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Today's AFL-CIO press clips

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POLITICS

Senate Republicans Want To Charge Federal Workers Thousands Of Dollars For Job Security

HuffPost

By Dave Jamieson

June 16, 2025

Everett Kelley, president of the American Federation of Government Employees, called the Senate legislation “a big retaliation bill” that seeks to punish unions “for successfully standing up for our members and fighting this administration’s illegal attempts to obliterate our federal agencies.” “Under this bill, federal employees will see their take-home pay slashed and their fundamental workplace rights obliterated. And the financial penalties will be significantly higher for employees who want to retain their rights,” Kelley said in a statement.


 

Judge deems Trump's National Institutes of Health grant cuts illegal

Reuters

By Daniel Wiessner and Nate Raymond

June 16, 2025

A federal judge in Boston on Monday said the termination of National Institutes of Health grants for research on diversity-related topics by President Donald Trump's administration was "void and illegal," and accused the government of discriminating against racial minorities and LGBT people. U.S. District Judge William Young during a non-jury trial said the NIH violated federal law by arbitrarily canceling more than $1 billion in research grants because of their perceived connection to diversity, equity and inclusion initiatives.


 

Judge rules some NIH grant cuts illegal, saying he’s never seen such discrimination in 40 years

AP

By Lauran Neergaard

June 16, 2025

A federal judge ruled Monday it was illegal for the Trump administration to cancel several hundred research grants, adding that the cuts raise serious questions about racial discrimination. U.S. District Judge William Young in Massachusetts said the administration’s process was “arbitrary and capricious” and that it did not follow long-held government rules and standards when it abruptly canceled grants deemed to focus on gender identity or diversity, equity and inclusion.


 

GOP tax bill could hurt the poorest households more than it helps them

The Washington Post

By Theodoric Meyer and Jacob Bogage

June 16, 2025

President Donald Trump and his Republican allies in Congress have pitched their sweeping tax-and-spending bill as a way to help the working-class voters who played a crucial role in electing Trump. But funding cuts to Medicaid and other programs included in the legislation would hurt low-income households financially more than the tax cuts would boost their finances, according to nonpartisan analyses of the bill. The biggest benefits would accrue to the highest-earning households, the analyses found. The bill’s potential to hurt working-class Americans has complicated its path to passage in the Senate, where several Republicans have raised concerns about the effects of the Medicaid cuts, in particular.


 

US Senate Republicans change Trump tax-cut bill, setting conflict with House

Reuters

By David Morgan, Richard Cowan and Andy Sullivan

June 16, 2025

U.S. Senate Republicans on Monday unveiled proposed changes to President Donald Trump's sweeping tax-cut and spending bill that would make some business-related tax breaks permanent and also limit a tax break for state and local income taxes, angering some of their colleagues in the House of Representatives. The different versions of the bill in the two narrowly Republican-controlled chambers of Congress could complicate party leaders' goal of passing the bill that is the centerpiece of Trump's domestic agenda before a self-imposed July 4 deadline.


 

Watchdog: Trump administration violated Impoundment Act a second time

The Washington Post

By Meryl Kornfield and Hannah Natanson

June 16, 2025

Staff from the Institute of Museum and Library Services were placed on administrative leave in April after President Donald Trump issued an executive order March 14 to make cuts to the agency. The American Library Association and the American Federation of State, County and Municipal Employees sued the administration in a case that is playing out in U.S. District Court in D.C.


 

AFL-CIO, Unions Seek Early Win To Block Slash Of FMCS

Law 360

By Beverly Banks

June 16, 2025

A group of unions and the AFL-CIO urged a New York federal judge to find the Trump administration's staffing cuts and shuttering of field offices at the Federal Mediation and Conciliation Service are unlawful, arguing the government did not have an explanation for slashing the agency's services. The Trump administration went too far with a March 14 executive order reducing services and staff at the FMCS, said the AFL-CIO and a coalition of unions in a motion for summary judgment Friday, looking to restore the agency's operations before many mediators are put on administrative leave. The FMCS provides mediation services for labor disputes. The unions and AFL-CIO accused the FMCS and the U.S. Office of Management and Budget of violating the Administrative Procedure Act by carrying out President Donald Trump's executive order titled "Continuing the Reduction of the Federal Bureaucracy." On March 14, the president's directive said the FMCS must eliminate its "non-statutory components and functions" and slash statutory functions and staff "to the minimum presence and function required by law."


 

Senate G.O.P. Releases Domestic Policy Bill With Deeper Cuts to Medicaid

The New York Times

By Catie Edmondson, Margot Sanger-Katz, Tony Romm and Brad Plumer

June 16, 2025

Senate Republicans on Monday released legislation that would cut Medicaid far more aggressively than would the House-passed bill to deliver President Trump’s domestic agenda, while also salvaging or slowing the elimination of some clean-energy tax credits, setting up a fight over their party’s marquee policy package.


 

Senate releases Trump tax and Medicaid blueprint

The Hill

By Alexander Bolton

June 16, 2025

Senate Finance Committee Chair Mike Crapo (R-Idaho) on Monday released the Senate’s long-awaited version of President Trump’s tax agenda, which would make the 2017 corporate tax cuts permanent, cut hundreds of billions of dollars in Medicaid spending and phase out renewable-energy tax cuts enacted under President Biden. The legislative text crafted by Senate Finance Committee Republicans represents the core of Trump’s “big, beautiful bill” and includes the populist tax breaks that the president campaigned on, including provisions to shield tipped income from taxation.


 

Senate Republicans release Trump agenda bill text on Medicaid, Medicare and SALT

NBC News

By Sahil Kapur

June 16, 2025

Republicans on the Senate Finance Committee released their portion of the massive bill for President Donald Trump’s domestic agenda on Monday, with some significant changes compared with the House-passed package. The 549-page bill extends the expiring Trump tax cuts and includes provisions to slash taxes on tips and overtime pay.


 

Senate Republicans Propose More Aggressive Medicaid Cuts to Help Pay for Tax Bill

Bloomberg

By Rachel Cohrs Zhang

June 16, 2025

Senate Republicans are proposing cuts to the Medicaid program for low-income and disabled people that are more aggressive than policies the House passed to help pay for President Donald Trump’s sweeping tax package. Notably, the Senate abandoned efforts to cut costs in the Medicare program that provides health insurance to people over age 65 and the disabled.


 

Advocates Seek to Protect Children with Disabilities from Federal Cuts

Nonprofit Quarterly

By María Constanza Costa

June 16, 2025

NPQ spoke with Brittany Coleman, a national shop steward for the American Federal of Government Employees (AFGE) Local 252 that represents Department of Education employees. She was laid off in March from her government job as a civil rights attorney at the now-closed Dallas OCR. Coleman’s job had been to receive complaints from the public related to civil rights in education, such as a complaint from a parent concerned that their child is not being treated fairly because of their disability.


 

 

E.P.A. Plans to Reconsider a Ban on Cancer-Causing Asbestos

The New York Times

By Hiroko Tabuchi

June 16, 2025

The Trump administration plans to reconsider a ban on the last type of asbestos still used in the United States, according to a court filing on Monday. The move, which could halt enforcement of the ban for several years during the reconsideration, is a major blow to a decades-long battle by health advocates to prohibit the carcinogenic mineral in all its forms.


 

 

Cuts to FEMA's storm prep program hammer communities that voted for Trump

CBS News

By Michael Kaplan, John Kelly, Maurice DuBois and Hannah Marr

June 16, 2025

Amid the avalanche of cuts made in the first five months of the Trump administration, none may have red state politicians more up in arms than the cancellation of the infrastructure program, which is formally known as Building Resilient Infrastructure and Communities, or BRIC for short. The $4.6 billion initiative was launched under the first Trump administration, and a CBS News analysis of FEMA data revealed that two-thirds of the counties awarded grants voted for President Trump over former Vice President Kamala Harris during the 2024 election.


 

IMMIGRATION

Advocacy organizations warn ‘we are all Kilmar’; pledge to fight for immigrant rights

Tennessee Lookout

By Cassandra Stephenson

June 13, 2025

Vonda McDaniel, president of the Central Labor Council of Nashville and Middle Tennessee, demanded fair treatment for Abrego Garcia, saying his case will not “disappear in the shadows of a courtroom.” She also questioned the legitimacy of the charges against him, which were filed after his deportation.


 

ICE tried to make an example out of labor leader David Huerta. Now is the time for unions to speak up on behalf of immigrant workers. (Opinion)

Prism

By Susan Naranjo

June 16, 2025

David Huerta, president of the Service Employees International Union (SEIU)–United Service Workers West (USWW), was detained earlier this month for doing what every labor leader should be doing right now: showing up. Huerta was arrested this month in Los Angeles while protesting citywide raids carried out by Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE), exercising his right to speak out—something the labor movement has done for centuries. But because this was an immigration protest, and because Huerta is a bold, unapologetic advocate for immigrant workers, he was targeted and thrown to the ground in broad daylight.


 

 

Trump officials reverse guidance exempting farms, hotels from immigration raids

The Washington Post

By Carol D. Leonnig, Natalie Allison, Marianne LeVine and Lauren Kaori Gurley

June 16, 2025

The Department of Homeland Security on Monday told staff that it was reversing guidance issued last week that agents were not to conduct immigration raids at farms, hotels and restaurants — a decision that stood at odds with President Donald Trump’s calls for mass deportations of anyone without legal status. Officials from Immigration and Customs Enforcement, including its Homeland Security Investigations division, told agency leaders in a call Monday that agents must continue conducting immigration raids at agricultural businesses, hotels and restaurants, according to two people familiar with the call. The new instructions were shared in an 11 a.m. call to representatives from 30 field offices across the country.


 

TRADE

Trump’s zeal for factory work risks damage to growing segments of economy

The Washington Post

By David J. Lynch

June 16, 2025

President Donald Trump says U.S. factories hollowed out by rapacious foreign competition can produce well-paying new jobs only if they are protected by the highest tariffs since the 1930s. But those trade barriers may damage the larger and faster-growing part of the economy: the services industries that employ more than 80 percent of American workers. Since January, manufacturing payrolls have increased by 6,000 jobs, a fraction of the 470,000 new providers of services such as financial advice, health care and education, who generally escape presidential notice.


 

UNION NEGOTIATIONS

Philly's largest blue collar union to unveil results of vote on potential strike

NBC 10

By NBC10 Staff

June 16, 2025

Members of Philadelphia's largest blue collar union, which represents 9,000 city employees, said they are ready to go on strike if they are unable to reach a deal on a new contract with the city. And, after days of voting, on Monday, votes will be tallied to determine if a strike will happen. 

District Council 33, which represents workers employed in city functions such as sanitation, the water department, police dispatch, street maintenance and the airport, said its members voted to authorize a strike last week.


 

Duke Energy union workers prepare for 'work stoppage' amid stalled contract negotiations

WVPE

By Timoria Cunningham

June 16, 2025

Union workers at Duke Energy are preparing for a potential strike over stalled contract negotiations with the company. The International Brotherhood of Electric Workers Local 1393 represents nearly 1,000 Duke Energy workers across the state. IBEW Local 1393 is advocating for fair wages, better benefits and improved working conditions. But the union's business manager, Christopher Wilson, said they feel like their voices aren’t being heard. Wilson said the union has tried to negotiate with their employer since January — but they haven't reached an agreement.


 

Safeway workers hit the picket line in Pueblo over concerns about staffing and pay

The Pueblo Chieftain

By Tracy Harmon

June 16, 2025

Armed with signs that read, "Please do not patronize Safeway; employees on unfair labor practice strike," Pueblo and Pueblo West Safeway workers joined the picket line June 15 in a fight for better wages and work schedules. More than 200 Pueblo and Pueblo West Safeway workers voted May 31 to join a United Food and Commercial Workers Local 7 strike. They made good on that promise on June 15, joining the first cities to go on strike, including Fountain, Estes Park, and a Denver distribution center. Later in the day, workers from the Littleton Safeway also walked off the job, said Kim Cordova, president of UFCW Local 7. "Both the Pueblo and Pueblo West Safeway stores are striking and I was with them and Fountain yesterday," Cordova said.


 

Quills Coffee baristas secure historic wage increases in tentative agreement

WHAS11

By CJ Daniels

June 16, 2025

Baristas employed by Quills Coffee have reached a new tentative agreement. The agreement features historic wage increases, the elimination of wage caps, paid family leave and a revamped holiday pay system. Employees and members of the 32BJ SEIU had organized last year when Quills recognized their union and was the first Louisville coffee chain to do so.


 

Hundreds of workers at Fenway Park, MGM Music Hall vote to authorize strike

Boston 25 News

By Frank O'Laughlin and Boston 25 News Staff

June 16, 2025

Hundreds of workers at Boston’s Fenway Park and MGM Music Hall have voted to authorize a strike over contract issues. Unite Here Local 26 announced Sunday that more than 700 Aramark contract workers overwhelmingly voted “YES” in favor of authorizing a strike that marks the first-ever labor stoppage in the history of the 113-year-old ballpark. The workers, whose Aramark contracts expired in December 2024, include barbacks, beer sellers, cashiers, catering servers, cooks, souvenir vendors, utility workers, and warehouse runners, among other roles.


 

Safeway strike expands into metro Denver on Monday

CPR News

By Sarah Mulholland

June 16, 2025

Safeway employees at a Denver store walked out Monday, expanding a strike that started this weekend. The strike started small with workers at three stores in Estes Park, Fountain and Pueblo, and a Denver distribution center. “This will allow time for the public to understand the problems these workers are facing, allow Safeway/Albertsons time to understand the seriousness of the workers’ resolve, and at the same time reduce the hardship on shoppers and workers alike that result from a wide-spread strike,” the union said in an emailed statement.


 

JOINING TOGETHER

Union wins court case against UNMH’s communication over layoffs

Albuquerque News

By Scott Brown

June 16, 2025

The relationship between UNM Hospital and Health Care Union Members has been rocky at times. A recent court decision came down in favor of the workers regarding the hospital’s lack of communication regarding layoffs in 2023. “In an organized workplace, when there is a layoff, standard law, whether it be federal law or state law, the employer has to negotiate with the union about the layoffs about when they will happen, whether there’s going to be some sort of pay for the employees who are laid off, which employees are going to be laid off, and I don’t know how to state it more bluntly, but the UNMH just refused to bargain with the union,” says Shane Youtz, attorney for United Health Professionals of New Mexico.

 

IN THE STATES

DOGE hits the Labor Department in Kansas City

KCUR

By Nomin Ujiyediin and Byron J. Love

June 16, 2025

Many federal workers in Kansas City are seeing their jobs and departments cut and their work devalued under the Trump administration. We're bringing you another conversation about DOGE's impacts in town — this time with a local union representative for the U.S. Department of Labor. KCUR's Nomin Ujiyediin spoke with Jeff Suchman, a worker's comp claims examiner for federal firefighters and the president of the American Federation of Government Employees Local 1748 — which represents Labor Department employees in Missouri, Kansas, Iowa and Nebraska.


 

 

STATE LEGISLATION
 

Deal with Uber paves way for drivers union in Illinois

Chicago Sun-Times

By David Struett

June 16, 2025

Uber has agreed to support state legislation that paves the way for drivers to unionize in a deal that scraps a city ordinance to raise driver pay. Ald. Michael Rodriguez (22nd) on Monday canceled a committee vote for a bill that would have boosted driver pay and added worker protections. The City Council member had been pushing the legislation since 2023, but he called the deal with Uber a win for the state’s estimated 100,000 drivers who use the ride-hailing app.