Posts tagged Virginia Foxx
Businesses Cry Foul on DOL Messaging for Trump Gig Worker Rule
May 8, 2023 // “My discussions with DOL investigators and the solicitor’s office out of Atlanta was exactly the same before the Trump regulations and after the Trump regulations,” McCutchen said. In her interactions with the agency, WHD investigators mentioned and recognized the agency was bound by the Trump rule, but didn’t follow the structure of the Trump test when analyzing whether one of her clients was a contractor or an employee, she said. “They didn’t say, ‘Let’s look at the two core factors,’” she explained, “or, ‘Now we’re going to look at the three additional factors,’ which is the structure of the Trump regulations. They didn’t do that.” The Trump rule has been in place for over two years, and given how it diverged from the Obama-era approach to worker classification, the department should be reaching out to field officers and offering training and guidance, said Michael Lotito, co-chair of Littler Mendelson PC’s Workplace Policy Institute. Simply acknowledging the rule isn’t enough, he added.
Julie Su Chastised by House Committee Chairwoman for Blowing Off Oversight Requests
April 20, 2023 // Congressional oversight involves conducting hearings with the heads of executive-branch departments, and the House Committee on Education and the Workforce is, understandably, interested in having the secretary of labor testify. But Julie Su is blowing the committee off. Chairwoman Virginia Foxx (R., N.C.) sent a letter to Su yesterday demanding that she appear before the committee on May 17. There’s a history of failing to respond to committee requests in a timely manner, Foxx writes. “During the week of March 27, Committee staff engaged with the Department to determine a time for you to appear before the Committee. However, despite offering dates that provided you with between nearly one month and nearly two months to prepare, we understand that you do not plan to make yourself available to the Committee before June,” the letter says.
House attempt to override Biden comes up short Labor Department regulation regarding ESG investments will stand
March 24, 2023 // "Thanks to Democrats, workers can be placed into ESG investment vehicles by default, and if a fiduciary finds that two investments are equal, the fiduciary is allowed to use collateral ESG factors to break the tie, without justifying or documenting that decision,” Education and the Workforce Chairwoman Virginia Foxx, a North Carolina Republican, said during the floor debate on the veto message.
Opinion: Let’s Continue to Fight for Freelancers
February 24, 2023 // New Senate HELP Committee Chairman and avowed socialist Bernie Sanders (I-VT) is eager to reintroduce the PRO Act in the chamber soon. The bill’s most recent version contained the following provisions: an ABC test that deems most workers employees and not independent contractors; a statute to abolish right-to-work; making union membership conditional for employment; and giving unions unfettered access to private worker information.
Marty Walsh to depart from Biden cabinet for job atop hockey players’ union
February 7, 2023 // By taking the players’ association gig, Walsh is now in line for a massive pay bump. Walsh makes a little over $200,000 as labor secretary. The current NHLPA executive director reportedly makes about $3 million. With Republicans taking over control of the House, Walsh would have faced significant congressional oversight from newly installed House Education and Workforce Chair Virginia Foxx. Rep. Andy Levin (D-Mich.), former Deputy Labor Secretary Seth Harris, California Labor Secretary Julie Su and AFL-CIO Chief Economist Bill Spriggs
Foxx to NLRB: Proposed Rule Puts Unions Before Employees
February 3, 2023 // “The NLRA is intended to protect the right of workers to organize or refrain from doing so in conditions free of interference, not to permit an employer to anoint a union as the employee representative. History and experience have shown that the secret ballot election is the most reliable method of assessing whether a majority of employees support union representation, while the card check process is notorious for its lack of privacy and invites intimidation and coercion of workers.”
Foxx Op-Ed: For apprenticeship programs to thrive—get employers back to the table
November 21, 2022 // With more than 10 million unfilled jobs in the U.S. and more than six million unemployed individuals, it’s obvious that our current systems need a lot of work. To make matters worse, an enormous skills gap is hampering our country’s economic growth, and America’s federal workforce development systems are doing little to address the problem effectively. These systems are not meeting the needs of workers because of Democrats’ misguided approach towards apprenticeships. Workforce development programs, including apprenticeships, must have employer input. Yet at every turn, Democrats are working to limit the voices of job creators and amplify those of Big Labor.
Reps Foxx and Allen Call For Greater OLMS Oversight
November 18, 2022 // It’s no secret unions aren’t always the best arbiters of members’ funds. Just look at the UAW — several high ranking officials recently went to prison for a wide-scale corruption scandal that included embezzling hundreds of thousands of members’ dues dollars. For the sake of union members across the country, let’s hope we get better insight to OLMS enforcement sooner rather than later.
Biden touts union-backed apprenticeships as he dissolves Trump-era apprentice program
November 8, 2022 // "President Biden and Vice President Harris recognized that IRAPs were a threat to union workers," the Laborers' International Union of North America posted on its website. President Biden on Wednesday touted an expansion of apprenticeship programs that are often run by his union allies, even as he prepares to dissolve a Trump-era apprentice program that unions have openly declared as a threat. Biden delivered a speech at the White House on how his legislative victories expanded apprenticeship programs through his administration’s "Talent Pipeline Challenge." That initiative aims to "support equitable workforce development" in three employment sectors: broadband, construction and electrification, which are predominately unionized fields.
U.S. House Republicans urge labor board to curb mail-in union elections
October 21, 2022 // The 2020 decision requires officials to consider six factors, including the local COVID-19 positivity rate and whether a workplace has had a recent COVID outbreak in determining whether to hold elections via mail. Before the pandemic, the vast majority of union elections were held in person. Between October 2021 and late January of this year, 304 of the 378 elections overseen by the NLRB were conducted via mail ballot, according to a recent board decision. During that period, the voter participation rate in mail-in elections was about 68%, compared to 86% in in-person elections.