Workday Magazine (https://workdaymagazine.org/category/policy/page/35/)
Top union leaders, headed by AFL-CIO President John J. Sweeney and Change To Win Chair Anna Burger, discussed health care and the Employee Free Choice Act in a 45-minute closed-door meeting with Democratic President Barack Obama on July 13.
Saying the nation’s 21-year-old plant closing law needs to be widened and toughened to account for changes in today’s economy, a bipartisan group of lawmakers introduced legislation in late June to do so.
Promising transparency in AFL-CIO affairs, pledging to fight to restore the middle class and vowing to listen to and heed grass-roots unionists, AFL-CIO Secretary-Treasurer Richard Trumka formally announced his candidacy for the labor federation’s presidency.
Now it’s official, as far as the labor-backed Economic Policy Institute is concerned: The present crash is the worst U.S. economic slump since the Great Depression. And that’s even before the June jobless numbers came out.
Minnesota’s new U.S. Senator, Al Franken, marked his first day in office Tuesday by signing on as a co-sponsor to a bill for the first time: the Employee Free Choice Act.
Minnesotans will gather at the steps of the State Capitol Wednesday at noon to congratulate Al Franken, Minnesota’s new U.S. Senator. People also will rally at noon at the Duluth Labor Center.
U.S. Senator Al Franken and his supporters gathered Wednesday on the steps of the state Capitol in St. Paul to celebrate the close of a difficult election process.
During the campaign, Minnesota’s newest U.S. Senator, Al Franken, said he would be an elected official in the tradition of the man who once held his seat, the late Paul Wellstone. It’s a commitment that America’s wage earners need him to keep.
Congressional supporters of the Employee Free Choice Act, trying to get the 60 senators they need to break a planned Republican-led filibuster, are discussing a compromise to replace a key provision – majority sign-up – with mail-in ballots in union recognition elections.
Citing what they call a lack of leadership in addressing the state’s struggling economy and budget crisis, Minnesota unions praised Gov. Tim Pawlenty’s announcement Tuesday that he won’t run for a third term.