Posts tagged PRO Act
COMMENTARY: You Can’t Support Trump and Government Unions
November 21, 2024 // Trump and his allies have talked endlessly about the need to take on the “deep state” or “drain the swamp” in Washington, D.C. Sometimes such talk veers into conspiracy-theorizing, but it’s certainly true that many federal bureaucrats are opposed to Trump and their obstruction can prevent him from governing as he was elected to govern. For years, conservatives have been raising the alarm about the constitutional problems that an entrenched, unelected administrative state presents when it hinders the elected leaders from making decisions. Government unions stand in the way of making many reforms to the civil service that Trump would like to see.
Op-Ed: Follow Trump 45 Labor Policy, Not the Teamsters Union
November 21, 2024 // By pushing Rep. Chavez-DeRemer for secretary of labor, O’Brien is essentially asking the winner of the 2024 presidential election to concede to the loser on one of the most important pieces of domestic legislation after the winner has already won in exchange for nothing. Rather than taking labor policy advice from a union boss, President Trump would do much better to follow the example he himself set in his previous term.
Business Group Alarmed by Rumored Candidate for Secretary of Labor
November 21, 2024 // CDW Chair Kristen Swearingen: “We were alarmed by press reports that President-Elect Trump is considering Rep. Chavez-DeRemer to lead the Department of Labor given her past support of the Protecting the Right to Organize (PRO) Act, which is a signature bill for President Biden and Senator Bernie Sanders and opposed by the vast majority of Republicans. The legislation has been repeatedly rejected on a bipartisan basis by Congress and opposed by business groups representing almost every industry, as was evident when 280 organizations signed onto a CDW letter opposing the bill in July 2021.
COMMENTARY: Don’t Let the Teamsters Pick the Labor Secretary
November 20, 2024 // It’s not as though congressional Republicans don’t have an alternative. The Employee Rights Act would protect secret-ballot elections, independent contracting, and franchising and prohibit union intimidation and the collection of personal information, while continuing to allow states to enact right-to-work laws. It has 84 Republican co-sponsors, and the latest two were added within the last week. Yet rather than support that bill that would build on conservative labor-policy successes, Chavez-DeRemer was one of only three Republicans who supported the PRO Act instead.
This housekeeper fought to unionize Trump’s Vegas hotel. Now, she’s fighting to keep him out of office
November 5, 2024 // “It’s important for a president to be pro-union,” said Olvera. “Without a union, a worker invests the majority of their time at work only to find they can’t afford health care for their kids. They leave work tired, have to work two jobs, and still find that the money isn’t enough.”
With much at stake, labor unions knock on millions of doors in final campaign push
October 31, 2024 // The American Federation of Teachers has sent hundreds of its members from New York to Pennsylvania and from Illinois to Wisconsin to canvass “labor doors.” The United Auto Workers has similarly deployed union members to fellow members’ homes and work sites, in addition to an aggressive phone, text and mail campaign.
Acting Labor Secretary Julie Su Criticizes Donald Trump’s Labor Record at IOP
October 22, 2024 // Though Su declined to address the former president by name, she argued that “hypothetically,” opposition to overtime pay, sexual harassment, and support for Elon Musk are incompatible with a “pro-worker” position. “I don’t care how many McDonald’s drive-throughs you pretend to work at,” Su said, referencing Trump’s Sunday visit to a Philadelphia McDonald’s where he served fries and answered questions through the drive-through window. Su was joined by Sara Nelson, the president of the Association of Flight Attendants-CWA, AFL-CIO to discuss the future of the American Labor Movement. Brett Story and Stephen Maing, directors of “UNION”— a documentary film that followed the unionization of Amazon workers in Staten Island, New York — were also on the panel.
The Highest Stakes Commentary: Kim Kavin
October 16, 2024 // In this version of the ABC Test, Part B states that a person can only be a legally operating independent contractor if: The person performs work that is outside the usual course of the hiring entity’s business. That line has been an unmitigated income- and career-destroyer for Californians in more than 600 professions. It hit everyone from comedians who could no longer perform at comedy clubs to translators who could no longer provide translation services for translation companies to freelance writers who could no longer write articles for publishers. Owner-operator truckers are still battling in the courts and trying to explain how it could decimate the supply chain, with the threat of taking so many self-employed truckers off the road. The damage to people’s livelihoods was so significant that within a year—just one year—of AB5 going into effect:
J.D. Vance slammed for announcement seen as ‘attacking workers’ right to organize’
October 15, 2024 // "You asked about the PRO act. The problem with the PRO act is that in some ways it doubles down on a lot of the failed things that we have done, instead of looking at American labor policy as something that's going to be better for the 21st century than it was in the 20th century," Vance replied. ADVERTISEMENT The official presidential campaign for Vice President Kamala Harris took to social media, saying, "J.D. Vance announces he and Trump oppose the PRO Act, a bill that would strengthen the power of workers to organize and collectively bargain for better wages, benefits, and working conditions." The Harris campaign also shared a video of Harris in which she vows to "pass the PRO Act and end union-busting once and for all."
Wabtec cites lost jobs in Erie as evidence that Fort Worth workers should not unionize
October 4, 2024 // In a letter to employees in Fort Worth, the company says they should consider the evidence from unionized workers at Wabtec plants in Erie and Wilmerding, near Pittsburgh. According to the letter, "Employment levels are down 58% in Erie since 2011. In Wilmerding, Wabtec's former headquarters, employment levels went from 70 employees in 2020 to just 5 remaining employees today,"