Tag: unions

Ilhan Omar Tries to ‘Honor’ American Workers By Sharing a Goofy Photo of Herself Inside a Semi-Truck and It Blows Up in Her Face

Far-left Rep. Ilhan Omar (D-MN) got nuked in the social media comments after a pathetic attempt to pander to American workers on Labor Day.

In an effort to pretend to honor America’s workers, Omar shared a photo of herself inside a Teamsters Union semi-truck.

Considering how many foreign nationals have killed Americans while driving these vehicles, this was an interesting decision on her part.

“America is only as strong as the labor that builds it every day,” Omar wrote in the post accompanying the photo. “Happy Labor Day.”

Omar attempted to prevent a roasting by turning the comments off her post. But social media users still found a way to ensure she regretted posing for the image.

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Mamdani signs order on Labor Day creating ‘first-in-the-nation’ municipal office aimed at organizing NYC workers

New York City Mayor Zohran Mamdani signed an executive order creating the “first-in-the-nation” Mayor’s Office of Worker Power (MOWP).

Rolled out on Labor Day, the MOWP is aimed at organizing workers and connecting them with relevant resources, according to the mayor’s office.

“MOWP will work across City Hall and City agencies on outreach, education, policy, research and strategic partnerships focused on workers who lack meaningful benefits, adequate wages and a voice on the job,” read a Monday statement.

Per the mayor’s office, the MOWP will:

  • “Convene rank-and-file workers, union leaders, worker centers, immigrant workers, gig workers and platform workers.
  • Hold public hearings on significant worker issues.
  • Provide referrals to organizations that support workers.
  • Coordinate with City agencies to produce research on pressing issues facing workers.
  • Develop policy proposals informed by workers’ experiences.
  • Engage workers on emerging challenges, including new technologies, worker misclassification, immigration-based exploitation and climate risks to worker safety.
  • Connect workers with information about their rights at everyday touchpoints, including workforce centers, libraries, IDNYC offices, schools and community events.”

“We created the first-in-the-nation Office of Worker Power to put the full weight of City Hall behind the people who keep New York running,” Mamdani (D-N.Y.) posted to X on Monday.

The NYC mayor framed the history of Labor Day as stemming from a movement championed and furthered by democratic socialists to “win us weekends, safety standards, overtime pay, a minimum wage, and social security.”

In 1882, 10,000 workers marched up Broadway in the first-ever Labor Day parade. Led by democratic socialists and organized by New York’s unions, they rallied the movement that went o

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Woke Socialists’ Labor Rhetoric Falls Flat as Attendees of Socialism 2026 Conference Happily Enter Hotel Staffed by Union Workers Without a Contract

Socialists are all about “the worker,” right? That is what they spout again and again.  So the irony of what is happening at the Socialism 2026 conference being held this weekend in Chicago is rich and lays bare the labor rhetoric vs. how champagne socialists actually behave.

The communist, Mao Zedong-loving influencer Hasan Piker is a featured speaker at the event.

The gathering is endorsed by groups including the Democratic Socialists of America (DSA), Organized Communities Against Deportations, and the Black Rose Anarchist Federation.

While good little Bolsheviks entered the venue to plan the demise of the American way of life, they walked right into a hotel where union workers have been working without a contract since midnight on September 1.

The annual conference, sponsored by Haymarket Books and other co-sponsors, is a weekend full of Marxism, Palestine cheerleading, ICE bashing, climate handwringing, and, of course, performative conversations about the labor force. This year’s event is being held at the Hyatt Regency McCormick Place with about 2,600 registered.

The same weekend, UNITE HERE Local 1 hotel workers at 46 Chicago hotels, representing more than 7,000 people workers, have been working without a contract since midnight on September 1. The union marched on Michigan Avenue on September 2 and said they could strike at any time.

Holding a socialist conference inside a Hyatt, tied to Illinois Governor JB Pritzker’s (D) family during an active citywide hotel contract fight doesn’t say much about how seriously the socialists take their fight for worker’s rights.

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Entertainment unions intensify campaign for corporate tax handouts as film subsidy race to the bottom accelerates

The Entertainment Union Coalition (EUC), including the California IATSE Council, Directors Guild of America, LiUNA! Local 724, Teamsters Local 399, Writers Guild of America West, American Federation of Musicians Local 47, IBEW Local 40 and SAG-AFTRA, has mounted an aggressive campaign to pressure California lawmakers to expand and protect the state’s Film and Television Jobs Program 4.0.

After successfully lobbying for the program to more than double, from $330 million to $750 million annually, the coalition is now demanding that the subsidy be made uncapped and further “modernized.” Gov. Gavin Newsom has been a leading champion of the expansion, presenting the tax credits as a means of keeping production and jobs in California.

The immediate target of the unions’ campaign is SB 122, a sweeping budget measure backed by the Democratic establishment, including Newsom. The legislation extends California’s existing $5 million annual limitation on business tax credits through 2029. Beginning in 2030, it establishes a permanent limit of $5 million or 70 percent of a corporation’s tax liability, whichever is greater. Credits blocked by the limitation can be carried forward or, under specified conditions, made refundable.

The measure was driven by the state’s fiscal crisis and is aimed broadly at corporate tax credits, particularly credits that have allowed large corporations to accumulate enormous write-offs. Newsom and legislative Democrats have presented the limits as a way to protect state revenues and fund essential programs. Film and television production was not the principal target. Its tax credits were caught in the net of a broad fiscal measure.

This is precisely what makes the dispute politically revealing. The same Democratic establishment that expanded the film subsidy to $750 million is now imposing limits on corporate tax credits because the state cannot indefinitely finance the concessions demanded by competing industries. The contradiction is not an accident. It exposes the logic of a system in which governments compete to hand public resources to corporations while simultaneously confronting the fiscal consequences of that competition.

The EUC responds by demanding that film and television credits be exempted. Because the film program itself has a separate annual allocation, the coalition denounces the business-credit limitation as a “double cap” that will supposedly make California uncompetitive.

But this argument accepts the premise that has produced the crisis: that workers must compete against one another to persuade corporations where to invest.

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Trump DOJ Launches Grand Jury Investigation Into UAW President Shawn Fain – Allegedly Pressured Official to Secure Benefits for Fiancée and Sister

The Trump Justice Department has launched a federal grand jury investigation into United Auto Workers President Shawn Fain over serious allegations of abuse of power and self-dealing.

A grand jury has subpoenaed the UAW’s court-appointed monitor as part of the probe into claims that Fain pressured a high-ranking union official to secure benefits for his fiancée and her sister, CNBC reported.

The investigation follows a series of damning reports from the federal monitor documenting retaliation against top UAW leaders who pushed back on questionable spending decisions.

The culture of corruption has long plagued the United Auto Workers. Multiple former UAW presidents and top officials were convicted and sent to prison in one of the largest labor racketeering scandals in modern history, using members’ dues for luxury cars, golf trips, bribes, and personal enrichment.

The UAW was placed under a federal consent decree after the previous wave of corruption convictions. The monitor was supposed to clean house.

Shawn Fain ran for president as a so-called “reformer.” But the more things change at the UAW, the more they appear to stay the same.

The court-appointed monitor, Neil Barofsky, has repeatedly accused Fain of abusing his authority.

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Labor Union Leader: Execute Democrats Who Break with Graham Platner via Firing Squad

Andy O’Brien, the communications director for the Maine AFL-CIO, a statewide federation of 160 local unions, posted on social media, suggesting Democrats who refuse to support Democrat U.S. Senate nominee Graham Platner should face execution after a “revolution.”

O’Brien shared a link to a the Hill opinion piece titled, “I’m a Democratic Strategist. I Won’t Stay Silent About Graham Platner,” by Democrat strategist Laurie A. Watkins. Watkins wrote that a career spent fighting for Democratic causes does not mean blindly supporting every candidate with a “D” by their name.

O’Brien’s response was brutal, saying political consultants like Watkins would be “first up against the wall when the revolution comes.”

Before supporting Platner, O’Brien was known for publicly calling out people he accused of holding extremist or neo-Nazi views.

After facing backlash, O’Brien said the post was meant as a joke referencing a science fiction novel, not a call for violence. He apologized to anyone offended and said he never intended to suggest harming people over their political views.

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Are Unions And Public Schools Violating Election Laws/Ethics?

The Easton Gazette received an email regarding the political activities of the Worcester County Public Schools. The email included this letter from a resident of the county.

The letter alleges that the school placed or allowed campaign material connected to a candidate for county commissioner to be placed into teachers’ school mailboxes within Worcester County Public Schools. The materials allegedly urge teachers to support certain candidates including this candidate and others and also have instructions for changing party affiliation.

As the letter states, this action could possibly pressure public school employees to feel that they must support a candidate who was once a system employee. Also, public schools, along with other public institutions, are supposed to remain politically neutral. Certainly, public materials and time should not be spent on political campaigns. One of the documents references a “building rep” which most likely refers to a “union” rep.

Again, these are allegations. However, they do bring up some important questions.

What is the law in Maryland regarding using school communications to promote candidates?

Maryland law prohibits teachers’ unions and any other group from using public school communication systems to promote or oppose political candidates, because doing so constitutes political activity using government resources, which is barred under both state ethics rules as well as federal tax rules for labor organizations such as teacher’s unions

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CT AFL-CIO President Warns AI Could Be The ‘Nail In The Coffin’ For Democrats 

Organized labor has found its next target: artificial intelligence. 

At a June 1 trade roundtable hosted by U.S. Rep. Rosa DeLauro in New Haven, Connecticut labor leaders warned that AI threatens workers and demands new government “guardrails.” But the discussion revealed something beyond concern: unions want a hand in writing the rules for how employers use it. 

The event, held at the Manufacturing and Technical Community Hub (MATCH), brought together DeLauro, Wisconsin Congressman Mark Pocan, Connecticut labor leaders, manufacturers, state economic development officials and Public Citizen, a progressive advocacy group. The official topic was trade policy. Before long, the conversation shifted to artificial intelligence. 

Connecticut AFL-CIO President Ed Hawthorne framed the issue in pointed terms.

“If the Democratic Party does not get out ahead of AI, it’s when the Democratic Party dies,” he said. “It’ll be the nail in the coffin, because we are the party of the workers, and if we are going to just sit back and let the tech industry and their money buy elections and not push back on that, we will no longer be the party of the workers, and that’s when we lose.”

Hawthorne also described AI as “the new NAFTA,” a warning that artificial intelligence could displace workers in ways similar to past trade disruptions. Those concerns are not baseless. AI will disrupt labor markets. Some jobs will disappear, others will change, and new occupations will emerge. Few serious observers believe the economy will be left untouched. 

But Hawthorne’s sharpest warning was political rather than economic. He was not simply saying AI could eliminate jobs. He was saying that if Democrats fail to satisfy organized labor’s demands on AI, they forfeit their claim to be the party of workers. That is a different kind of argument, and worth noting as such. 

The real question is how policymakers respond. At the roundtable, the answer increasingly centered on one word: “guardrails.” 

Participants repeatedly called for guardrails around AI and automation. In practice, that meant stronger worker input requirements, advance notice when AI is used in employment decisions, human oversight, appeal rights, bias testing and an expanded government role in governing how AI systems are introduced in the workplace. 

Some of that is defensible. Few Americans want hiring decisions or workplace discipline delegated to opaque systems with no accountability. Protections against deceptive deepfakes and discriminatory bias deserve serious consideration. But the discussion ranged well beyond basic safeguards. It sounded less like a targeted debate over genuine AI risks and more like organized labor ensuring no major workplace technology advances without union-approved conditions attached. 

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Oregon’s Union Crackdown Spreads

The state of Oregon passed a law last year that should outrage every American who believes in the First Amendment.

Not because it bans speech outright. Not because it targets a newspaper or a broadcaster. Because it targets a letter. An email. A text message. A conversation telling public employees they have a constitutional right to opt out of their union.

That’s what Oregon made illegal.

The Freedom Foundation has been communicating with public employees for years. We do it because back in 2018 the U.S. Supreme Court affirmed in Janus v. AFSCME that every government employee has a constitutional right to decline union membership and dues — a right workers will never find out about if they’re waiting for their union to inform them of it.

Someone else, most likely the Freedom Foundation, has to do it for them.

Oregon’s HB 3789, which took effect Jan. 1, was written specifically to shut down our outreach activities in that state — and potentially others. Egged on by their union puppet masters, lawmakers in that state approved legislation threatening heavy financial penalties for what the law describes as impersonating a labor union.

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Labor group cancels Cesar Chavez events over ‘profoundly shocking’ new allegations

Cesar Chavez has been lauded by Mexican-Americans as an iconic labor leader who fought for farmworkers’ rights in the 1960s, but his legacy may be marred by growing allegations of “profoundly shocking” behavior.

Several celebrations of Cesar Chavez Day, which is observed March 31, have been canceled across the country by the United Farm Workers, an organization Chavez co-founded.

The union said in a letter Tuesday that the claims against Chavez were “incompatible” with the organization’s values.

“Some of the reports are family issues, and not our story to tell or our place to comment on,” the group said. “Far more troubling are allegations involving abuse of young women or minors. Allegations that very young women or girls may have been victimized are crushing. We have not received any direct reports, and we do not have any firsthand knowledge of these allegations.”

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