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Anna Susman, anna.susman@berlinrosen.com, (646) 200-5285
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The Fight for $15 and the Movement for Black Lives will take to the streets nationwide April 4 - the anniversary of Dr. Martin Luther King Jr.'s assassination - in a two-dozen-city "Fight Racism, Raise Pay" protest.
Thousands of underpaid workers, local racial justice activists, elected officials and clergy will hold rallies, marches, teach-ins, and other demonstrations to stress that the push for economic and racial justice remains as deeply linked today as when Dr. King was killed in 1968 supporting striking black sanitation workers in Memphis, Tenn. The coast-to-coast protests will culminate in a march by thousands of workers, national civil rights leaders and politicians on the Lorraine Motel in downtown Memphis, where they'll hold a memorial at the site of Dr. King's assassination 49 years ago.
The "Fight Racism, Raise Pay" protests, planned for more than two-dozen cities from Atlanta to Milwaukee to Las Vegas, come as working Americans face an onslaught of attacks on their right to join together for higher pay and confront racist policies from the White House down to local police departments. Republican lawmakers in more than two-dozen states have introduced legislation aimed at cracking down on protestors like those in the Fight for $15 and the Movement for Black Lives.
The marchers will converge in Memphis weeks after a local Fight for $15 worker organization filed a federal civil rights lawsuit against the city, charging its police department with widespread illegal surveillance and intimidation to stifle worker protest. Rallies on April 4 in Minneapolis, Detroit and Durham will condemn anti-protest legislation proposed by lawmakers in those states.
"We're joining together with the Movement for Black Lives because our two movements have a common bond in fighting the racism that keeps down people of color everywhere," said Latierika Blair, 23, who works at McDonald's in Memphis, Tenn., and is paid $7.35/hour. "McDonalds conspires with police to try to silence us when we speak out for higher pay. Corporations and politicians act to keep workers and black people from getting ahead in America. We should be investing in our people and communities. That's why we have to protest, and that's why we will keep speaking out together until we win."
The April 4 protests come as newly empowered corporate interests and right-wing politicians attempt to strip away the rights of workers to organize across the country. Union jobs in state and local government - which have historically provided a pathway to the middle class for workers of color - are under attack from corporate-backed politicians like Illinois Gov. Bruce Rauner, who has refused to bargain a contract with state employees for nearly two years in an effort to break their union. And people of color remain over-represented in low-paying industries like fast-food: more than half of black workers and nearly 60 percent of Latino workers are paid less than $15, according to an analysis by the National Employment Law Project.
"White supremacy and corporate greed have always been linked in America," said Chelsea Fuller of the Movement for Black Lives. "The fast-food workers who are going on strike for $15/hour and the right to a union are resisting the same institutional racism and oppression that fuels police violence across the country. We are stronger when we stand together, and so our movements are going to keep fighting back against the twin evils of racial and economic inequality that continue to hold back black and brown people."
The April 4 protests are the latest wave of defiance against reactionary attacks on working people, people of color, women and immigrants. Just weeks after the November 2016 election, thousands of workers in the Fight for $15 walked off the job from coast to coast and engaged in waves of civil disobedience. The walkouts marked the start of a new era of mass demonstration, including the Women's March and a rash of protests at the nation's airports following President Trump's announcement of an immigration ban from predominantly Muslim countries. The April 4 Fight for $15/Movement for Black Lives protests will kick off a wave of protests around the country in the following weeks, including demonstrations calling attention to immigrants' rights, climate change and tax policy that benefits the rich.
Dr. King saw a common bond between the labor and civil rights movements and believed that union rights were fundamental to achieving racial justice. As King said in 1961, "the two most dynamic and cohesive liberal forces in the country are the labor movement and the Negro freedom movement. Together we can be architects of democracy."
"Dr. King spent his final days standing with Memphis sanitation workers because he saw the deep link between the labor movement and the civil rights movement," said the Rev. William Barber II, founder of the social justice organization Repairers of the Breach. "Dr. King knew that if the racism and poverty are inextricably linked, our struggles to confront them must be inseparable as well. On April 4, we follow in Dr. King's footsteps to march on Memphis and take on the twin scourges of racial and economic inequality."
The April 4 actions will conclude with a national moment of silence at 6:01pm Central - the exact time of Dr. King's assassination - when Americans across the country will reflect on Dr. King's dream for racial and economic justice and how it connects to theirs.
Racial justice organizations participating in actions on April 4 include Black Lives Matter chapters in Los Angeles, Calif., Atlanta, Ga., Broward County, Fla., Hillsborough County, Fla., Chicago, Ill., and Flint, Mich.; NAACP chapters in Missouri, North Carolina, Virginia and Las Vegas, Nev., and other groups including Black Youth Project 100 and Workers Center for Racial Justice in Chicago, and Dream Defenders in Tampa and Miami.
The Fight for $15 has built deep ties with civil rights groups and leaders across the country. U.S. Rep. John Lewis joined Atlanta fast-food workers on a strike line in August 2013, encouraging them to, "Keep walking, keep marching, keep talking, keep pushing." In the summer of 2014, the NAACP passed a resolution backing the Fight for $15; in the winter of 2015 Memphis sanitation workers who participated in the 1968 strike in Memphis, during which Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. was assassinated, implored a gathering of fast-food workers at Dr. King's church in Atlanta to keep fighting for $15 and union rights; and faith leaders of all stripes have echoed the workers' moral argumentfor dignity on the job. Workers have developed deep ties with the Movement for Black Lives and marched alongside activists calling for racial justice from Ferguson, Mo. to Baton Rouge, La, to Milwaukee, Wisc.
The Fight for $15 has spurred wage hikes for 22 million underpaid workers, including more than 10 million who are on their way to $15/hour, by convincing everyone from voters to politicians to corporations to raise pay. Workers have taken what many viewed as an outlandish proposition - $15/hour- and made it the new labor standard in New York, California, Seattle and Washington, D.C. Home care workers in Massachusetts and Oregon won $15/hour statewide minimum wages and companies including Facebook, Aetna, Amalgamated Bank, JP Morgan Chase and Nationwide Insurance have raised pay to $15/hour or higher. Workers in nursing homes, public schools and hospitals have won $15/hour via collective bargaining. The movement was credited as one of the reasons wages for lower-paid workers grew faster than for upper-income workers last year, marking a significant break with the runaway wage growth captured by wealthy Americans over the past several decades.
"Every day workers of color across this country face deep-seated racism that would seem to be out of Dr. King's era, but is, sadly, still reality today," said Kendall Fells, national organizing director of the Fight for $15. "But workers and activists are standing up and speaking out, the way Dr. King would, to fight racism and raise wages, and we are not giving up until companies like McDonald's get the message that workers are worth more than minimum wage."
Fast food workers are coming together all over the country to fight for $15 an hour and the right to form a union without retaliation. We work for corporations that are making tremendous profits, but do not pay employees enough to support our families and to cover basic needs like food, health care, rent and transportation.
Critics of the "COP of false solutions" said that instead of much-needed funding, developing nations got "a global Ponzi scheme that the private equity vultures and public relations people will now exploit."
It was early Sunday by the time the United Nations climate summit wrapped up in Baku, Azerbaijan after running into overtime to finalize deals on carbon markets and funding for developing countries that were sharply condemned by campaigners worldwide.
"COP29 was a dumpster fire. Except it's not trash that's burning—it's our planet," declared Nikki Reisch of the Center for International Environmental Law. "And developed countries are holding both the matches and the firehose."
Recalling last year's conference in the United Arab Emirates, Oil Change International global policy senior strategist, Shady Khalil highlighted that "the world made a deal at COP28 to end the fossil fuel era. Now, at COP29, countries seem to have been struck with collective amnesia."
"With each new iteration of the texts, oil and gas producers managed to dilute the urgent commitment to phase out fossil fuels," Khalil said. "But let's be clear: Rich countries' failure to lead on fossil fuel phaseout and to put the trillions they have hoarded on the table has done more to imperil the energy transition than any obstructionist tactics from oil and gas producers."
This year's conference began November 11 and was due to conclude on Friday, but parties to the Paris agreement were still negotiating the carbon market rules, which were finalized late Saturday, and the new collective quantified goal (NCQG) on climate finance.
"The carbon markets in Article 6 of the Paris agreement were pushed through COP29 in a take-it-or leave-it outcome," said Tamra Gilbertson of Indigenous Environmental Network, decrying "a new dangerous era in climate change negotiations."
As Climate Home Newsreported, they establish two types of markets: "The first—known as Article 6.2—regulates bilateral carbon trading between countries, while Article 6.4 creates a global crediting mechanism for countries to sell emissions reductions."
The outlet pointed to expert warnings that "the rules for bilateral trades under 6.2 could open the door for the sale of junk carbon credits—one of the weaknesses of the previous crediting mechanism set up by the U.N. known as the Clean Development Mechanism (CDM)."
Jonathan Crook of Carbon Market Watch said in a statement that "the package does not shine enough light on an already opaque system where countries won't be required to provide information about their deals well ahead of actual trades."
"Even worse, the last opportunity to strengthen the critically weak review process was largely missed," he continued. "Countries remain free to trade carbon credits that are of low quality, or even fail to comply with Article 6.2 rules, without any real oversight."
As for Article 6.4, “much lies in the hands of the supervisory body" that's set to resume work in early 2025, said Crook's colleague, Federica Dossi. "To show that it is ready to learn from past mistakes, it will have to take tough decisions next year and ensure that Article 6.4 credits will be markedly better than the units that old CDM projects will generate."
"If they are not, they will have to compete in a low-trust, low-integrity market where prices are likely to be at rock bottom and interest will be low," Dossi added. "Such a system would be a distraction, and a waste of 10 years worth of carbon market negotiations."
Some campaigners suggested that no matter what lies ahead, the embrace of carbon markets represents a failure. Kirtana Chandrasekaran at Friends of the Earth International said that "the supposed 'COP of climate finance' has turned into the 'COP of false solutions.' The U.N. has given its stamp of approval to fraudulent and failed carbon markets."
"We have seen the impacts of these schemes: land grabs, Indigenous peoples' and human rights violations," Chandrasekaran noted. "The now-operationalized U.N. global carbon market may well be worse than existing voluntary ones and will continue to provide a get out of jail free card to Big Polluters whilst devastating communities and ecosystems."
Chandrasekaran's colleague Seán McLoughlin at Friends of the Earth Ireland was similarly critical of the conference's finance deal, asserting that "Baku is a big F U to climate justice, to the poorest communities who are on the frontlines of climate breakdown."
"COP29 has failed those who have done least to cause climate change and who are most vulnerable to climate breakdown because the process is still in thrall to fossil fuel bullies and rich countries more committed to shirking their historical responsibility than safeguarding our common future," he said. "Now it's back to citizens to demand our governments do the right thing. We must keep demanding the trillions, not billions owed in climate debt and a comprehensive, swift, and equitable fossil fuel phaseout. The struggle for climate justice is not over."
Campaigners and developing nations fought for $1.3 trillion in annual climate finance from those most responsible for the planetary crisis. Instead, the NCQG document only directs developed countries to provide the Global South with $300 billion per year by 2035, with a goal of reaching the higher figure by also seeking funds from private sources.
The deal almost didn't happen at all. As The Guardiandetailed Saturday: "Developed countries including the U.K., the U.S., and E.U. members were pushed into raising their offer from an original $250 billion a year tabled on Friday, to $300 billion. Poor countries argued for more, and in the early evening two groups representing some of the world's poorest countries walked out of one key meeting, threatening to collapse the negotiations."
While Simon Stiell, executive secretary of U.N. Climate Change, celebrated the NCQG as "an insurance policy for humanity, amid worsening climate impacts hitting every country," Chiara Martinelli, director at Climate Action Network Europe, put it in the context of the $100 billion target set in 2009, which wealthy governments didn't meet.
“Rich countries own the responsibility for the failed outcome at COP29," Martinelli said. "The talk of tripling from the $100 billion goal might sound impressive, but in reality, it falls far short, barely increasing from the previous commitment when adjusted for inflation and considering the bulk of this money will come in the form of unsustainable loans. This is not solidarity. It's smoke and mirrors that betray the needs of those on the frontlines of the climate crisis."
Also stressing that "it's not even real 'money,' by and large," but rather "a motley mix of loans and privatized investment," Oxfam International's climate change policy lead, Nafkote Dabi, called the agreement "a global Ponzi scheme that the private equity vultures and public relations people will now exploit."
"The terrible verdict from the Baku climate talks shows that rich countries view the Global South as ultimately expendable, like pawns on a chessboard," Dabi charged. "The $300 billion so-called 'deal' that poorer countries have been bullied into accepting is unserious and dangerous—a soulless triumph for the rich, but a genuine disaster for our planet and communities who are being flooded, starved, and displaced today by climate breakdown."
Rachel Cleetus from the Union of Concerned Scientists, who is in Baku, took aim at not only rich governments, but also the host, saying that "the Azerbaijani COP29 Presidency's ineptitude in brokering an agreement at this consequential climate finance COP will go down in ignominy."
Cleetus' group is based in the United States, which is preparing for a January transfer of power from Democratic President Joe Biden to Republican President-elect Donald Trump, who notably ditched the Paris agreement during his first term.
"The United States—the world's largest historical contributor of heat-trapping emissions—is going to see a monumental shift in its global diplomacy posture as the incoming anti-science Trump administration will likely exit the Paris agreement and take a wrecking ball to domestic climate and clean energy policies," Cleetus warned. "While some politically and economically popular clean energy policies may prove durable and action from forward-looking states and businesses will be significant, there's no doubt that a lack of robust federal leadership will leave U.S. climate action hobbled for a time."
"Other nations—including E.U. countries and China—will need to do what they can to fill the void," she stressed. "Between now and COP30 in Brazil next year, nations have a lot of ground to make up to have any hope of limiting runaway climate change."
Ben Goloff of the U.S.-based Center for Biological Diversity called out the departing Biden administration, arguing that it "should be going out with at least a signal of its moral climate commitment, not copping out ahead of the Trump 2.0 disaster."
"Of course Trumpers want to dismantle the only agency formed in decades dedicated to giving consumers a fair shake in a predatory economy," one journalist said in response to reporting on Republican plans.
Just hours after U.S. President Donald Trumpnamed a labor secretary nominee seen by some union leaders and advocates as genuinely pro-worker, The Washington Post on Saturday detailed what the incoming administration and Republican Congress have planned for a federal agency designed to protect everyday Americans from corporate abuse.
Initially proposed by Sen. Elizabeth Warren (D-Mass.) while she was still a Harvard Law School professor, the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau (CFPB) was created by the Dodd-Frank Wall Street Reform and Consumer Protection Act, which Congress passed in response to the 2007-08 financial crisis.
The first Trump administration was accused of "gutting the CFPB and corrupting its mission." However, as the Post noted, "its current Democratic leader, Rohit Chopra, has been aggressive" in his fights for consumers, working to get medical debt off credit reports and crack down on "junk fees" for everything from bank account overdrafts and credit cards to paycheck advance products—efforts that have drawn fierce challenges from the financial industry.
"Working- and middle-class people who voted for Trump did so for many reasons, but you'd be hard-pressed to find any who did so because they want higher overdraft fees."
Chopra, an appointee of outgoing President Joe Biden, isn't expected to stay at the CFPB, but Trump's recent win hasn't yet halted bold action at the agency. On Thursday, it announced plans "to supervise the largest nonbank companies offering digital funds transfer and payment wallet apps," which is set to impact Amazon, Apple, Block, Google, PayPal, Venmo, and Zelle, unless the Trump administration shifts course.
The Post reported that Republican leaders "intend to use control of the House, Senate, and White House next year to impose new restrictions on the agency, in some cases permanently," and "early discussions align the GOP with banks, credit card companies, mortgage lenders, and other large financial institutions."
According to the newspaper:
"There will be a pretty significant change from the direction the agency has been going in, and I think in a positive way," predicted Kathy Kraninger, who led the CFPB during Trump's first term. She now serves as chief executive of the Florida Bankers Association, a lobbying group whose board of directors includes top executives from Bank of America, JPMorgan Chase, PNC, and Truist.
Aides on Trump's transition team have started considering candidates to lead the CFPB who are expected to ease its oversight of banks, lenders, and tech giants. The early short list includes Brian Johnson, a former agency official; Keith Noreika, a banking consultant and former regulator; and Todd Zywicki, a professor at George Mason University's law school who has previously advised the bureau, according to four people familiar with the matter.
"Of course Trumpers want to dismantle the only agency formed in decades dedicated to giving consumers a fair shake in a predatory economy," Katrina vanden Heuvel, The Nation's editorial director and publisher, said in response to the reporting—which came just a day after Forbes similarly previewed "big changes coming to Elizabeth Warren's CFPB" when Trump returns.
"The number of CFPB regulatory advisories and enforcement actions will likely shrink" and "bank mergers and acquisitions could see a boost too," Forbes highlighted. "Even more noteworthy, the CFPB's funding structure could be at increased risk," with some congressional Republicans considering the reconciliation process as a path to forcing changes, following the U.S. Supreme Court's May decision that allowed the watchdog to keep drawing money from the earnings of the Federal Reserve System.
"Changing the CFPB's funding structure would be an uphill battle since it would be perceived by many as an attempt to take the bureau’s budget to zero," the magazine noted. "But the concept 'has been on every wish list I've seen from House Republicans for the last 10 years or more since its creation,' says a former Capitol Hill staffer who has worked with the House Financial Services Committee."
Warren, who won a third term in the Senate earlier this month, is optimistic about the agency's survival. "The CFPB is here to stay," she told the Post. "So I get there's big talk, but the laws supporting the CFPB are strong, and support across this nation from Democrats, Republicans, and people who don't pay any attention at all to politics, is also strong."
The senator's comments about the CFPB's popularity are backed up by polling conducted last weekend and released Thursday by Data for Progress. Although the progressive firm found that a plurality of voters (48%) lacked an initial opinion of the agency, they expressed support when introduced to major moves during the Biden administration.
"More than 8 in 10 voters support the CFPB's actions to protect Medicare recipients from illegal and inaccurate bills (88%), crack down on illegal medical debt collection practices like misrepresenting consumers' rights and double-dipping on services already covered by insurance (86%), publish a consumer guide informing consumers of the steps they can take if they receive collection notices for medical bills (84%), and propose a rule to ban medical bills from people’s credit reports (81%)," the firm said.
Data for Progress also found that voters back agency actions to "require that companies update any risky data collection practices (85%), rule that banks and other providers must make personal financial data available without junk fees to consumers (85%), confront banks for illegal mortgage lending discrimination against minority neighborhoods (83%), and state that third parties cannot collect, use, or retain data to advance their own commercial interests through targeted or behavioral advertising (80%)."
After learning about the watchdog's recent moves, 75% of voters across the political spectrum said they approve of the CFPB.
The polling came out the same day Warren addressed Trump's campaigning on a 10% cap for credit card interest rates.
"I can't imagine that President Trump didn't mean every single thing he said during the campaign," Warren
told reporters. She later added on social media: "If Donald Trump really wants to take on the credit card industry, count me in. The CFPB will back him up."
While Trump's latest electoral success was thanks in part to winning over key numbers of working-class voters, the president-elect has spent the post-election period filling key roles in his next administration with billionaires and loyalists, fueling expectations that his return to the White House—with a Republican-controlled Congress—will largely serve ultrarich people and corporations, reminiscent of his first term.
The recent reporting on the CFPB has further solidified those expectations. In a snarky social media post, Aaron Sojourner, a labor economist and senior researcher at the W. E. Upjohn Institute for Employment Research who served on the Council of Economic Advisers (CEA) during the Trump and Obama administrations, wrote: "#priorities Bringing back junk fees."
Joshua Smith, budget policy director for the Democrat-run Senate Budget Committee,
said that "working- and middle-class people who voted for Trump did so for many reasons, but you'd be hard-pressed to find any who did so because they want higher overdraft fees."
The DOL pick has sparked debates about how much she will actually "do right by workers" and whether "Teamsters president Sean O'Brien and Donald Trump are effectively dividing the labor movement."
Amid a flurry of Friday night announcements about key roles in the next Trump administration, one stood out to union leaders and other advocates for working people: Congresswoman Lori Chavez-DeRemer, an Oregon Republican, for labor secretary.
Chavez-DeRemer, who lost her reelection bid to Democrat Janelle Bynum earlier this month, "has built a pro-labor record in Congress, including as one of only three Republicans to co-sponsor the Protecting the Right to Organize (PRO) Act and one of eight Republicans to co-sponsor the Public Service Freedom to Negotiate Act," said AFL-CIO president Liz Shuler in a statement.
"But 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," she stressed. "Despite having distanced himself from Project 2025 during his campaign, President-elect Trump has put forward several Cabinet nominees with strong ties to Project 2025. That 900-page document has proposals that would strip overtime pay, eliminate the right to organize, and weaken health and safety standards."
"You can stand with working people, or you can stand with Project 2025, but you can't stand with both."
"The AFL-CIO will work with anyone who wants to do right by workers, but we will reject and defeat any attempt to roll back the rights and protections that working people have won with decades of blood, sweat, and tears," added Schuler, whose group endorsed Democratic Vice President Kamala Harris and developed a guide detailing how the right-wing initiative would be catastrophic for working people. "You can stand with working people, or you can stand with Project 2025, but you can't stand with both."
Seth Harris, a Northeastern University professor who served as acting secretary of labor under former President Barack Obama, toldBloomberg that "the president-elect has nominated a unicorn: a genuine pro-labor Republican."
"This is about the best nomination for the Labor Department that Democrats could have hoped for," he said, but "we don't know if she's going to be given the freedom to carry out the agenda that she supported in Congress."
Some skeptics and critics highlighted that Chavez-DeRemer—who only entered the U.S. House of Representatives last year—has just a 10% lifetime score from the AFL-CIO. Among them was longtime labor reporter Mike Elk, who warned, "This is divide and conquer politics at its worst as Trump prepares for an attack on federal workers unions!"
Others, such as Progressive Mass policy director Jonathan Cohn and University of California, Los Angeles historian Trevor Griffey, have suggested that Trump's U.S. Department of Labor (DOL) nominee supporting the PRO Act was simply her "posturing in a swing district."
Like the AFL-CIO, the nation's two largest teachers unions shared nuanced reactions to Trump choosing Chavez-DeRemer. Alongside many other labor groups, both backed Harris after President Joe Biden left the race—though Trump's victory has ignited heated debates over the Democratic Party's failure to win over working-class voters in a cycle that featured Trump cosplaying in a Pennsylvania McDonald's and a garbage truck while cozying up to the world's richest man, Elon Musk, and praising him for firing striking workers.
National Education Association president Becky Pringle said in a statement that "across America, most of us want the same things—strong public schools to help every student grow into their full brilliance and good jobs where workers earn living wages to provide for their families."
Noting Chavez-DeRemer's co-sponsorship of "pro-student, pro-public school, pro-worker legislation" and votes "against gutting the Department of Education, against school vouchers, and against cuts to education funding," Pringle asserted that "this record stands in stark contrast to Donald Trump's anti-worker, anti-union record, and his extreme Project 2025 agenda that would gut workplace protections, make it harder for workers to unionize, and diminish the voice of working people."
"During his first term, Trump appointed anti-worker, anti-union National Labor Relations Board members," she continued. "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."
Trump's track
record also includes nominating agency leaders and U.S. Supreme Court justices with histories of siding with companies over employees, gutting DOL regulations intended to protect workers' wages and benefits, and giving major tax cuts to wealthy individuals and corporations—policies he plans to extend with the help of an incoming GOP Congress.
"Educators and working families across the nation will be watching Lori Chavez-DeRemer as she moves through the confirmation process," said Pringle, "and hope to hear a pledge from her to continue to stand up for workers and students as her record suggests, not blind loyalty to the Project 2025 agenda."
American Federation of Teachers president Randi Weingarten called Chavez-DeRemer's selection "significant," given that "her record suggests real support of workers and their right to unionize."
"I hope it means the Trump [administration] will actually respect collective bargaining and workers' voices from Teamsters to teachers," Weingarten added, referring to the International Brotherhood of Teamsters.
The Teamsters notably declined to endorse in the U.S. presidential contest after the group's general president, Sean O'Brien was widely criticized by labor advocates including his predecessor for speaking at the Republican National Convention. O'Brien lobbied Trump to choose Chavez-DeRemer and welcomed the Friday development on social media, posting a photo of himself with the pair and thanking the president-elect "for putting American workers first."
"Nearly a year ago, you joined us for a Teamsters roundtable and pledged to listen to workers and find common ground to protect and respect labor in America," O'Brien wrote. "You put words into action. Now let's grow wages and improve working conditions nationwide. Congratulations to Lori Chavez-DeRemer on your nomination! North America's strongest union is ready to work with you every step of the way to expand good union jobs and rebuild our nation's middle class. Let's get to work!"
Washington Post labor reporter Lauren Kaori Gurleydescribed Trump's decision as "a coup for the Teamsters" and New York Times labor reporter Noam Scheiber called it "a bona fide win" for the union, though he added that "the way you'll know if they have substantive influence or mostly cosmetic influence is if Trump's NLRB continues pressuring Amazon to bargain with unionized workers and drivers, who the Teamsters represent."
Meanwhile, Labor Notes staff writer Luis Feliz Leon said: "Lori Chavez-DeRemer for labor secretary isn't a win for the labor movement. The PRO Act is dead. Unlike the Democrats, the Republicans have party discipline. What's noteworthy: Teamsters president Sean O'Brien and Donald Trump are effectively dividing the labor movement."
Some right-wing leaders and groups have already expressed disapproval of Trump's nominee, a sign that she may need some Democratic support to get confirmed by the Senate—if the president-elect doesn't pursue recess appointments.
Sen. Patty Murray (D-Wash.), who serves as Senate Appropriations Committee chair and president pro tempore until Republicans take over in January, said Friday that "Americans deserve a labor secretary who understands that building a stronger economy means standing up for workers, not billionaires and giant corporations."
"We need a labor secretary who will protect workers' rights, help ensure everyone can have a secure retirement, make sure every worker gets paid the full paycheck they've earned, and that all workers are treated with dignity and respect. And as an original author of the PRO Act, I'm glad to see Rep. Chavez-DeRemer is a co-sponsor," she continued. "I look forward to carefully evaluating Rep. Chavez-DeRemer's qualifications leading up to her hearing and a thorough vetting process."
In a statement announcing the nominee, Trump said: "Lori has worked tirelessly with both Business and Labor to build America's workforce, and support the hardworking men and women of America. I look forward to working with her to create tremendous opportunity for American Workers, to expand Training and Apprenticeships, to grow wages and improve working conditions, to bring back our Manufacturing jobs."
"Together, we will achieve historic cooperation between Business and Labor that will restore the American Dream for Working Families," he added. "Lori's strong support from both the Business and Labor communities will ensure that the Labor Department can unite Americans of all backgrounds behind our Agenda for unprecedented National Success—Making America Richer, Wealthier, Stronger, and more Prosperous than ever before!"
Other key picks announced Friday included former Office of Budget and Management Director Russ Vought, a Project 2025 architect, to return as the agency's leader, and ex-professional football player Scott Turner of the Trump-allied America First Policy Institute to helm the Department of Housing and Urban Development.
Trump also chose billionaire hedge fund manager
Scott Bessent, who supports his tariff plan, to run the U.S. Treasury Department. That followed the president-elect naming billionaire Wall Street CEO Howard Lutnick as his nominee for commerce secretary, meaning he will lead tariff and trade policy.