Today's AFL-CIO press clips
MUST READ
Ahead of Workers Memorial Day, AFL-CIO releases ‘Death on the Job’ report
Safety + Health Magazine
By Staff
April 24, 2025
“Every worker has the fundamental right to come home safe at the end of their workday,” AFL-CIO President Liz Shuler said in an April 23 press release. “But for too many workers, that basic right is under attack. Workers fought and died for generations for the health and safety laws and protections we have today, and this year’s report shows we need to do even more.”
POLITICS
Trump Executive Order Makes It Easier to Fire Probationary Federal Workers
The New York Times
By Eileen Sullivan
April 24, 2025
President Trump issued an executive order on Thursday making it easier for the government to fire federal employees who are in a probationary period. Probationary government workers already have far fewer job protections than their established colleagues, and they were the Trump administration’s first targets for mass firings earlier this year. At least 24,000 of those terminations have led to court-ordered reinstatements that were overturned on appeals.
100 days of DOGE: lots of chaos, not so much efficiency
Reuters
By Tim Reid, Alexandra Alper and Nathan Layne
April 24, 2025
At the Social Security Administration, lawyers, statisticians and other high-ranking agency officials are being sent from the Baltimore headquarters to regional offices to replace veteran claims processors who have been fired or taken buyouts from the Trump administration. But most of the new arrivals don't know how to do the job, leading to longer wait times for disabled and elderly Americans who depend on these benefits, according to two people familiar with the situation. Asked about the changes, an SSA official said in an email that reassigned employees "have vast knowledge about our programs and services."
Anti-DEI Guidance Letter Put On Hold, for Now
Inside Higher Ed
By Jessica Blake
April 24, 2025
AFT president Randi Weingarten added in a statement that “the court agreed that this vague and clearly unconstitutional requirement is a grave attack on students, our profession, honest history, and knowledge itself.”
Judge Limits Trump’s Ability to Withhold School Funds Over D.E.I.
The New York Times
By Dana Goldstein
April 24, 2025
A federal judge in New Hampshire limited on Thursday the Trump administration’s ability to withhold federal funds from public schools that have certain diversity and equity initiatives. The judge, Landya B. McCafferty, said that the administration had not provided an adequately detailed definition of “diversity, equity and inclusion,” and that its policy threatened to restrict free speech in the classroom while overstepping the executive branch’s legal authority over local schools. She also wrote that the loss of federal funding “would cripple the operations of many educational institutions.”
CNN
By Tierney Sneed
April 24, 2025
A federal judge significantly curtailed the Trump administration from implementing a policy that threatens to withhold federal funding from schools for engaging in diversity, equity and inclusion – or DEI – programs or if they incorporate race in certain ways in many other aspects of student life. US District Judge Landya McCafferty said in a scathing opinion that the administration’s policy, laid out by the Department of Education in a letter to educators earlier this year, was “textbook viewpoint discrimination,” likely violating the First Amendment’s Free Speech protections.
'How Authoritarians Reshape Society': Critics Denounce Trump Order Targeting College Accreditation
Common Dreams
By Eloise Goldsmith
April 24, 2025
President of the American Federation of Teachers, Randi Weingarten, highlighted that Trump's executive orders focused on K-12 run counter to its own professed goal of ceding federal control over education. David Axelrod, who was once a senior adviser to former President Barack Obama, made this same point. "The Trump administration really does want to be in the business of education after all. It just wants to pick and choose who it helps and who it hurts, rather than build on six decades of bipartisan efforts to improve public education," Weingarten said.
Democrats urge Social Security Administration to keep field offices open
The Washington Post
By Meryl Kornfield
April 24, 2025
Democratic lawmakers, led by Sen. Elizabeth Warren (D-Massachusetts), are urging the Social Security Administration in a new letter to keep open its field offices and demanding transparency about potential closures. In addition to Warren, 65 House members and 40 senators signed the letter to acting Social Security commissioner Leland Dudek on Wednesday, requesting that he commit to keeping the field offices open and that he tell them if the agency intends to close any.
AFL-CIO, unions sue Trump administration over cuts to key Labor relations agency
Labor Tribune
By Staff
April 24, 2025
The AFL-CIO and unions representing workers across private and public sector industries filed suit against the Trump administration April 14 over its dismantling of the Federal Mediation and Conciliation Service (FMCS), including firing mediators and staff, and closing field offices across the country. FMCS is a small but important independent federal agency that is integral to the government’s Labor relations infrastructure. Among the critical services FMCS provides, it helps resolve contract negotiations between workers and employers to protect both the economy and workers’ rights, generating over $500 million in national economic savings each year, even by conservative estimates. But DOGE cuts have decimated the agency: 93 percent of FMCS staff have been placed on leave, the mediation workforce has been taken down from the 80-100 needed for the agency’s work to just five, and all of the field offices have been closed.
AFL-CIO organizes new free federal workers legal defense network
Labor Tribune
By Staff
April 24, 2025
With federal workers across the country under attack, the AFL-CIO has organized a new legal defense network to help those workers who have been targeted. The free program is called Rise Up: Federal Workers Legal Defense Network. Tens of thousands of hardworking people who run the programs and services that working families rely on have been mistreated or abruptly fired by Elon Musk and the Department of Government Efficiency.
Treasury Seeks Friendly Court in Suit With Federal Worker Union
Bloomberg Law
By Parker Purifoy
April 24, 2025
The National Treasury Employees Union and attorneys for the government will battle for a second time this week, asking a Kentucky district court to consider an unusual lawsuit from the Trump administration that seeks to invalidate the union’s collective bargaining agreement. The unorthodox move for the government to proactively bring litigation against the unions could prove to undo its own arguments. AFGE said in its motion to dismiss that the government lacks standing to sue because it filed the litigation before Trump’s executive order went out.
Judge blocks part of Trump’s order requiring citizenship proof to vote
The Washington Post
By Patrick Marley
April 24, 2025
A federal judge temporarily blocked election officials Thursday from implementing parts of President Donald Trump’s executive order to require people to prove they are citizens when they fill out federal voter registration forms. The sweeping order Trump signed last month sought to overhaul how the 2026 midterm elections are run, even though the Constitution says voting policies are to be set by the states and Congress. Democrats and voting rights groups quickly sued, leading to Thursday’s preliminary injunction. “Our Constitution entrusts Congress and the States — not the President — with the authority to regulate federal elections,” U.S. District Judge Colleen Kollar-Kotelly wrote in her opinion.
Trump’s Attempt to Overhaul Election Law Is Partly Blocked by a Judge
The New York Times
By Nick Corasaniti
April 24, 2025
A federal judge blocked part of an expansive executive order signed last month seeking to overhaul election laws, writing on Thursday that President Trump did not have the authority to require documentary proof of citizenship for all voters. “Our Constitution entrusts Congress and the states — not the president — with the authority to regulate federal elections,” wrote Judge Colleen Kollar-Kotelly of the Federal District Court in Washington. She pointed to federal voting legislation being considered in Congress, adding that the president could not “short-circuit Congress’s deliberative process by executive order.”
More than 50 House Democrats demand answers after whistleblower report on DOGE
NPR
By Jenna McLaughlin
April 24, 2025
The lawmakers, who are part of the Congressional Labor Caucus, wrote the letter in light of news first reported by NPR, that a whistleblower inside the IT Department of the NLRB says DOGE may have removed sensitive labor data and exposed NLRB systems to being compromised.
Workers in 600+ US Cities to Protest 'Billionaire Takeover' on May Day
Common Dreams
By Julia Conley
April 24, 2025
As labor unions and rights advocacy groups announced a mass mobilization planned for May 1, or May Day, one leader said the protests aim to "send a loud and clear message" to U.S. President Donald Trump, his adviser Elon Musk, "and the rest of the billionaire oligarchs trying to destroy our democracy." "There will be no business as usual while they are disappearing people off the street, slashing critical services, and taking away our freedoms," said Saqib Bhatti, executive director of Bargaining for the Common Good. "They're causing a crisis in our communities. We're going to bring that crisis directly to their doorsteps."
What Trump’s order on ‘disparate impact’ means for civil rights
The Washington Post
By Kim Bellware
April 24, 2025
President Donald Trump on Wednesday moved to dislodge a cornerstone of modern civil rights law through a sweeping executive order that strips the federal government of the key tool it used to enforce antidiscrimination laws — a concept known as disparate-impact liability. The order has alarmed civil rights advocates, who warn it could make it harder to shield people from exclusionary policies in areas like housing, employment, education and criminal justice.
UNION NEGOTIATIONS
Maryland commuter bus drivers on strike against contractor Martz
The Washington Post
By Rachel Weiner
April 24, 2025
Raymond Jackson, president of Amalgamated Transit Union Local 689, said in a statement that the union has made concessions in negotiations but the company hasn’t done enough to compromise. “The Union does not tolerate companies that try to bully workers at the bargaining table,” he said. “Throughout the negotiations there has been only one party, the Union, that’s been operating in good faith and actually wants to reach a deal.”
Norwalk Hospital union workers to hold rally amid contract negotiations, merger
Hartford Business Journal
By Michael Juliano
April 24, 2025
Aunion that represents workers at Norwalk Hospital said it plans to hold a solidarity rally on Sunday as it calls for higher wages, more affordable benefits, safer working conditions and greater workplace fairness. The rally comes as Norwalk Hospital’s parent company, Nuvance Health, is in the process of being acquired by Northwell Health, a 21-hospital New York-based nonprofit health system, on May 1.
Houston union workers call for $23 minimum wage ahead of contract fight
Hotel Dive
By Noelle Mateer
April 24, 2025
Union workers in Houston launched an initiative to advocate for a $23 minimum wage for hospitality workers at a summit with city leaders Wednesday, hospitality union Unite Here Local 23 announced in a release obtained by Hotel Dive. Union workers and city leaders, including Houston City Council Members Joaquin Martinez and Tiffany Thomas, discussed the need for a livable wage, as workers in the city claim they aren’t benefiting from Houston’s tourism boom, which saw a record-breaking 54 million people visit the city in 2024.
Martz Gold Line workers strike in Hyattsville over unfair labor practices
ABC 7
By Ida Domingo
April 24, 2025
The Amalgamated Transit Union (ATU) Local 689, which represents bus operators, mechanics and service technicians at Martz, announced the strike in a statement early Thursday morning. ATU Local 689 said Martz has pushed wage proposals that would leave employees further behind compared to others in the transit industry.
Workers for six MTA commuter bus routes begin strike over halted contract negotiations
The Baltimore Banner
By Daniel Zawodny
April 24, 2025
Workers for a company that operates six Maryland Transit Administration commuter bus routes went on strike Thursday morning, according to their union, alleging that their employer has not engaged in contract negotiations in good faith. Workers for bus company Martz Gold Line, which operates MTA commuter bus routes 305, 315, 325, 630, 640 and 735 as a private contractor, have been seeking higher wages that the union says would put them on par with other area transit companies.
Graduate students push for fair union contract at University of Maine
News Center Maine
By Brianna Bush
April 24, 2025
University of Maine graduate workers rallied Thursday, saying they've gone over 500 days without a union contract guaranteeing fair pay and basic workplace protections. "We need economic security now more than ever,” Tommy Pinette, a graduate student at UMaine, said. Pinette conducts historical research work for UMaine and said it's becoming more difficult to make ends meet.
University of Maine System graduate workers rally in Orono for contract agreement
Spectrum News
By David Ledford
April 24, 2025
Graduate workers in the University of Maine System rallied at UMaine's Orono campus Thursday demanding that the administration reaches a contract agreement. Workers said they have been bargaining for their first union contract for nearly 18 months. “Waiting 500 days to reach a contract agreement is not only unacceptable but disgraceful,” said Tommy Pinette, a UMaine graduate worker working on language revitalization and historical research. “And it shows that that UMS team does not value our labor or our livelihoods as the workers who make the UMS System run.”
Portland State University’s Faculty Union Ratifies New Contract
Willamette Week
By Joanna Hou
April 24, 2025
More than 95% of members in Portland State University’s chapter of the American Association of University Professors voted Tuesday to ratify a new contract with the university. The 1,172-member body approved the contract with more than 70% of members participating in the vote, says David Kinsella, the PSU-AAUP vice president for collective bargaining. Negotiations had at times proven fraught over 10 months of bargaining, and the approval helped PSU narrowly dodge what could have been the first faculty strike in university history.
IN THE STATES
WENY
By Alecia Solorzano
April 24, 2025
People gathered outside of Congressman Nick Langworthy's district office in Corning on Thursday to speak out against federal cuts they say he is in support of. The congressman encourages the protests but says he wants to set the record straight. The event was organized by members of the American Federation of State, County, and Municipal Employees Union (AFSCME) to discuss how those cuts could affect local public service employees. They say Representative Nick Langworthy (R-NY23) voted in favor of supporting cost-raising tariffs, cuts to Medicaid, food assistance, and more. Several local healthcare workers attended the event and said a few words about their experiences in the field and with patients during this time.
WORKPLACE SAFETY AND HEALTH
AFL-CIO Death on the Job report: Wyoming workers face greatest danger
People’s World
By Mark Gruenberg
April 24, 2025
“Every worker has the fundamental right to come home safe at the end of their workday. But for too many workers, that basic right is under attack,” federation President Liz Shuler, an Electrical Worker, said in introducing the report. “The Trump administration and DOGE”—multibillionaire Elon Musk’s so-called Department of Government Efficiency—”are gutting the federal agencies that hold bosses accountable for endangering workers” and “firing the federal workers who monitor and research health hazards.” DOGE just fired many researchers at the National Institute of Occupational Safety and Health—despite the Auto Workers’ organizing drive there. And Trump indicates he’ll “will repeal crucial worker safety regulations, and give billionaires like Musk the power to access and even manipulate OSHA whistleblower records,” Shuler warned.
UNION BUSTING
Frustrated Berkeley REI Workers Accuse Co-Op of Union Busting, Straying From Values
KQED
By Farida Jhabvala Romero
April 24, 2025
“It definitely feels like retribution, like punishment,” said Robin, who has helped customers select footwear at the Berkeley store for nearly four years. “REI is not living up to its values, not treating us with the respect we deserve. It’s really sad why a company that has a deep history of doing the right thing isn’t doing that.” The outdoor specialty retailer has yet to sign a legally binding agreement with any of its 11 stores that have voted to unionize over the past three years. A federal labor board is reviewing dozens of claims that the company violated labor laws, including by illegally terminating and intimidating workers. Growing dissatisfaction has also led some employees at the Berkeley store and another location to take steps to decertify the United Food and Commercial Workers as their union representative.
WBEZ
By Kaitlin Washburn
April 24, 2025
The union for Chicago History Museum workers alleges museum management retaliated against employees for organizing, including firing four members and threatening five others. Chicago History Museum Workers United detailed the allegations in a letter delivered Wednesday to the museum’s board of trustees.