AFL-CIO thanks Yarmuth for voting for the PRO Act
EDITOR'S NOTE: Rep. John Yarmuth, D-Louisville, is one of labor's best friends in Washington. He has supported issues important to working families 98 percent of the time since he's been in Congress, according to the AFL-CIO's most current legislative scorecard. Issues include "strengthening Social Security and Medicare, freedom to join a union, improving workplace safety and more."
AFL-CIO President Richard Trumka's statement on passage of the PRO Act: "The PRO Act is the labor movement’s number one legislative priority this year for a reason. Working people are hungry for a bill that will ensure a process for reaching a first contract once a union is recognized, prevent the misclassification of employees, protect the right to strike and so much else. America is ready for more unions; and a happier, healthier and upwardly mobile workforce will help reverse the inequality of income, opportunity and power that is threatening our families, our communities and our democracy.”
By MARK GRUENBERG
People's World
WASHINGTON—Turning aside a multitude of Republican “poison pill” schemes, the Democratic-run U.S. House passed the Protect The Right To Organize (PRO) Act, the nation’s most-comprehensive pro-worker labor law reform in decades, 224-194. Five Republicans and 219 Democrats voted for it.
And as strenuous worker lobbying by e-mail and toll-free phone preceded the Feb. 6 late-evening win, the head of the labor-environmentalist BlueGreen Alliance said he believes the “green jobs” his group pushes for will increase in number, pay well, and likely be union jobs, too, thanks to the legislation.
But alliance Executive Director Jason Walsh also concedes, from past service in Democratic President Barack Obama’s White House, that the PRO Act won’t move in the GOP-run Senate. “We’re laying groundwork for the future” for both unions and greens, he says.