
May 28, 2025 // Workers contend that “card check” unionization method leads to false claims of majority union support, intimidation, and constitutional violations