UNION LEADERS URGE CAUTION IN JUDGING TRUMP PICK FOR LABOR SECRETARY

President-elect Donald Trump’s designated appointment of Congresswoman Lori Michelle Chavez-DeRemer as Secretary of Labor in his incoming administration has been hailed in some quarters as an act friendly to labor. Others, however, were saying, “not so fast.”

Her labor-friendly bona fides come from the fact that she was only one of three Republicans in the House of Representatives who co-sponsored the pro-labor Protect the Right to Organize (PRO) Act. The act was defeated in the face of Republican opposition.

But AFL-CIO President Liz Shuler was skeptical that it would mean that the Trump administration would be friendly to workers. “Donald Trump is the President-elect of the United States—not Rep. Chavez-DeRemer—and it remains to be seen what she will be permitted to do as Secretary of Labor in an administration with a dramatically anti-worker agenda,” noted Shuler. “Despite having distanced himself from Project 2025 during his campaign, President-elect Trump has put forward several cabinet nominees with strong ties to [anti-union] Project 2025.”

And Becky Pringle, president of the National Education Association, the country’s largest teachers’ union, pointed out that it is the National Labor Relations Board that is charged with preventing union busting, not the Department of Labor. “During his first term, Trump appointed anti-worker, anti-union National Labor Relations Board members,” said Pringle. “Now he is threatening to take the unprecedented action of removing current pro-worker NLRB members in the middle of their term, replacing them with his corporate friends. And he is promising to appoint judges and justices who are hostile to workers and unions.”

As if to reinforce the perception that the Chavez DeRemer-appointment may be more symbolic than substantive, Trump quickly took pains to reassure the business community that his anti-union views have not changed. After business leaders expressed “alarm” at the appointment, he promised that he would pick a more “business-friendly” appointee for Deputy Secretary of Labor to run the day-to-day operations of the department.

In his first term, his appointees to the NLRB gave companies more time to fight unionization campaigns, more discretion over who gets overtime pay and more control over workers’ tips. He is expected to immediately fire the General Council, who has the authority to decide what sorts of cases the agency prosecutes. A new counsel there could work quickly to unwind cases including the agency’s recent efforts to hold Amazon.com Inc. liable for the treatment of its subcontracted drivers, whom the Teamsters are trying to organize.

Payday Report, 11/23; Bloomberg News, 11/26

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UNIONS FACE BIG ATTACKS FROM INCOMING TRUMP PRESIDENCY

by Paul Becker

Labor leaders around the country are bracing for the onslaught against unions that they see coming in the wake of Donald Trump’s victory in the presidential elections. Speaking of the election results, Lee Saunders, president  of the American Federation of State, County and Municipal Employees, said, “This is going to impact the entire labor movement.”

UAW President Sean Fain sounded a defiant note,  declaring, “It’s time for Washington, DC,  to put up or shut up, no matter the party, no matter the candidate. Will our government stand with the working class, or keep doing the bidding of billionaires?”

Much of their apprehension comes from Trump’s performance toward labor during his first administration when he appointed anti-union operatives to government posts that oversee labor-management relations. For example, the Department of Labor cabinet post was created during the administration of Franklin D. Roosevelt to protect the interest of workers. Instead, Trump appointed Eugene Scalia as his Secretary of Labor. Scalia, son of right-wing Supreme Court Justice Antonin Scalia, had spent most of his career as a corporate lawyer fighting unions and used his new position to chip away at worker rights and protections.

And the National Labor Relations Board was created by the Wagner Act to protect the rights of workers to organize and engage in collective bargaining with their employers. Instead, his anti-union appointees handed down decisions that, among other things, allowed employers to delay collective bargaining elections, sometimes for years, while corporations illegally got rid of union activists and killed union organizing in their shops.

Public-sector unions, particularly teacher unions have special reason to anticipate an onslaught against them. Some of Trump’s top advisers want to eliminate them altogether. Project 2025, a wide-ranging document drawn up by a number of these advisers as a blueprint for the Trump administration, has proposed that Congress consider “whether public-sector unions are appropriate in the first place.” And Vivek Ramaswamy, who is likely to play a prominent role in the new administration, made elimination of teacher unions a priority in his campaign for the Republican nomination for president. He subsequently drew back only slightly when he said that he meant eliminating only collective bargaining rights for public school teachers. Some prominent Trump advisers have also called for the elimination of the federal Department of Education.

“There’s no doubt it’s an existential threat,” said Randi Weingarten, president of the American Federation of Teachers.

Also endangered are unions in the service industries that represent hotel and restaurant workers who are often immigrants who could be victims of Trump’s promise of mass roundups and deportations. In Nevada, the Culinary Workers union has raised the standard of living of many of these workers who are now threatened.

NY Times, 11/10

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NEW NLRB RULING: AMAZON DRIVERS ARE EMPLOYEES. ENTITLED TO UNION BARGAINING

A recent NLRB ruling could have a major beneficial effect for Amazon drivers.

Millions of Americans today are ordering merchandise from Amazon, changing the manner of shopping for a large section of the American people as  trucks with the bent arrow are a ubiquitous presence in virtually every neighborhood. But even as they receive their goods delivered at the doorstep in quick time,  very few people pay attention to the working conditions of the folks who drive the trucks and deliver those packages.

In order to gain maximum profits from deliveries, Amazon has been resorting to a tactic now used by other companies – not treating their drivers as employees. Some companies like Uber and Lyft call their drivers individual business operatives, thus avoiding having to pay them health insurance and retirement benefits and preventing them, under current labor laws, from joining unions.

In Amazon’s case, it subcontracts deliveries to non-union companies even as it monitors, with cameras inside the trucks, the activities of the drivers and the pace of their deliveries. If Amazon feels that a driver is falling behind the dictated schedule, they report it to the subcontracting company for disciplinary actiony against the driver. Some drivers report having to work late into the night to complete their schedules. If the employees of one of those companies choose to unionize, causing an increase in delivery costs, Amazon simply will cancel its contract with the company.

But that might be about to change. The National Labor Relations Board’s regional director in Los Angeles has ruled, in a case involving a Palmdale, Cal. company, that Amazon is a joint employer of the drivers and must bargain with its drivers after they have started to join the Teamsters Union and petitioned for a union election. And across the country, a similar situation is occurring. Drivers at eight locations in New York City and four locations in Skokie, Ill. Have signed authorization cards with the Teamsters Union.

A court test is likely but if it is upheld, it will be a major step forward for the Amazon drivers and possibly for other workers who find themselves in this position.

NY Times, 10/10

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DOCK WORKERS STRIKE HITS EAST COAST & GULF PORTS

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Dock workers at Eat Coast and Gulf ports walked off the job Sept 30 after weeks of negotiations failed to yield an agreement between the International Longshoreman’s Association and the US Maritime Alliance, representing the shipping industry.

ILA members have been working under a six-year contract that expired Sept 30 and saw their real income deteriorate during the pandemic when many ports could not operate. The workers unload cargo from ships docked in the ports They are seeking substantial pay increases to make up for their losses and protection from automation severely cutting into their jobs.

Even though a major strike like this one could endanger Democrats just before election, President Biden has said he will not seek a Taft-Hartley injunction against the strike. “Ocean carriers have made record profits since the pandemic,” Biden said in a statement. “It’s only fair that workers, who put themselves at risk during the pandemic to keep ports open, see a meaningful increase in their wages as well.”

Politico, 2 items, 10/1 and 10/1

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BOEING WORKERS STRIKE AFTER REJECTING PROPOSED CONTRACT

By an overwhelming vote of 95 percent, thousands of workers at Boeing walked off the job Sept. 13, turning down a proposed contract that had been negotiated between the company and the union’s leaders. The strike by 33,000 members of the International Association of Machinists and Aerospace Workers affects workers on the West Coast that produce commercial jet passenger planes, spacecraft, and rockets.

The industrial behemoth operates two large plants in the Seattle area that turn out the 737 Max, its most popular model, the 767 and the 777. The walkout closes down these factories and would also affect the supply chain to other Boeing facilities around the country, possibility causing them to shut down or sharply curtail operations as well.

The company has also been obliged to slow production of the 737 Max for quality control issues after a door panel fell off one of them during takeoff earlier this year. No one was seriously injured but, coming after the fatal crashes of two of the planes several years ago, production of the 737 Max was halted for two years.

The striking workers are trying to make up for concessions they have made in previous contracts. They are also seeking to restore the pension benefits they gave up in the previous contract, negotiated in 2008 and extended twice since then. In addition, they have been angered by Boeing’s decision four years ago to manufacture its new 787 Dreamliner at a non-union plant in South Carolina.

The last Boeing strike in 2008 went on for 50 days. If this one lasts as long, it could cost the company somewhere in the neighborhood of $3 billion. On the evening of the first day of the strike, a federal mediation service announced that it would convene mediation talks between Boeing and the union in a few days.

NY Times print edition, 9/14

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‘TRUMP IS A SCAB’ PROCLAIM UNION LEADERS AT DEMOCRATIC PARTY CONVENTION

Labor unions were very visible on the first night of the Democratic convention Aug. 19 with the leaders of over a half-dozen unions representing millions of workers took the floor to express their support for Kamala Harris and Tim Walz in this year’s elections.

United Auto Workers union president Shaw Fain speaks to the Democratic National Convention on August 19. AFP via Getty Images)

Particularly notable was the speech by United Auto Workers president Sean Fain who recalled President Biden’s support of the auto worker’s recent strike and his appearance on their picket line. Auto workers remember that during their strike, Trump was addressing a rally called by a non-union auto shop on company time where workers were mandated to attend, and condemned the strike and the UAW. The strike meanwhile gained for workers at the Big Three automakers a record contract with gains they haven’t seen in decades.

Fain also pointed to the time when Harris, as a U.S. Senator, joined a UAW pocket line in a previous strike. “For us in the labor movement, it’s real simple.” he said. “Kamala Harris is one of us, she’s a fighter for the working class, and Trump is a scab.” While they pose as friends of workers, he and his VP nominee JD Vance are “lap dogs for the billionaire class who only serve themselves.”

And then, in an act of showmanship that drew a roar and enthusiastic applause from the crowd, he said “It’s getting hot in here,” and took off his jacket revealing a red t-shirt with the large inscription, “Trump is a scab.”

“The American working class,” he declared, “is in a fight for our lives.”

“We are going to build a younger, darker, hipper, fresher, sneaker-wearing labor movement,” said Service Employees International Union president April Verrett, whose union represents nearly two million workers. “A movement that is going to be more inclusive and built for the middle class, and we are going to end poverty-wage work once and for all,” she said, to loud approval from theDemocratic  Party delegates.

In her speech to the delegates on the same night, New York congresswoman Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez slammed the former president as a “two-bit union buster.”

The Independent (UK), 8/20

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AMAZON PRIME DAYS TAKE MAJOR TOLL ON COMPANY’S WORKERS

Every year Amazon stages a Prime Day season, featuring big bargains for Amazon Prime members and big profits for Amazon. But what’s left unsaid is how much the speedup during those sale days takes its toll on the company’s workers.

A new report from the US Senate Committee on Health, Education, Labor, and Pensions condemns the “outrageous injury levels during the Prime Day season. Amazon has a notorious record in violation of safety rules and worker injuries on the job. Normally, the ratio for the company in any given year is 10 for every hundred workers, more than twice the average for the industry. But during the Prime Days,. It jumps to 45 for every hundred, or almost half ofthe company’s warehouse workers.

“The incredibly dangerous working conditions at Amazon revealed in this investigation are a perfect example of the type of corporate greed that the American people are sick and tired of,” said Senator Sanders, chair of the Senate committee issuing the report.

“Despite making $36 billion in profits last year and providing its CEO with over $275 million in compensation over the past  years,”said Christy Hoffman, General Secretary of UNI Global Union,“this report confirms what we have heard from workers for years. Amazon drives its workers to the brink of physical collapse, causing unbearable wear and tear on their bodies, resulting in injuries and long-term damage. It is well known that to work at Amazon is to work in a meat grinder. It doesn’t have to be this way, The call for change is even more urgent as the planet overheats and record-breaking temperatures become the norm. Instead of resisting its workers’ call for a union, Amazon should sit down and negotiate fair – and safe- conditions, which includes an end to unreasonable production demands and comprehensive measures to protect their employees from the consequences of heat.”

Sanders emphasized the issue of chronic understaffing at Amazon warehouses, particularly during peak periods like Prime Day. He argued that understaffing leads to longer hours and increased workloads that puts workers at a higher risk of injuries.

This is not the first time that Amazon has been criticized for putting workers at risk. Last month, UNI Global Union unveiled a new survey which states that Amazon warehouse and delivery workers in India are enduring intense pressure and unsafe conditions while struggling to support themselves with insufficient pay. The report last month published by UNI Global Union in partnership with the Amazon India Workers Association (AIWA), examining the working conditions of Amazon employees in India comes in the wake of widespread reports of dangerous conditions at Amazon during the summer heatwave in and around New Delhi.

United States Senate; Health, Education, Labor, & Pensions, Committee; Bernard Sanders, Chair: Amazon Investigation Interim Report, 7/15

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UNIONS ARE LINING UP TO SUPPORT HARRIS

As the Harris presidential campaign heats up, labor is an important part of the coalition that is emphasizing the stakes in this election. In the words of United Auto Workers President Sean Fain, “The path forward is clear. We will defeat Donald Trump and his billionaire agenda and elect a champion for the working class to the highest office in this country. We will speak truth to power about the issues that matter to the working class: a living wage, decent healthcare, a dignified retirement, and taking our lives and our time back.”

Although UAW has not as yet formally endorsed Harris, no one doubts that an enthusiastic endorsement will soon be forthcoming. Fain has contrasted the behavior of President Biden, who joined striking auto workers on their picket line, with Trump who answered an invitation from the head of a non-union auto-parts company to address a meeting of its workers and denounce the strike. “Vice President Kamala Harris walked the picket line with us in 2019,” said a union statement “and along with President Biden has brought work and jobs back to communities like Lordstown, Ohio, and Belvidere, Illinois.”

As of this writing, among the unions who have endorsed Harris are:
The national AFL-CIO
Service Employees International Union
American Federation of Teachers
National Union of Healthcare Workers
United Farm Workers
Communication Workers of America
United Auto Workers

Given the stakes for labor in this election and the fact that many labor leaders have also praised the Biden-Harris administration as the most pro-labor administration in our history, there is no doubt that a flood of union endorsements are on the way.

Real News Network, 7/22; CWA, 7/25

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STEEL UNION WINS NLRB COMPLAINT AGAINST UNFAIR FIRINGS  OF UNION WORKWERS

Hello Neighbor, a nonprofit in Pittsburgh, agreed July 5 to a settlement in which they paid more than $198,000 for unfair labor practices involving five employees unlawfully terminated for union activities and a supervisor terminated for refusing to commit unfair labor practices. The settlement includes remediating the denial of wage increases to 22 workers plus backpay and interest.

Hello Neighbor agreed to the terms after the United Steelworkers brought a complaint before the Region 6-Pittsburgh office of the National Labor Relations Board. The NLRB upheld the complaint and oversaw the settlement.

In addition to the terms above, the company agreed to post and email a notice of the settlement to all their workers hired since January 2023, for one year post an explanation of their rights to organize under the National Labor Relations Act, and rescind the company policy of requiring employees to sign confidentially agreements and agreements not to publicly criticize the company. They must also notify workers who had already signed these agreements that they were no longer in effect.

Union Track, 7/16

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STRIKE BY BUILDING CLEANERS PROMPTS MANAGEMENT FEELERS TO BARGAIN

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In June it was a big demonstration in front of the office building at 529 Fifth Avenue, called by the Service Employees International Union. Hundreds of their members who work in the area, picketed in front of the building at 44th Street in Manhattan’s diamond district in support of their union brothers and sisters. We reported on this demonstration in an earlier post.

Now, just a few weeks later, a strike by the building employees beginning July 10 seems to have stirred the management to reach out feelers about bargaining with the union. At issue was the fact that management, Fifth City Realty, an affiliate of Empire Capital, had recently acquired the building and brought in a new contractor, L&J Janitorial, to manage its janitorial services, L&J then unilaterally tore up the contract that had been negotiated between the old management and SEIU. The new janitorial service,  then proceeded to cut the wages of the buildings cleaners nearly in half to the city’s minimum wage of $16 an hour. cancelling worker benefits like family medical insurance and terminating long term employees, including full-time and part-time security officers and a fire safety director.

The action prompted a mass demonstration of hundreds of SEIU members and supporters on the streets around the building and a walkout by the buildings employees on July 10.

It didn’t take long for the owners and the janitorial contractor, which had adamantly refused to bargain with the union, to reach out to the union, potentially the first step in the negotiating process.

In response, then union agreed to temporarily suspend the strike but said that it’s still possible  for the strike to continue if L&J Janitorial delays negotiations or does not bargain in good faith with the union.

Labor Press, 7/13

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