Free Republic

Elizabeth Warren has a plan — to annoy union members who work for state and local governments. With her “Medicare for All” plan, the top-tier Democratic contender is revealing a tension in the neo-progressive movement. Warren’s $20.5 trillion over a decade to pay for Medicare for All requires what she calls a “redirection” in funds: $6 trillion in “existing state- and local-government insurance spending.” Of this figure, $3.3 trillion goes for Medicaid, public insurance for poorer people. But the other $2.7 trillion comes from the funds state and local governments “currently spend on employer contributions to private insurance premiums for...

It was revealed in 2004 that in the week prior to Election Day in the 1972 United States Senate election in Delaware, an unidentified representative of the Biden campaign (described as the campaign's legal counsel) approached Teamsters Local 326 President - and Mafia hitman - Frank Sheeran about preventing the distribution of the Wilmington News Journal because Sen. Boggs was running an advertisement unflattering to Biden. In exchange for undisclosed considerations and because Sheeran felt "Biden was better for labor anyway," the Teamsters Union organized a strike preventing the newspapers from being delivered. Additionally a shipment of newspaper printing materials...

Nearly 80,000 Californians collected six-figure taxpayer-funded pensions in 2018, as retirement costs leave half the state's cities at "high risk" of serious financial distress, according to an analysis. Transparent California, a free-market think tank, found that 6 percent of retired government workers collected more than $100,000 in 2018, an 85 percent jump since 2013. Those payouts represented 20 percent of the $51.7 billion in total pension payments. Taxpayers spent a record-high $40 billion to cover the costs of public sector retirees in 2018, the report also found. The median household income in California is $75,277. The six-figure payouts propel thousands...

A story was published in Bloomberg News earlier this week that includes statements by several former AFGE staff and officers alleging misconduct by National President Cox. AFGE respects all of its employees and takes the allegations that have appeared in the press very seriously. These allegations, if true, are abhorrent to all of us and contrary to AFGE’s mission and values.When AFGE learned of the new allegations contained in the article, the Federation took immediate action. President Cox was informed of the allegations, and he immediately authorized an investigation, from which he simultaneously recused himself. In accordance with the AFGE...

United Auto Workers President Gary Jones is going on leave amid a federal probe into corruption at the top of the union. Jones “has asked for a leave of absence,” the union, known as UAW, said in a statement on Saturday.

When San Francisco Fire Chief Joanne Hayes-White retired after 15 years leading the department, she joined the ranks of a growing financial elite — the 139 former city workers collecting pensions of more than $200,000 a year. Most are former police and firefighter brass, and some are making more in retirement than they did when working. And it’s not only in San Francisco. Hayes-White is receiving a pension of $311,560 a year, with cost of living increases of 2% or more each year. “To put these high pensions into perspective, a guaranteed $200,000 annual pension for 25 years would require...

The de Blasio administration has agreed to add 250 miles of protected bike lanes after a dramatic surge in cyclist deaths. The mayor got behind City Council Speaker Corey Johnson's $1.7 billion proposal to remake the streets in an effort to, “break the car culture in New York,” as Johnson often puts it. Twenty five people have died this year riding bicycles, compared to 10 in all of last year despite the mayor's safe streets agenda, which is called Vision Zero. Bicycle advocates have been demanding the city take new action, especially as traffic increases from e-hailed vehicles and on-demand...

Legislation from Sens. Blackburn and Howley “is a solution in search of a problem,” union president says WASHINGTON – American Federation of Government Employees National President J. David Cox Sr. issued the following statement in response to legislation introduced by Sens. Marsha Blackburn and Josh Hawley that would relocate the headquarters of major federal agencies outside Washington, D.C.: “Eighty-five percent of federal employees already live outside the nation’s capital – caring for veterans, supporting our military, processing Social Security and other federal benefits, and carrying out other vital work serving citizens across the country. It is neither cost-effective nor practical...

Ever since the dawn of the age of unions, it has been a given that, even if society allows the concept of strikes against private business, it is illogical to allow striking against the government. Government employers are special cases, with monopoly status, providing necessary services (at least in theory). Everyone knows you cannot allow employees of the military, the police, the fire stations, the schools, the gas and electric utilities, etc. to strike. Society simply is no longer civilized, after awhile without these building blocks of a safe and civil society. And even so, some states do foolishly, self-destructively,...

The International Federation of Professional Technical Engineers, a union which represents more than 80,000 workers in the private and public sector, slammed President Donald J. Trump's reported potential choice to lead the Department of Homeland Security, Chad Wolf. Wolf, the group asserts "is an unqualified flack for big business who has a terrible track record of putting corporate interests ahead of the needs of American workers."In a statement sent to Townhall, IFPTE argued that Wolf "has no problem separating U.S. workers from secure and good-paying employment and driving down wages for U.S. engineers and other skilled workers" because of his...

Members of the Chicago chapter of the Democratic Socialists of America met Sunday morning to coordinate efforts to assist the Chicago teachers and school support staff whose concurrent strikes are likely to stretch into a second week. The group, commonly known as Chicago DSA, has remained on the front lines of the strike that now threatens to cancel a third day of classes for Chicago Public Schools students. During Sunday’s meeting at Chicago DSA’s modest Logan Square headquarters, about a dozen members of the chapter were preparing to curry public support by canvassing a series of brunch spots around Mayor...

In an apparent pandering competition to win the favor of union voters, Democratic presidential candidates used the Ohio debate stage to blast General Motors on Tuesday night, blaming the automaker for the month-long strike with the United Auto Workers union.On the morning of the debate, reports had broken that GM and UAW leadership had reached a tentative agreement to end the month-long strike that impacted some 175,000 workers and cost GM roughly $1.2 billion. But reports of a possible end to the strike didn’t prevent Democratic candidates from forgoing their chance to bash the corporation and virtue-signal their support for...

East St. Louis is short $9.5 million between a budget deficit and back payments owed to its fire and police pensions. As a result, city leaders are closing a firehouse and laying off nine firefighters. Nine firefighters have been asked to hand in their gear and their fire station will temporarily close as East St. Louis, Illinois, faces a $5.5 million budget deficit and interception of nearly $4 million in state funding for debts owed to its police and fire pensions. Unfortunately, with 100% of the City’s state revenues being redirected to the police and fire pensions, we are faced...

This is the first segment of AFGE’s 5-part series: The Secret Memo : Inside Trump’s Plan to Destroy Unions.A leaked White House memo, as first reported by the New York Times and then obtained by POLITICO, outlines President Trump’s plans to destroy public and private-sector unions, get rid of worker protections, cripple workers’ ability to organize, and increase profits for corporate special interests.This explosive 19-page document was prepared in 2017 by Special Assistant to the President for Domestic Policy James Sherk, who was previously a research fellow at the regressive, anti-worker Heritage Foundation.The memo, laced with familiar half-truths and outright...

Members of the Chicago Teachers Union went on strike on Thursday as 27,000 educators began picketing near schools at 6:30 a.m. The strike leaves 300,000 students unsure of when they will return to school. The union listed thirteen demands on its website, which include salary raises for all school employees, smaller class sizes, and hiring more support staff such as teacher’s assistants. “Our students deserve smaller class sizes. They deserve nurses. They deserve social workers. They deserve bilingual educators,” special education teacher Linda Perales told CNN School social worker Emily Penn said teachers face a continuing struggle to work in...

Key Points The deal is likely about two weeks away from being finalized. It still needs approval from local union leaders and GM’s 48,000 UAW members, who’ve been on strike since Sept. 16. The monthlong work stoppage is the UAW’s longest strike against GM since 1970. DETROIT — General Motors and union leaders have reached a tentative deal on a new labor contract that could end the United Auto Workers’ monthlong strike against the automaker, the UAW said Wednesday. Details of the proposed deal were not immediately available. However, the union’s roughly 48,000 members with GM are expected to receive...

ANALYSIS/OPINION: Imagine each working day, federal employees report for work but do not perform any governmental duties. Instead, they work for a private enterprise void of any public purpose — their union. Taxpayers pay for these employees’ wages, pensions and health care benefits. Taxpayers pay for office space, supplies and travel, too. Unfortunately, there is no need to imagine. It is a longstanding and wasteful practice, known as union official time. Generally, federal employees on official time perform union business such as negotiate contracts, file grievances, attend union conferences and even lobby Congress. The latest data from the Office of...

Love him or hate him, President Donald Trump has stood with law enforcement officers, vowing to bring them back to a position of honor and respect.  A far cry from others who have created an environment that has allowed for the current war on our police to reach critical levels.If you take some time and wade through the many inaccurate news stories regarding the President, and tune out the news stations that are continuing to dredge up the same narratives, you will find one major positive consistent message- President Donald Trump loves and respects the men and women in law...

MINNEAPOLIS — A wide spectrum of community organizations and labor unions have announced plans for protests outside of President Donald Trump's Minneapolis campaign rally Thursday. They're predicting that thousands will converge on the congested area around the Target Center starting at 5:30 p.m. that evening, in an effort to counter the message the president's supporters will be hearing indoors. "This group of people and all of the coalition have signed onto an agreement of making sure this rally and this protest is peaceful for everyone," Jaylani Hussein of the Council on American Islamic Relations, or CAIR, told reporters Monday. "We...

Staff attorneys at the National Right to Work Legal Defense Foundation have won favorable settlements for Stop & Shop supermarket employees whose rights were violated by United Food and Commercial Workers (UFCW) officials before, during, and after the union boss-ordered strike on the grocery chain in April 2019. The extraordinary settlements were directed by the National Labor Relations Board (NLRB) Region 1 in Boston. Two employees, Matthew Coffey and Saood Rafique, had been misled by union agents from the start of their respective employments into thinking that joining the UFCW was a condition of employment at Stop & Shop. Such...