Last March, the administration issued an executive order that illegally eliminated collective bargaining rights for more than 1 million federal workers. That order affected the majority of federal workers represented by a union.
AFSCME President Lee Saunders said at the time the order was “a direct effort to silence federal workers’ voice on the job.”
The writing was on the wall: The billionaires running this administration are escalating their attacks on workers’ freedom to negotiate.
To combat this rising anti-union tide, Reps. Jared Golden (D-Maine) and Brian Fitzpatrick (R-Pa.) introduced H.R. 2550, the Protect America's Workforce Act. This bipartisan bill seeks to restore the collective bargaining rights for affected federal employees and cancel the executive order.
On Thursday, House Minority Leader Hakeem Jeffries and Golden called on every member of the House of Representatives to sign a petition that would fast-track H.R. 2550 for a floor vote.
Saunders applauded the bill’s supporters for standing up for working people.
“The House of Representatives has the votes to stop this illegal, union-busting executive order from continuing to strip more than 1 million workers of their voice on the job, and the speaker of the House should not be blocking this bill from coming to a vote,” Saunders said.
“We urge the bill’s supporters to act swiftly and compel an immediate vote on the Protect America’s Workforce Act,” he added. “Federal workers have dedicated their lives to keeping our communities safe and healthy, and they need a voice on the job to continue to defend the essential work they do from the billionaires and anti-union extremists who are trying to rob working people of our power.”
Every worker of every union needs to be in this fight.