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Why I'm Answering the May Day Call to Action By Running for Congress
The workers of Uptown and The Bronx have been making the demand for a better life for over a century but Washington has ignored their demands for too long. I'm running to make sure it finally has an answer.
May 01, 2026
Uptown wakes up before the rest of New York even opens its eyes. Walk Broadway from 125th to 168th, up through Dyckman, as I have, and you'll see it: The bodega coffee grabbed on the run, the crosstown bus packed before dawn, people clocking into work while downtown is still asleep. These are the people who built our city. Not the CEOs, real estate developers, or the politicians who show up every two to four years with fliers and false promises. The movement fighting for their dignity has always lived here—on these buses and these street corners.
Every May 1, we honor them. May Day, or International Workers' Day, was created from needless state violence. In 1884, American workers went on strike to win an eight-hour workday. As the deadline approached, a protest in Chicago turned deadly, with police firing into the crowd and arresting seven workers who, after a sham trial, were executed. The bosses thought that would be the end of it. They were wrong. Workers fought for and won the right to an eight-hour workday.
Here in Harlem, Washington Heights, and Kingsbridge, May Day isn’t an abstract history lesson, it’s a mirror. This is a day to honor the transit workers, nurses, teachers, laborers, and caregivers who have always refused to accept less than they deserve and risked everything to fight for a better future for the next generation. They show us what's possible when working people come together, across generations, race, gender, and culture, and demand a dignified life.
May Day reminds us of something simple and profound: Uptown is a union town. It always has been.
I want to build power for the people on that crosstown bus before dawn who never get thanked for keeping our city running and are told to be grateful for what little they have.
New York, and Uptown especially, has become a stronghold of union power. It was in Harlem, during the Harlem Renaissance, that A. Philip Randolph founded the Brotherhood of Sleeping Car Porters—the first Black-led labor union in American history. It was in Washington Heights and Spanish Harlem where Dominican and Puerto Rican immigrant women transformed the garment industry, becoming so essential to the International Ladies' Garment Workers' Union that by the 1950s, the union published its paper, Justicia, entirely in Spanish. And it was in the Bronx that Ella Baker and Marvel Cooke exposed the Bronx Slave Market, where domestic workers, most of them Black women, were paid as little as 15 cents an hour and subjected to workplace harassment and abuse. Their conditions were so appalling that it sparked city-wide organizing to protect domestic workers. This is my community’s inheritance.
That tradition is still alive in our streets today. In January 2026, 70 years after 1199 Service Employees International Union's historic 46-day strike at Uptown hospitals, hundreds of unionized NY State Nurses Association (NYSNA) nurses walked off the job at NewYork-Presbyterian on 168th Street and at hospitals across our community. They stood on their picket lines from dawn to dusk, through a brutally cold January, fighting starvation wages and conditions so unsafe that patients were being put at risk. After 41 days of striking and organizing, they won. That's the Uptown way.
From the factory floor to the hospital room to the living room, Uptown is still at the center of the labor movement. I think about this legacy when people ask me why I'm running for Congress. The honest answer is: I'm not sure I had a choice.
When you grow up as the daughter of Dominican immigrants and watch your parents work multiple jobs and come home exhausted, see your neighbors get pushed out, watch politicians blame the vulnerable instead of the corporations robbing them blind, all while sending their tax dollars to drop bombs on babies, you organize and fight back. And eventually, the question stops being why run and starts being how could I not?
Congress was not built for us. It was built to manage us. It was built to keep our labor, our rent checks, and our votes flowing to people who have never had to choose between rent and groceries, all while allowing the people who are the foundation of our city to fall through the cracks. But here's what the establishment never understood about Uptown and The Bronx: We don't wait for permission.
That's the legacy I am fighting to protect in Congress. I am a proud card-carrying United Auto Workers member. I've picketed alongside NYSNA nurses on 168th Street and Mount Sinai Morningside. I've fought with Student Workers of Columbia to protect their peers from harassment by the university and Immigration and Customs Enforcement.
In Congress, I will fight to pass the PRO Act so every worker can organize without fear. I will push to fund public housing, cancel medical debt, and end the forever wars that drain our communities to pad the pockets of defense contractors. I want to build power for the people on that crosstown bus before dawn who never get thanked for keeping our city running and are told to be grateful for what little they have. They built New York and deserve everything it has to offer.
May Day is a call to action. The workers of Uptown and The Bronx have been making the demand for a better life for over a century but Washington has ignored their demands for too long. I'm running to make sure it finally has an answer.
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Unions Ready for 'Righteous Fight' as Sanders, Dems Reintroduce PRO Act
"We know it won't be easy," said the AFL-CIO president. "There's no fight more righteous than ensuring that every single worker who wants a union has a fair shot to join or form one."
Mar 05, 2025
As U.S. Sen. Bernie Sanders and Congressman Bobby Scott reintroduced the Richard L. Trumka Protecting the Right to Organize Act on Wednesday, labor union leaders prepared to fight for the legislation that would strengthen workers' rights.
While Sanders (I-Vt.) and Scott (D-Va.) have long led the battle for the bill on Capitol Hill, most Democrats in Congress—including both minority leaders—also support the PRO Act, which features a wide range of policies intended to hold companies accountable for violating employees' rights and make it easier for workers to form and negotiate with a union.
"Never before in the history of our nation have income and wealth inequality been greater than today. Workers are falling further and further behind. In response, millions of Americans have expressed their desire to join a union," Sanders said in a statement. "However, the billionaire class is fighting with all its might to put down attempts by workers to exercise their constitutional right to unionize."
The PRO Act's reintroduction comes as U.S. President Donald Trump and billionaire Elon Musk work to gut the federal government while congressional Republicans—who have narrow majorities in both chambers—work to cut healthcare and food assistance programs that serve working-class people to fund tax giveaways for the ultrawealthy and corporations.
"Congress has an urgent responsibility to ensure that workers can join a union and negotiate for higher pay, better benefits, and safer workplaces."
Sanders pointed to Trump's decision "to illegally fire National Labor Relations Board Member Gwynne Wilcox and effectively shut down the NLRB," and warned that "without a functioning NLRB, corporate bosses can illegally fire unionizing workers, flagrantly violate labor laws and render free and fair union elections near impossible."
"Supporting the immediate reinstatement of Member Wilcox and the swift passage of the PRO Act would be major steps toward building real worker power," added the senator, who is the ranking member of the Senate Committee on Health, Education, Labor, and Pensions. "The PRO Act is long overdue and I am proud to be introducing this bill."
Scott also framed the bill as a necessity, saying that "unions are essential for building a strong middle class and improving the lives of workers and families. Regrettably, for too long, workers have suffered from anti-union attacks and toothless labor laws that undermined their right to form a union."
"As union approval remains at record highs, Congress has an urgent responsibility to ensure that workers can join a union and negotiate for higher pay, better benefits, and safer workplaces," he argued. "The PRO Act is the most critical step Congress can take to uplift American workers. I urge my House and Senate colleagues on both sides of the aisle to join me in advancing the most significant update for workers' labor organizing rights in over 80 years."
Labor leaders also called on members of Congress across the political spectrum to back the bill—which largely lacks GOP support, but is co-sponsored by Rep. Brian Fitzpatrick (R-Pa.).
"In too many workplaces, in too many industries across the country, big corporations and billionaire CEOs still retaliate against us for organizing," said AFL-CIO president Liz Shuler, who has led the federation since the bill's namesake, Trumka, died in 2021.
"They refuse to negotiate our contracts, force us to sit through hours of anti-union propaganda and engage in illegal union-busting every day," she said of companies and executives. "Now they have an unelected, unaccountable union-buster trying to illegally fire tens of thousands of our fellow workers in federal jobs and an administration rolling back the workplace protections."
Shuler added that "we know it won't be easy, but the labor movement never backs down from a righteous fight. And in today's economy, where our workers' hard-earned paychecks are covering less of what they need while still facing unsafe conditions and a lack of respect on the job, there's no fight more righteous than ensuring that every single worker who wants a union has a fair shot to join or form one."
American Federation of State, County, and Municipal Employees president Lee Saunders reiterated AFSCME's support for the legislation on Wednesday, calling out billionaires and big business for "anti-union extremism" that "is deepening economic inequality, halting progress on health and safety, and harming millions."
"The PRO Act will loosen billionaires' grip on our economic future and make clear that their days of using illegal union busting tactics without consequence are over," he said. "This legislation will level the playing field, giving workers the legal protections they need to organize without fear of retaliation or obstruction. It's about time Congress prioritized workers over billionaires and gave them a fair shot at improving their workplaces."
Other groups that support the PRO Act include the American Federation of Teachers, Communications Workers of America, International Association of Machinists and Aerospace Workers, International Brotherhood of Electrical Workers, National Nurses United, Service Employees International Union, United Autoworkers, and United Steelworkers, among others.
The right to a union means fair wages, benefits, and security—but corporate greed stands in the way," the Laborers' International Union of North America said on social media Wednesday. "The PRO Act fights back! Congress must choose: Stand with working people or bow to Wall Street. The time is now!"
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Trump Set to Install Anti-Union Attack Dog as Director of Key Labor Office
One watchdog group warned that Elisabeth Messenger is "a real ideologue" whose selection underscores the Trump administration's hostility to organized labor.
Mar 04, 2025
U.S. President Donald Trump is reportedly expected to pick the former head of an anti-union organization that supports so-called "right-to-work" laws to lead a key office within the Department of Labor, where the administration is working to gut enforcement efforts against lawbreaking employers.
Citing two unnamed sources, HuffPost reported Monday that Elisabeth Messenger, former CEO of Americans for Fair Treatment (AFFT), is set to become director of the Office of Labor-Management Standards (OLMS), whose purpose is to promote "labor-management transparency by making available reports showing unions' financial condition and employers' expenditures for their activities in persuading workers during union organizing campaigns."
HuffPost noted that "as the head of OLMS, Messenger would be charged with making sure unions, as well as anti-union consultants, make lawful disclosures to the government about their work."
Bob Funk, director of the watchdog group LaborLab, told HuffPost that Messenger is "a real ideologue" and her selection signals that the Trump administration will likely "go after not just public-sector unions but worker centers, too."
The outlet observed that AFFT "promotes right-to-work laws and advises public-sector workers like teachers on how to opt out of paying union dues."
Elisabeth Messenger, former CEO of the anti-union group "Americans for Fair Treatment," will be tasked with making sure anti-union consultants disclose their work.
[image or embed]
— LaborLab (@laborlab.bsky.social) March 3, 2025 at 4:59 PM
After posturing as a champion of American workers on the campaign trail, Trump kicked off his second White House term with what one observer described as "rapid-fire anti-worker actions," including mass firings of federal employees and the termination of key labor officials.
One of the fired officials, former National Labor Relations Board Chair Gwynne Wilcox, is suing Trump in federal court arguing her termination was illegal.
News that Trump is poised to install Messenger at the helm of OLMS comes roughly two weeks after former Rep. Lori Chavez-DeRemer (R-Ore.), the president's pick to lead the Labor Department, vowed during her Senate confirmation hearing to defend "right-to-work laws" and said she no longer supports pro-union legislation that would dramatically weaken them.
That legislation, the Protecting the Right to Organize (PRO) Act, is set to be reintroduced Tuesday by Sen. Bernie Sanders (I-Vt.), a group of congressional Democrats, and Rep. Brian Fitzpatrick (R-Pa.).
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'Let's Bring in the Real Secretary': Sanders Wants Elon Musk to Appear for Senate Hearing
"Let us understand that reality and not play along with this charade," the Senate HELP committee ranking member said before a vote on the labor secretary nominee.
Feb 27, 2025
U.S. Sen. Bernie Sanders on Thursday urged colleagues to reject Lori Chavez-DeRemer, President Donald Trump's nominee for labor secretary, and hold hearings to examine Department of Government Efficiency chief Elon Musk's outsized role in the Republican president's administration.
Chavez-DeRemer, a former GOP U.S. congresswoman from Oregon was
approved by a 14-9 Senate vote by members of the Senate Health, Education, Labor and Pensions (HELP) Committee.
"Let us understand that reality and not play along with this charade," said Sanders (I-Vt.), the ranking HELP member.
Sanders used the occasion of the panel's vote, however, to make the broader point about key members of Trump's cabinet and the absurdity of the amount of power that has been bestowed on Musk.
"Today, we are not voting on who the next secretary of labor is," Sanders said. "The next secretary of labor, the next secretary of education, the next secretary of housing, the next secretary of the treasury is Elon Musk. Let us understand that reality and not play along with this charade."
Sanders continued:
We have a situation where people all over this country understand that joining a trade union is a way to get better wages and working conditions. Millions of workers all over this country say, "I want to join a union." And yet we have large corporations acting illegally to deny workers the right to join unions, which is why one of my major priorities and the priority of many members on this side of the aisle is to pass the :[Richard L. Trumka] Protecting the Right to Organize PRO Act.
Last year, Sanders led the reintroduction of the PRO Act, legislation which would give unionswhich would, give unions and employers the ability to override state-level so-called "right to work" laws, enhance strike protections, ban anti-union "captive audience" meetings, and empower the National Labor Relations Board to impose monetary penalties on companies that violate workers' rights.
"Today, tens of millions of American workers are earning starvation wages, $12, $13 an hour," Sanders noted. "Nobody in any part of this country can survive on $12, $13 dollars an hour. And yet the minimum wage—the federal minimum wage of $7.25—has not been raised in a very, very long time."
"So what we need is a secretary of labor who is going to stand up and say we are going to take on powerful special interests," the senator continued. "We are going to stand with the working class of this country. Unfortunately... Chavez-DeRemer is not that person."
"Just yesterday, the president held a meeting with his cabinet," Sanders noted. "And who was the star of the meeting? Was it the secretary of the defense? Was it secretary of state? No, it was an unelected official who happens to be the wealthiest person on Earth. It was Elon Musk."
"If any cabinet official has courage to stand up to Mr. Musk and disobey his edicts, they are gone," the senator added. "So... my request to you is a simple one. Let's be honest. The American people understand it, and it’s time that we understood it as well."
"If you want to discuss policies in the Department of Labor," Sanders said, "let's bring in the real secretary. Mr. Chairman, I respectfully request that this committee bring Elon Musk before this committee so that we can really hear what's going on with the government."
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Trump Labor Secretary Pick Vows to Defend Anti-Union 'Right-to-Work' Laws
"How very not pro-worker of you," the Philadelphia Council AFL-CIO said in response to Lori Chavez-DeRemer's remarks.
Feb 19, 2025
U.S. President Donald Trump's pick to lead the Department of Labor made clear during her Senate confirmation hearing on Wednesday that she no longer supports legislation known as the PRO Act, which would bolster worker organizing and dramatically weaken anti-union "right-to-work" laws currently in place in over two dozen states.
Asked by Sen. Rand Paul (R-Ky.) whether she still supports the Protecting the Right to Organize Act—a bill she co-sponsored while in Congress—former Rep. Lori Chavez-DeRemer (R-Ore.) said she signed onto the bill because she "wanted to be at that table," not because she was fully supportive of its provisions.
Chavez-DeRemer answered "yes" when Paul—the lead sponsor of the National Right to Work Act—specifically asked her to confirm that she no longer supports "the aspect of the PRO Act that would have overturned state right-to-work laws."
"The right to work is a fundamental tenet of labor laws, where states have a right to choose if they want to be a right-to-work states," said Chavez-DeRemer.
"How very not pro-worker of you, Lori," the Philadelphia Council AFL-CIO wrote in response.
Watch the exchange:
Rand Paul: "You no longer support the aspect of the PRO Act that would have overturned state right to work laws?"
Trump Labor Secretary Nominee Lori Chavez-DeRemer: "Yes, sir." pic.twitter.com/L5v9StcEhD
— More Perfect Union (@MorePerfectUS) February 19, 2025
In so-called right-to-work (RTW) states, employees in unionized workplaces can opt out of paying union dues while still benefiting from the union's collective bargaining efforts.
An Economic Policy Institute study published last year found that RTW states "have lower unionization rates, wages, and benefits compared with non-RTW states."
"RTW laws are designed to diminish workers' collective power by prohibiting unions and employers from negotiating union security agreements into collective bargaining agreements, making it harder for workers to form, join, and sustain unions," the study noted. "Consequently, workers in states with RTW laws have lower wages, reduced access to health and retirement benefits, and higher workplace fatality rates. On average, workers in RTW states are paid 3.2% less than workers with similar characteristics in non-RTW states, which translates to $1,670 less per year for a full-time worker."
In her opening remarks to the Senate Health, Education, Labor, and Pensions Committee on Wednesday, Chavez-DeRemer said her job if confirmed "will be to implement President Trump's policy vision"—which has thus far been glaringly anti-worker.
"In his first few weeks back in office, Trump fired the [National Labor Relations Board's] acting chairperson, leaving the board without a quorum to enforce laws that protect workers' right to unionize," Steven Greenhouse, a senior fellow at The Century Foundation, wrote Tuesday. "Trump has designated [Elon] Musk, a vehemently anti-union billionaire, to launch an all-out war against the federal bureaucracy and workforce, and Trump and Musk have essentially treated the nation's 2 million-plus federal employees as if they were disposable, low-quality widgets."
Trump also removed former NLRB General Counsel Jennifer Abruzzo, who was strongly pro-labor. The president's acting replacement has moved quickly to roll back NLRB guidance issued during Abruzzo's tenure, including a memo declaring that anti-union "captive audience meetings" amount to an "unlawful threat" aimed at deterring union organizing.
During Wednesday's hearing, Sen. Bernie Sanders (I-Vt.) raised Trump's termination of former NLRB member Gwynne Wilcox, who argues her dismissal was illegal and is suing Trump in federal court.
Sanders said he also views Wilcox's firing as unlawful and asked Chavez-DeRemer if she agrees.
In response, Chavez-DeRemer said that Trump "has a right to exercise his executive power."
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Over $1.5 Billion in Workers' Stolen Wages Recovered From 2021-23
"Workers who can least afford to bear the cost of lost earnings—particularly low-wage workers—are disproportionately vulnerable to wage violations," according to Economic Policy Institute researchers.
Dec 23, 2024
A report published Friday by the progressive-leaning think tank the Economic Policy Institute found that federal, state, and local efforts were able to recover more than $1.5 billion in stolen wages between 2021 and 2023.
Wage theft, which includes things like paying workers less than the legal minimum wage or denying workers their legal meal breaks, "is pervasive across all industries and income levels," according to the report's authors, "but workers who can least afford to bear the cost of lost earnings—particularly low-wage workers—are disproportionately vulnerable to wage violations."
Wage theft is extremely costly to workers. Prior research cited by the EPI report estimates that workers lose $15 billion annually from minimum wage violations alone. For comparison, FBI data shows that robberies accounted for $598 million in losses in 2018, and $482 million the year after, so less than $2 billion over a two-year period, according to the report.
Action at multiple levels of government can help recover what's lost. At the federal level, the Department of Labor's Wage and Hour Division reports that it recovered $659.8 million between 2021 and 2023, which comes out to wage recovery for 510,534 workers, and an average of $1,292 in recovered wages per worker.
As an example of this kind of enforcement effort, the authors recounted that the Department of Labor (DOL) went after four Los Angeles sewing contractors, which yielded $1.1 million in back wages and damages for over 160 garment workers.
Meanwhile, at the state level, 34 departments of labor and attorneys general recovered a total of $203.3 million over those three years. The other 16 states either did not respond, did not have the requested data, or could not provide the requested data.
Class action settlements are another important avenue for wage recovery. According to the authors, the value of the top ten wage and hour class action settlements tallied $641.3 million in 2021—putting it on par with the DOL wage recovery for the full 2021-2023 period. The report, which includes class action settlement research done by the firm Seyfarth Shaw LLP, does not include class action data for 2022 and 2023.
"This class action data illustrates that workers are more effective in recovering stolen wages on a collective versus individual basis. However, many workers are barred from joining class action cases, because they are subject to forced arbitration agreements," the authors wrote.
When it comes to policy solutions, the authors noted that there have been a number of positive enforcement changes at the state level. For example, "many states have strengthened penalties for wage theft violations, enforcing them as criminal statutes" while some have "established laws allowing victims of wage theft to obtain a lien on employer property to ensure payment of back pay."
At the federal level, the authors advocated for increased funding for DOL’s Wage and Hour Division in order to boost enforcement efforts. The division has not seen a significant funding increase in over a decade, they wrote. The authors also argue in favor of a number of pieces of legislation, including the Wage Theft Prevention and Wage Recovery Act and the Protecting Right to Organize (PRO) Act—which would strengthen the right of private sector workers to unionize and collectively bargain.
While many in the labor movement expect U.S. President-elect Donald Trump to advance an anti-worker agenda, his pick to head the Department of Labor was met with cautious optimism by some corners of the labor world. Trump tapped Rep. Lori Chavez-DeRemer (R-Ore.) for the role. She co-sponsored the PRO Act in 2023—though at least one critic called this move "mostly symbolic."
In response to the news that Trump had picked Chavez-DeRemer, EPI's Celine McNicholas wrote in November that if workers truly have an ally in her, she "will advance policies that improve workers' lives."
According to McNicholas, those include funding the Department of Labor and protecting workers' overtime pay—as well as refusing to reinstitute the Payroll Audit Independent Determination program that was instituted during the first Trump administration, which mandated that if "if an employer proactively notified DOL of the failure to pay minimum wage or overtime or for taking illegal deductions from workers' paychecks, then DOL waived all penalties and liquidated damages," according to McNicholas.
The program "essentially permits employers who have stolen workers' wages to confess and get out of jail free," she wrote.
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5 Ways Trump's Labor Secretary Pick Can Prove She's Really Pro-Worker
If workers truly have an ally in Rep. Lori Chavez-DeRemer (R-Ore.), she will advance policies that improve workers’ lives.
Nov 27, 2024
President-elect Donald Trump recently announced his nomination of Oregon Rep. Lori Chavez-DeRemer to serve as secretary of labor.
She is one of only three House Republicans to cosponsor the Protecting the Right to Organize (PRO) Act and one of only eight Republicans to cosponsor the Public Service Freedom to Negotiate Act. Both bills would help reform our nation’s badly broken system of labor law. While Rep. Chavez-DeRemer’s support for these needed reforms is encouraging, if confirmed, she will be secretary of labor for a president who steadfastly pursued an ambitious anti-worker agenda during his first term in office.
Chavez-DeRemer has stated that “working-class Americans finally have a lifeline” with President-elect Trump in the White House. If workers truly have an ally in Chavez-DeRemer, she will advance policies that improve workers’ lives. Here are a few policies that will reveal whether the second Trump administration will actually aid working-class Americans or be a continuation of his first administration’s agenda attacking workers’ rights.
If confirmed as secretary of labor, Chavez-DeRemer should not follow the playbook of Trump’s first administration that used populist pro-worker rhetoric while advancing an anti-worker agenda that proved deeply harmful to U.S. workers.
Win funding for the Department of Labor (DOL) that enables the agency to serve the U.S. workforce: DOL and other worker protection agencies have been chronically underfunded. As the workforce has grown, the budgets of these agencies have shrunk, leaving workers without effective enforcement of basic minimum wage and overtime and health and safety protections. Chavez-DeRemer should fight for and secure at least a $14 billion budget to ensure that U.S. workers have health and safety inspectors and wage and hour investigators on the job to enforce their rights.
Protect workers’ overtime: Overtime pay ensures that most workers who put in more than 40 hours a week get paid 1.5 times their regular pay for the extra hours they work. Most hourly workers are guaranteed the right to overtime pay, while salaried workers’ eligibility is based on their pay and the nature of their duties. DOL recently issued a rule to raise the pay threshold for salaried workers to be eligible for overtime, which stands to benefit 4.3 million workers. Despite this benefit to U.S. workers, corporate interest groups and conservative states challenged the rule in court. Chavez-DeRemer should fight for workers’ right to overtime and continue to defend this rule in litigation. She should not allow the Trump administration to, once again, institute a low-salary threshold for overtime eligibility that leaves millions of workers without these protections and forced to work long hours for no additional pay.
Refuse to reinstitute the Payroll Audit Independent Determination program: This program was instituted during Trump’s first administration and essentially permits employers who have stolen workers’ wages to confess and get out of jail free. If an employer proactively notified DOL of the failure to pay minimum wage or overtime or for taking illegal deductions from workers’ paychecks, then DOL waived all penalties and liquidated damages. Wage theft is rampant, costing U.S. workers as much as $50 billion each year. Any program that makes it easier and less costly for employers to steal workers’ wages is a program that hurts U.S. workers and their wages. Chavez-DeRemer should make it harder for employers to steal workers’ wages, not easier.
Promote policies to protect workers’ health and safety: DOL’s Occupational Safety and Health Administration (OSHA) is responsible for ensuring U.S. workers are safe on the job. Still, 344 workers die each day from hazardous working conditions. Under the prior Trump administration, OSHA scaled back safety inspections. Chavez-DeRemer should ensure that OSHA does not repeat this under her watch and instead expands inspections to ensure that all workers have a safe workplace. Further, she should fight to protect safety standards like the recently proposed standard protecting workers from extreme heat. Workers’ health and safety must be a priority for any secretary of labor and administration claiming to be pro-worker.
Hold employers accountable for exploiting workers: Some employers use workers’ immigration status as leverage to exploit workers, threatening them with deportation if they report violations of labor and employment laws. For workers in labor disputes, the current administration granted deferred action, which is a determination to defer removal (deportation) of an individual from the U.S. In order to qualify for deferred action, a worker’s employer must be the subject of an open investigation at a labor agency, like DOL, and the labor agency conducting the investigation must submit a letter supporting deferred action to the Department of Homeland Security which oversees the program. Deferred action helps hold lawbreaking employers accountable, and Chavez-DeRemer should continue to support this for workers whose employers are being investigated for violating the law. If she is confirmed, she should fight to ensure the Trump administration provides deferred action for workers whose rights have been violated and should work to issue letters in support of deferred action for eligible workers.
These are just a few actions Chavez-DeRemer could take to demonstrate her commitment to workers. If confirmed as secretary of labor, Chavez-DeRemer should not follow the playbook of Trump’s first administration that used populist pro-worker rhetoric while advancing an anti-worker agenda that proved deeply harmful to U.S. workers.
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Unions Note Chavez-DeRemer's Record, 'But Donald Trump Is the President-Elect'
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."
Nov 23, 2024
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, told Bloomberg 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 Gurley described 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.
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Teamsters Decline to Endorse in 2024 US Presidential Race
"The vice president's strong union record is why Teamsters locals across the country have already endorsed her—alongside the overwhelming majority of organized labor," said a spokesperson for Vice President Kamala Harris.
Sep 18, 2024
For the first time in decades—and in a break with other major unions and many of its own local bargaining units—the International Brotherhood of Teamsters on Wednesday announced it would not endorse a candidate in the U.S. presidential election.
The union's decision came two months after its general president, Sean O'Brien was widely criticized by labor proponents for speaking at the Republican National Convention, with advocates noting that GOP candidate Donald Trump had spent his presidential term from 2017-21 appointing anti-union federal judges and key agency leaders, undermining collective bargaining rights, and making it harder for workers to hold their employers accountable for unfair labor practices.
The Teamsters General Executive Board said its 1.3 million members had expressed no majority support for Vice President Kamala Harris and no universal support for Trump.
Prior to President Joe Biden's announcement in July that he was stepping aside in the presidential race and endorsing Harris, the Teamsters' rank-and-file members had backed Biden over Trump, 44.3% to 36.3%.
Harris met with the union's leadership earlier this week, reminding officials that Trump had named anti-union members to the National Labor Relations Board, while the vice president had cast the Senate's tie-breaking vote on the American Rescue Plan, which shored up the Teamsters pension fund with $35.6 billion. She also pointed to Trump's comments in an interview with billionaire Tesla founder Elon Musk that striking workers should be fired.
"Listen to the guy when he's told you who he is," she reportedly told union leaders.
O'Brien said Wednesday that the union "sought commitments from both Trump and Harris not to interfere in critical union campaigns or core Teamsters industries—and to honor our members' right to strike—but were unable to secure those pledges."
The union objected to Harris "not preemptively saying the White House would play no role in settling the Teamsters' dispute with [the United Postal Service]," according to The New York Times.
But a number of union locals and the Teamsters National Black Caucus endorsed Harris before the union's announcement Wednesday, and the California Teamsters Public Affairs Council announced its support for the vice president shortly afterwards.
"The 250,000 who work across California are fundamental to the American economy, not only producing and transporting goods, but also providing essential services throughout the private and public sectors," said Joint Council 42 president Chris Griswold. "They deserve an administration that will put working people first."
Harris has won endorsements from the United Auto Workers, the Communications Workers of America, the American Federation of Labor and Congress of Industrial Organizations, and other key unions.
"The vice president's strong union record is why Teamsters locals across the country have already endorsed her—alongside the overwhelming majority of organized labor," Harris campaign spokesperson Lauren Hitt said Wednesday. "She will look out for the Teamsters rank-and-file no matter what—because they always have been and always will be the people she fights for."
John Palmer, a vice president at large for the union and member of its executive board, acknowledged that Harris had sent that message in her meeting with the Teamsters this week, telling the Times that she said, "I want your endorsement, but if I don't get it, I will treat you exactly as if I had gotten your endorsement."
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Trade Unionism vs. the Oligarchy on Labor Day and Every Day
The working people of our country are increasingly aware of the unprecedented level of corporate greed and power we are now experiencing, and the outrageous level of income and wealth inequality that exists.
Sep 02, 2024
As we celebrate Labor Day, 2024, there is some very good news.
Public approval of labor unions, at 70%, is higher today than it has been in decades. Over the last year major unions like the UAW have won some highly publicized strikes, while many other unions have negotiated trail-blazing contracts for their members. Young people at Starbucks and on college campuses are now more involved in labor organizing than ever before. And, for the first time in American history, a president of the United States, Joe Biden, walked a picket line with striking workers.
It is not an accident as to why we are now seeing more militancy and growth in the labor movement. The working people of our country are increasingly aware of the unprecedented level of corporate greed and power we are now experiencing, and the outrageous level of income and wealth inequality that exists. They understand that never before in American history have so few had so much, while so many continue to struggle. And they are fighting back. They know that workers in unions can negotiate contracts that give them better wages, working conditions and benefits than non-union workers. They appreciate that when you’re in a union you have some power against the arbitrary decisions corporate bosses.
On this Labor Day, let us redouble our efforts to grow trade unionism in America and create the kind of grassroots movement we need to take on the power of the Oligarchy.
Working people today are more than aware that, over the last 50 years, there has been a massive transfer of wealth from the bottom 90% to the top 1%. They are disgusted that, despite huge increases in worker productivity, real inflation-accounted for wages for the average American worker are lower now than they were over 50 years ago as 60% of Americans live paycheck to paycheck. They are insulted that CEOs of major corporations make almost 350 times as much as their average employee. They are concerned that the American dream is ending and that their kids may have an even lower standard of living than they do. And they worry that with the rapid growth of Artificial Intelligence and robotics, they have no power as to what will happen to their jobs as the economy undergoes major transformations.
The average American worker also understands that his/her political power has been significantly diminished as billionaires pour huge amounts of money into both political parties as they undermine our democracy. It is no great secret as to who now has the clout in Congress. It is the billionaires, the corporate CEOs, the campaign donors and their well-connected lobbyists.
Bottom line: The average American worker is sick and tired of status quo economics and politics. He/she knows that in the richest country on earth we can and should have an economy and political system that works for all, and not just the wealthy few, and that a strong union movement is the vehicle for bringing about the changes that we need.
On this Labor Day, as we reaffirm our support for the trade union movement and for labor solidarity throughout the world, as we continue to fight the day to day struggles against corporate greed, it’s important that we not lose sight of our vision for the future and what kind of country we want to become. Here, in my view, are just a few components of the agenda we need to fight for.
We must establish a vibrant democratic political system. One person, one vote. We must end the disastrous Citizens United Supreme Court decision and the billionaire funding of campaigns through super-PACs. We need to move to the public funding of elections and give political power back to ordinary Americans.
We need to pass the PRO Act and end the ability of companies to illegally intimidate and fire workers who want to join a union. Corporate interests spend an estimated $400 million a year on anti-union consultants who do everything possible, legal and illegal, to fight the right of workers to join unions.
We need to end starvation wages in America and raise the $7.25 an hour federal minimum wage to a living wage. People should not have to work two or three jobs just to pay the bills for their families.
We need trade policies that benefit workers in the U.S. and abroad, not just the CEOs and stockholders of major conglomerates. We need to rebuild our manufacturing sector and create good paying jobs here.
We need to join the rest of the industrialized world and guarantee health care to all people as a human right through a Medicare for All, single payer system. No one should go bankrupt because of a hospital stay. Everyone in America, regardless of income, should have the right to see a doctor.
We must finally guarantee paid family and medical leave to every worker in America. New moms and dads should be able to spend the first few months after delivery with their newborn child. Family members should be able to care for a loved-one who is sick without having to worry about missing a paycheck.
Like health care, education and job training must be considered a human right from childcare to graduate school. At a time when, in a highly competitive global economy, we need the best-educated workforce in the world, no one should be forced to go deeply in debt to get the education and training they need to be productive members of our society.
At a time when 50% of older workers have nothing in the bank for retirement, and 25% of seniors are trying to live on $15,000 a year or less, we must re-establish Defined Benefit Pension plans and increase Social Security benefits. Workers are entitled to a secure and dignified retirement.
And finally, we must address the unprecedented and outrageous level of income and wealth inequality that currently exists. No. It is not acceptable that three multibillionaires own more wealth than the bottom half of American society. It is not acceptable that many billionaires pay an effective tax rate that is lower than truck drivers or nurses. We need a progressive tax system that demands that the wealthiest people in our country finally start paying their fair share of taxes.
Let’s be clear. None of these progressive concepts are “radical.” While they are opposed by the Big Money interests and marginalized by the corporate media and the political establishment, they are strongly supported by a majority of the American people. Most of these ideas, in one form or another, are already in place in other wealthy countries around the world.
So, on this Labor Day, let us redouble our efforts to grow trade unionism in America and create the kind of grassroots movement we need to take on the power of the Oligarchy. Let us, in the wealthiest nation in the history of the world, create an economy that provides a decent standard of living for all, and not just massive and obscene income and wealth inequality.
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