Posts tagged House staff
House Republicans’ attempt to block staffer unions may have missed mark
March 13, 2023 // The House began allowing members’ staff to form unions last year by adopting a resolution that authorized regulations from the Office of Congressional Workplace Rights. Republicans opposed the measure at the time, and after taking control of the House, they adopted a rule that said the “regulations adopted pursuant to [last year’s resolution] shall have no force or effect” during the current Congress. While that might seem to nullify aides’ ability to form new unions, the language is actually ineffective, said Kevin Mulshine, author of the Demand Progress Education Fund report and a former senior adviser and counsel at OCWR.
Democrats’ big union bet
August 30, 2022 // The Democratic Party is about to find out whether broadly unionizing campaign workers is a smart way to draw top talent, breed happy staffs and embody the party's ideals — or a distraction that will divert donor dollars and weaken candidates and their top strategists. Driving the news: On Tuesday, months after voluntarily agreeing to recognize it, the Democratic Congressional Campaign Committee, the Democrats' House campaign arm, ratified the first collective bargaining agreement with its more than 250-member union.
“Dear White Staffers” Speaks: Inside the Effort to Unionize Capitol Hill
July 19, 2022 // To join the CWU, a simple majority of workers in a given Hill office must vote to unionize. Each House office that joins CWU will serve as its own collective bargaining unit represented by members elected from their own ranks. How things will unfold on the Senate side still isn’t settled. “I don’t know what the process is,” said Ohio Democratic Senator Sherrod Brown on Monday. “It’s up to the Rules Committee, I assume.”
Some arguments against the move for unionization on Capitol Hill
June 17, 2022 // The latest example is the American Federation of Government Employees. One of their locals that represents EPA employees said that during collective bargaining, they plan to ask for a climate emergency declaration by President Biden. That’s, I mean, that’s not what we traditionally think of as collective bargaining, right? We think of it as being just about what the employee needs, their benefits, their pay, their working conditions. So when you add in sort of the public sector, it adds another layer of politics, and it becomes more complicated. And especially if you see something like that, where a union that represents people, members of the bureaucracy asked for an actual policy change in collective bargaining, what does that mean, for Congress, right, where you’re already talking about political staffers? Jared Serbu, policy issues,
Nationwide push for unions expands to Capitol Hill after House votes to allow staffers to unionize
May 16, 2022 // The House passed a resolution Tuesday night allowing congressional staff to unionize. House staffers will be able to join a union, if they choose, but it isn’t a requirement under the resolution.