Posts tagged organized labor
Republicans invite Teamsters president to testify on labor laws
October 5, 2025 // Cassidy’s invitation comes after the Teamsters’ decision in September 2024 not to endorse a presidential candidate – the first time the union did so since 1996 – and follows O’Brien’s remarks at last year's Republican National Convention, the first time in history that the organization’s leader addressed the RNC. The hearing, which is set to take place next Wednesday, as well as O'Brien’s invitation to it, is emblematic of the GOP’s slow crawl toward embracing parts of a working-class union message that would have turned heads even half a decade ago.
LMU faculty union calls strike vote after university says it has ‘religious exemption’ from organized labor
September 29, 2025 // Untenured faculty at Loyola Marymount University launched an unfair labor practice strike authorization vote this week following the school’s announcement that it will no longer recognize or bargain with the faculty union for a first contract. The union had been negotiating for a contract with LMU’s administration for about 10 months. Then, in mid-September, campus leaders announced that LMU is invoking a religious exemption from the National Labor Relations Board’s jurisdiction. The board oversees unionization efforts and protects the rights of private sector employees
Op-ed: Organized Labor Pushes Blue States to Protect Private University Student Workers
September 2, 2025 // Without a quorum at the NLRB, state legislation that codifies collective bargaining for private-sector employees may be key to preserving workers’ rights.
TVA privatization could spell trouble for unions in Appalachia, workers say
August 27, 2025 // Around 5700 union members work on a range of energy projects across the seven-state footprint of the Tennessee Valley Authority. From Western North Carolina to Tennessee, unionized workers work on TVA energy infrastructure, operate gas, coal, and nuclear plants, and check safety on waste ponds and landfills. While 24 full-time TVA employees work in Western North Carolina, union contractors are regularly called upon to maintain the region’s four major dams. Though all the states in which TVA operates are right-to-work states with resulting low union density, the TVA workforce is 57% unionized.
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.
Trump Is Making Major Concessions To Union Bosses. Is It Worth It?
August 15, 2025 // The Institute for the American Worker noted that union members who had funds embezzled by their leaders in recent years would now have less insight into how their dues were being spent. For example, in 2024, the Secretary-Treasurer of the International Association of Machinists and Aerospace Workers Local Lodge 2198 pleaded guilty to embezzling more than $63,000; under the proposed rule, the group would no longer have to file an LM-2.
Union Leaders Get Tough With Democrats as Members Drift Toward Trump
August 11, 2025 // “Every time we talk politics, the first thing that comes up is, ‘The Democrats let us down,’” Jimmy Williams, the president of the International Union of Painters and Allied Trades, told The New York Times.
Nationwide ‘People’s Sick Day’ set to cripple U.S. as Trump protesters plot mass walkout
July 21, 2025 // However, one group rising in membership plans to use their sick time for precisely that — taking a page out of organized labor's handbook and using their collective action to expose and potentially even directly impact what they view as systemic injustices against the working class of the United States.
The Roadmap To Modernizing Federal Labor Laws: Matt Kittle, F. Vincent Vernuccio
July 20, 2025 // That's one of the main things that we want to see at I4AW. Is workers having a choice in a voice, having. The ability to say who they want to be represented by, how they want their money spent, and how they want to work. And I know we talked about it briefly with the ERA, but the ability for an independent contractor to work for themselves, not be considered an employee, small business owner, to own a franchise, all those things are core to what the flexibility and the entrepreneurship of the modern worker, and those are the concepts that are embraced, you know, not just on the union end of the Employee Rights Act, but on the innovation and entrepreneurial spirit and pro worker end of the ERA.
Op-ed: Trump DOL Rule Would Reduce Union Transparency
July 2, 2025 // Keeping the reporting threshold at $250,000 in receipts is a good way to increase union transparency automatically. As that has become a smaller number in real terms over time, more unions have been subject to the highest level of scrutiny in their reports. Conservatives should applaud this win for public accountability. Instead, the Trump administration is looking to shield hundreds of unions from greater accountability by raising the reporting threshold. It’s not as though unions have been doing anything for Trump, as the AFL-CIO and government employee unions remain some of his top political adversaries.