No collective bargaining for you-hoo
Union leaders have accused Donald Trump of union-busting in a “blatant” attempt to silence them after the president stepped up his attacks on government unions on Thursday, signing an executive order that attempts to eliminate collective bargaining for hundreds of thousands of federal workers.
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Liz Shuler, the president of the AFL-CIO, the largest federation of labor unions in the US, said the move was “straight out of Project 2025”, the rightwing Heritage Foundation’s manifesto to remake the federal government.
“This executive order is the very definition of union-busting. It strips the fundamental right to unionize and collectively bargain from workers across the federal government at more than 30 agencies,” said Shuler. “It’s clear that this order is punishment for unions who are leading the fight against the administration’s illegal actions in court – and a blatant attempt to silence us.”
Well, that, but also core conservative: bosses and rich people can do no wrong, and workers are parasites who can do no right.
“President Trump’s latest executive order is a disgraceful and retaliatory attack on the rights of hundreds of thousands of patriotic American civil servants – nearly one-third of whom are veterans – simply because they are members of a union that stands up to his harmful policies,” said Everett Kelley, the president of the American Federation of Government Employees (AFGE), the largest union representing federal workers.
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The union held a press conference with Democratic lawmakers on Friday afternoon at the US Capitol, during which Kelley criticized the invocation of national security to strip federal workers of their union rights and called for support from the public.
“This isn’t about safety or security. It’s about silencing workers who are courageously standing up to this non integrity, non accountability in the government,” said Kelley. “We won’t be silenced.”
The congressman Jamie Raskin said the Trump order was an attempt to bring “chaos and retaliation” against the US labor movement.
“It’s clear as day that they are retaliating against the labor movement for standing up for the rights of workers,” said Raskin. “When rightwing coups and authoritarian takeovers happen all over the world, the first thing they do is they attack the civil service, and then they attack the labor movement.”
I wonder how many of those union members voted for Trump.
Takes me back to 1969, and to the voice of the inimitable Joan Baez. (Song starts just before 2.00 minutes in.)
A few years before, I had read John Steinbeck’s US class war classic The Grapes of Wrath. For me, that put Steinbeck into the very front rank of American writers, even though he afterwards moved to the political right over the Vietnam War. NB: For younger readers, that was the war that Trump supported while being relieved from risking his life, hide, or any other part of his anatomy thanks to the fact that he had bonespurs. (Could still have maybe got a minor part in some cowboy movie on the strength of them; so a great loss there to the whole Hollywood scene and tradition.)
But Joan Baez courageously visited North Vietnam during the war and showed the people there the better side of America, as personified by the legendary Joe Hill.. And Ho Chi Minh was the George Washington of Vietnam.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=99jMOkGL1dE
Nebraska farmers are already starting to squeal like stuck pigs; I imagine quite a lot of them voted for Trump. It becomes a little difficult to feel sorry for their plight, but unfortunately. because they grow our food, their plight could end up concerning all of us.