Posts tagged PRO Act
Op-ed: To High Praise and Hallelujahs, Trump Nominates Keith Sonderling for Secretary of Labor
June 30, 2026 // As Acting Secretary, Sonderling has strongly advocated for Trump's pro-business and pro-worker agenda, touting the manufacturing jobs that have been returned to the U.S., and has worked tirelessly to beef up and expand apprenticeships through the U.S. Department of Labor for small businesses and private-sector concerns. Under Biden's DOL, apprenticeships were issued through the major labor unions like the AFL-CIO and SEIU, effectively cutting out any private sector opportunities. Sonderling has also long been a champion for defined benefit pension plan sponsors to be able to use group annuities to protect pension benefits through pension risk transfers, and to allow employers to incorporate retirement plan options like cryptocurrency assets and private credit funds. But most pivotal, Sonderling is working hand-in-hand with the Fraud Task Force to eradicate the rampant unemployment insurance fraud.
Kavin: How To Be An Anti-Socialist
June 26, 2026 // If moderate Democrats want to distance themselves from the party's socialist surge, a good place to start is by protecting independent contractors.
Faster is Not Always Better: House Passes Bill Seeking Radical Change in First Contract Bargaining
June 17, 2026 // The bill also raises questions about the lawfulness of strikes and lockouts during these first contract negotiations. Typically, where parties agree to interest arbitration (or where it exists in the public sector) it is premised on a mutual commitment of labor peace, i.e., the union will not go on strike, and the employer will not lock employees out while negotiations are ongoing and the arbitration is pending. However, in the private sector and in the absence of such a mutual commitment, both such economic weapons may be used offensively in furtherance of a party’s bargaining demand. The FLCA does not explain if or how a party may exercise such an economic weapon in furtherance of their bargaining position if the dispute will be submitted to an FMCS panel for binding interest arbitration. Equally troubling is the FLCA’s potential impact on unilateral implementation. Unilateral implementation upon reaching a good-faith bargaining impasse has long been a vital bargaining tool for employers. The possibility of implementing terms when negotiations stall has been an effective tool to encourage the parties to continue making movement towards the other. Eliminating this option will alter bargaining leverage and strategies particularly in successor contracts where the FLCA’s temporal framework does not apply.
Op-ed: A GOP Gift to the Cultural Left
June 15, 2026 // We wonder if Republicans know what they’ve voted for—and not merely on wages or pensions. Unions, allied with Democrats, have long supported a progressive agenda that includes collective bargaining for abortion coverage and transgender healthcare. The model language the AFL-CIO recommends to local chapters says “all health plans offered to bargaining unit members shall cover comprehensive . . . reproductive healthcare services, including contraceptives, abortion services . . . and gender affirming care.” In 2012 the Service Employees International Union unanimously approved a resolution “calling on local unions to bargain for trans-inclusive healthcare.” The NewsGuild of New York/Communications Workers of America said in 2022 it “unequivocally supports access to abortion as a healthcare right.”
Editorial: Why are some Republicans pushing price-hiking, pro-union bills in Congress?
June 15, 2026 // Democrats have long pushed pro-union measures sure to boost prices, even as they pretend to care about “affordability.” But why are Republicans now joining them? On Tuesday, a full 20 GOPers crossed the aisle to pass the Faster Labor Contracts Act, 230-193. The bill, lifted from Dems’ PRO Act, aims to boost unionization by forcing employers to agree to labor contracts within 90 days after a newly formed labor group calls for talks.
These Republicans keep undermining Trump. This week proves it
June 11, 2026 // Specifically, the Faster Labor Contracts Act would empower a federal agency that Trump has called to eliminate. It could then impose a collective bargaining agreement on workers if the union and employer don’t reach an agreement within three months. But the workers wouldn’t even get a vote, fundamentally gutting workplace democracy. As Trump’s administration said in 2020, “Involuntary contracts that do not work for employees or their employers could force layoffs or even bankruptcies — ultimately, harming workers.” This bill is one of the Democrats’ top priorities. It should never be a priority for any Republican. Several of these Republicans pulled a similar stunt in January, when they killed House leadership’s plan to vote on the Save Local Business Act. The bill would have prevented a heavy-handed mandate from the Obama and Biden years that put many franchises, subcontractors, and small businesses at risk of layoffs or even closure. Yet LaLota said that he and his colleagues would only support a watered-down version. Trump has proposed a regulation that’s similar in intent to the legislation that was killed, yet by refusing to support the bill, these Republicans are all but ensuring that a future Democrat president will overturn this necessary reform.
Nothing Pro-Worker About the Faster Labor Contracts Act, AFP Urges the Senate to Vote NO
June 10, 2026 // “There is nothing pro-worker about a system that allows third-party arbiters to unilaterally impose contract terms on both employees and employers. At its core, this approach weakens individual choice, reduces workplace flexibility, and risks entrenching one-size-fits-all outcomes that do not reflect the needs of workers, businesses, or local economies.
Jonathon Wolfson: Testimony before the House Committee on Education and Workforce
June 10, 2026 // In short, locum tenens is not a temporary patch on a permanent problem; it is a permanent and growing part of the healthcare access solution. In many areas, the choice is not between a permanent healthcare provider and a locum tenens healthcare provider. The choice is between a locum tenens healthcare provider and no provider at all. Any policy that undermines locum tenens would directly harm the patients who depend on it.
Faster Labor Contracts Act passes House after GOP rebels join Democrats
June 10, 2026 // The bill, though, exposed a trend of more populist Republicans bucking House leadership and free-market conservative groups that had been traditional allies of the GOP. Steven Bernstein, co-chair of the Fisher Phillips law firm’s labor relations practice group, said in a statement ahead of the vote that the legislation if enacted would “lead to a sea change in the country’s well-established labor dynamic by taking away the rights of employers and unions to decide for themselves what goes into their initial collective bargaining agreements.”
Why Would Any Republican Support Forced Unionism?
June 9, 2026 // What makes this even more shocking is that President Trump has proposed completely eliminating the Federal Mediation and Conciliation Service, which the bill would supercharge. The president understands that contracts imposed by government bureaucrats are more likely to be based on political than economic logic, and that negotiations are better left to the private parties. Ironically, government-imposed contracts are likely to harm the workers whose union bosses are pushing this idea. Because when economics don’t add up, it’s the workers who pay in layoffs, reduced hours and the diversion of capital investments that would have raised productivity. This risks broader economic disruption by creating a threat perception that, at any time, a single union request could trigger a government-enforced contract clock. That perception would tend to chill hiring and investing, especially by smaller businesses that can’t afford to fight out an arbitration battle.