Posts tagged Joe Biden
Opinion: Congress Must Oppose Big Labor’s “PRO Act” Power Grab
March 14, 2025 // In the 2024 election cycle, labor unions gave nearly 90 percent of their political donations to Democratic Party candidates. For large unions like the National Education Association (NEA), as much as 99 percent of political donations went to Democrats. The PRO Act is a return on investment for the hundreds of millions of dollars that union bosses continue to pour into Democrat coffers.
Construction groups decry PRO Act’s reintroduction
March 13, 2025 // “The reintroduction of the PRO Act displays continued disregard for the livelihoods of small business owners, employees and independent contractors,” said Swearingen. “While Congress has long rejected the PRO Act and its provisions, these legislators continue to pursue failed policies and attack business models and fundamental freedoms that have fueled entrepreneurship, job creation and opportunity for the American worker.”
Official Fired By Trump Returns To Work To Cheers After Judge Orders Reinstatement
March 11, 2025 // Wilcox filed a lawsuit seeking reinstatement, arguing her removal was unlawful. Judge Beryl A. Howell agreed with Wilcox, issuing an order last Thursday ensuring her temporary return to the agency as the underlying case moves forward. In a stinging opinion, Howell wrote that Trump failed to grasp the Constitution’s limits on executive power.
Backgrounder: Modern Worker Security Act
March 7, 2025 // Rep. Kiley’s legislation would ensure that the offer of portable benefits by companies would not be a factor in any calculation regarding the classification of a worker under “any federal law”—including the FLSA. The legislation defines portable benefits as a work-related benefit that stays with the worker regardless of whether they continue to perform work for that individual. Such work-related benefits can include “workers’ compensation, skills training, professional development, paid leave, disability coverage, health insurance coverage, retirement savings, income security, and short-term saving” or financial contributions toward such coverage—or a combination thereof.
Op-ed: Protect American workers: How Trump’s team can fulfill his promise
March 6, 2025 // Regulatory reform is needed at three federal agencies that oversee labor laws and regulations: the U.S. Department of Labor, the National Labor Relations Board, and the Equal Employment Opportunity Commission. At the Labor Department, the administration should remove the economically inept "environmental, social and governance" investment criteria and instead protect workers’ retirement savings. Investment managers should be prohibited from advancing political agendas that reduce pension returns. The administration should guarantee workers freedom of information and transparency, so union members know how their leaders are spending dues.
White House seeks data on federal staffers’ union work, raising alarms
March 4, 2025 // Legislation passed by Congress in 1978 grants federal government employees designated paid time during work hours — known as “official time” — to engage in certain union matters related to labor-management activities, such as bargaining contracts, filing grievance proceedings and holding workplace safety trainings. A federal worker, for example, may be allowed to use paid work time to represent an employee who is getting disciplined or fired. Official time is not allocated for union-specific business, such as union drives or elections.
GOP lawmakers demand info on Biden-era spending used to declare student-athletes as employees
March 3, 2025 // While the change in how college athletes are treated has been welcomed by many, others have been concerned about the move's potential implications. Earlier this month, the Trump administration rescinded the Biden administration NLRB's September 2021 memo insisting college athletes be recognized as employees under federal labor laws. The Trump administration this month also revoked guidance issued by President Joe Biden on his way out of the White House that required schools to distribute direct NIL payments equally to female and male athletes. Aaron Withe, an expert in government unionization and a former college athlete, said he fears continued momentum toward viewing college athletes as strictly employees will destroy college sports. "Are unions going to step in between a coach and their athletes for yelling at the players, or because practice went long or because they're making them run an exceptional amount of lines?" Withe wondered. "If you're represented by a union, they're now your bargaining agent. You have no ability to go represent yourself in anything with the university if it is deemed they are your employer. You've got no ability to go negotiate with them anymore."
‘Union Joe’ left labor movement weaker than it was
February 25, 2025 // As Dominic Pino pointed out last month in National Review, the overwhelming majority of workers in such fields as manufacturing, construction, mining, transportation and warehousing are not union members. Efforts to unionize employees attract disproportionate media cheerleading, especially when the unions target iconic American companies like Starbucks and Amazon. But there isn’t nearly as much coverage when workers in high-profile workplaces vote against joining a union — as they have recently at a Mercedes factory in Alabama, an Amazon warehouse in North Carolina and even Princeton University — or when scores of unions each year are decertified in workplace elections.
Labor unions call on Trump to boost US shipbuilding against increasing Chinese dominance
February 20, 2025 // Last year under President Joe Biden, the unions filed a petition seeking to address China’s shipbuilding under Section 301 of the 1974 U.S. Trade Act, hoping to start a process by which tariffs and other measures could be enacted. The letter notes China manufactured more than 1,000 ocean-going vessels in 2023, while the United States made fewer than 10 ships. It adds that the Chinese shipbuilding industry received more than $100 billion in government support from 2010 to 2018, such that Chinese shipyards accounted for the majority of worldwide orders last year.
With federal student labor rights in limbo, Brown’s unions push for state-level protections
February 10, 2025 // Under President Trump, the National Labor Relations Board may overrule its landmark 2016 decision extending unionization rights to student workers.