Collective bargaining lawsuit | ‘Admin Error’ | Cory Booker

Tuesday, April 1, 2025

STRIKES

► From Variety — SAG-AFTRA’s Duncan Crabtree-Ireland on How Consumers Can Support Video Game Actors Strike as It Nears 250-Day Mark — “It’s definitely a tool that’s still in our toolbox,” Crabtree-Ireland said of the union’s option to call for a formal boycott. “Because we are actively having conversations, both formally and informally, with the industry, it’s not a tool we have chosen to deploy yet — but we absolutely are willing to deploy it if the circumstances demand, and we absolutely have not ruled out doing that if necessary…I think consumers definitely can support the strike by, first of all, just sharing their disappointment with the companies through social media channels, through customer service channels, just communicating either directly to the companies or publicly through social media that they support our members and what we’re fighting for,” the SAG-AFTRA chief said.

► From KTVU — UC workers on 1-day strike throughout California  — Thousands of workers from the University of California campuses and hospital systems are on strike Tuesday for one day, in an effort to address what they say are unfair labor practices and short staffing. It’s the second such work stoppage this year for the University Professional and Technical Employees Local 9119.  Also striking in solidarity are members of the American Federation of State, County and Municipal Employees Local 3299, which represents UC service workers, including medical technicians, therapists, custodians and food service workers.

LOCAL

► From NW Public Broadcasting — United Farms Workers call for boycott of Windmill Farms products at Tacoma rally — People traveled from across Washington state to rally outside of a Tacoma Safeway store in support of farm workers Monday afternoon. The United Farm Workers and their supporters are calling on Windmill Farms in Sunnyside to recognize the unionization efforts and give workers a contract. The union said workers have been trying to get recognition for two years.

► From the Yakima Herald-Republic — WA schools served food from local farms. Then Trump cut the program — The Local Food for Schools program, a federal program that funneled $8.8 million to Washington, played a crucial role in helping 160 districts, including Bellevue, boost the amount of fresh produce and locally grown meat, poultry and seafood they served students. But, earlier this month, the Trump administration canceled the program, leaving school nutrition staff in the Eastside district and across the state scrambling to revise their menus and determine which local foods they can still buy without the federal funding.

► From the Wenatchee World — ‘A humanitarian crisis’: Legal aid for unaccompanied minors slashed in Washington state  — A federal funding cut has forced a Washington-based immigrant rights nonprofits to assess resources and temporarily pause accepting new legal cases for unaccompanied children. The Trump administration ended a contract that provided legal aid to migrant children arriving without a parent or guardian, forcing them to navigate the immigration system alone. This decision comes after a move to have immigration authorities track migrant children who entered the U.S. without their parents.

► From the UW Daily — UW student legal services weighs in on detention of UW Medicine lab technician — “While UW does not have legal authority over immigration enforcement, higher ed institutions may assist detained employees by helping them secure legal representation or advocating with congressional representatives,” Fekri said in an email. “However, any specific actions would depend on institutional policies and legal considerations.”

Editor’s note: SEIU 925 is calling on supporters to send an email to UW leadership calling on them to support Lewelyn by allowing her to draw leave while detained, and have leave donated to her so she can keep her job and green card status. 

AEROSPACE

► From Forbes — The Looming Impact Of Aerospace Tariffs — These included significant impacts on balance of trade, since Boeing is the number one exporter for the US, the highly complex nature of the components of the aircraft which cross borders multiple times and the criticality of performance of those constituent parts to the safe operation of air travel. Finally, the aerospace supply chain is fairly rigid due to regulatory constraints and is not easily transferred geographically, meaning the added costs will have to be absorbed within the value chain or passed on eventually through the airlines to the flying public.

CONTRACT FIGHTS

► From Railway Age — NCCC, IAM Reach Tentative National Agreement — The agreement, which is subject to ratification, is consistent with the terms set by dozens of local and national contracts between railroads and unions that have been ratified as part of the 2025 bargaining round, according to the NCCC. The terms of these pattern agreements provide: “Wage increases of 18.8% over five years. Based on current inflation projections, this will translate to real wage growth for covered railroaders along with pay certainty for the life of the contract.

► From KEZI — University of Oregon union faculty, administration reach tentative agreement — Around 1,500 union faculty members were fighting for more than a year for a new contract with better pay. The tentative deal includes salary increases for career instructors and career researchers through at least 2026.

► From WHYY — Hundreds of Philly stadium-food workers win health insurance in ‘historic’ contract agreement with Aramark — The “historic contract” for Unite Here Local 274 sets the new wage minimum at $20 an hour with plans to get all workers to $24 by 2029. The increase gives the lowest-paid workers an immediate raise of $6 an hour. It also ensures employees who work 180 days or 1,050 hours between all three stadiums at the South Philadelphia Sports Complex will be eligible for health insurance.

Editor’s note: you may remember these union siblings from their strike last year, calling attention to the company’s practice of dividing up hours at the different stadiums to keep workers from being able to access health insurance. No more! 

NATIONAL

► From the New York Times — U.S. Says Deportation of Maryland Man Was an ‘Administrative Error’ — The Trump administration now admits that Mr. Abrego Garcia’s removal was an “administrative error.” Moreover, Justice Department lawyers said in court papers that there was little they could do get him back from El Salvador, and have urged the judge overseeing the case to reject his family’s petition to bring him home, arguing that the White House cannot force the Salvadoran government to release him and that U.S. federal courts have no jurisdiction to order his release.

Editor’s note: So, our government sent human beings to a notoriously inhumane prison in a foreign country, and are now claiming that because those people are no longer in the U.S., they have no authority over them. Essentially, if they send you to El Salvador with no due process, *even if you have legal status like Abrego Garcia*, you have no rights, no recourse, no way out. 

► From Investigate West — ‘You can report her, too!’ Right-wing Idaho activist targets Republican legislator with calls for ICE raids — Spoon, who moved to Boise from San Francisco in 2019 to work remotely as a loss prevention specialist, and Mickelsen, a state legislator who is one of the biggest potato producers in southeast Idaho, are on opposite ends of the state’s Republican Party. And immigration is a particularly incendiary flashpoint: Mickelsen argues migrants are an essential part of the agricultural economy, while Spoon portrays both undocumented immigrants and legal refugees as a sinister foreign invasion force. But Spoon’s tactics represented a new avenue of attack. For farm owners, it raises the possibility that speaking out — or running for office or backing the wrong bill — could trigger a political enemy to try to call down an ICE raid.

► From AP News — On the heels of a dry winter, firefighters around the US brace for wildfire risks — Experts with NOAA’s National Centers for Environmental Information reported in early March that total winter precipitation in the U.S. was just shy of 6 inches (15.24 centimeters) — or nearly an inch (2.54 centimeters) below average. The period of December through the end of February — what forecasters consider the meteorological winter — ranked the third driest on record.

► From the AFl-CIO:

On April 5th, America’s unions are coming together with allies of labor at events across the country to send a message: #HandsOff our unions and our contracts!

Find an event near you: https://t.co/zV9NW5v33B pic.twitter.com/duW64ZqBaE

— AFL-CIO (@AFLCIO) March 31, 2025

POLITICS & POLICY

► From Common Dreams — Federal Workers Union Sues Trump Over Attack on Collective Bargaining — The National Treasury Employees Union (NTEU) filed the federal lawsuit in Washington, D.C., arguing that the order issued by Trump last week is not only illegal but also motivated by “a policy objective of making federal employees easier to fire and political animus against federal sector unions,” many of which have vocally resisted Trump’s legally dubious attacks on agencies and key programs.

► From Wired — Top Officials Placed on Leave After Denying DOGE Access to Federal Payroll Systems — Top career officials at the Department of the Interior (DOI) were placed on administrative leave late last week after declining to immediately give affiliates of the so-called Department of Government Efficiency (DOGE) levels of access to a payroll system that would in theory allow them to, among other things, stop individual Supreme Court justices’ paychecks.

► From the Washington State Standard — Washington Democrats divided on school funding plans — The current budget, which runs through June 30, spends roughly $31.2 billion of the general fund — the cache of state tax dollars used to fund day-to-day operations — on public schools. That works out to roughly 43%, down from the high-water mark of over 50% in 2019. The Senate is proposing a two-year $78.5 billion budget, of which $34.3 billion of the general fund – 43.7% – would go to public schools. The House drew up a $77.8 billion plan, of which $33.2 billion, or 43%, is penciled in for education.

► From KUOW — Tax the rich? Not so fast, say Microsoft, other Washington state businesses — In an interview with KUOW last week, Microsoft President Brad Smith questioned why the state Legislature is seeking to raise more money when revenue has nearly doubled over the past decade.

Editor’s note: let’s talk about the last decade. Working families have seen their costs rise, and their needs grow, especially in education and healthcare where the impacts on the pandemic continue to linger. In WA, which relies heavily on sales tax, those higher costs increase revenue pulled from working families. Meanwhile, since 2020, the wealth of the top 1% has increased by nearly $15 trillion, or 49%. So yes, the ultrawealthy and global corporations like Microsoft — $245 billion in annual revenue, up 16 percent year-over-year — can afford to pay taxes so kids can get the education they need. 

► From the Olympian — Employees, families predict turmoil if Pierce County center for adults with disabilities closes — Many of the people who attended work for the Rainier School or have a family member who resides there. “It affects the residents there, that’s all they’ve known,” said Danielle Modrow, an employee at the Rainier School. “They don’t know anything else, and it’s very sad the Senate is trying to do this – they’re taking their home away.”

► From the Spokesman Review — Baumgartner and House Judiciary Committee investigating Washington AG, state’s sanctuary policies — Rep. Michael Baumgartner and other members of a House oversight committee sent a letter to Washington Attorney General Nick Brown claiming the state’s “sanctuary law” is preventing local law enforcement from cooperating with federal immigration officials. It’s the latest example of confusion and discord as a state government’s laws conflict with the second Trump administration’s sweeping crackdown on illegal immigration, diversity initiatives and protections for transgender students.

► From the New York Times — Why a Wisconsin Supreme Court Election Is All About Trump — But as a torrent of money from outside Wisconsin has made the contest the most expensive judicial race in American history, voters across the state said they had come to see this election to fill a single State Supreme Court seat more as a referendum on the early months of President Trump’s second term. Fueling that perception is roughly $20 million that Elon Musk and groups allied with him have spent to boost the conservative candidate, Brad Schimel, a judge who also got President Trump’s endorsement not long ago.

► From the AP — New Jersey Sen. Booker presses his marathon speech against Trump’s agenda past 17 hours and counting — New Jersey Democratic Sen. Cory Booker held the Senate floor with a marathon speech that lasted all night and into Tuesday afternoon in a feat of endurance to show Democrats’ objections to President Donald Trump’s sweeping actions. Booker took to the Senate floor on Monday evening saying he would remain there as long as he was “physically able.” The 55-year-old senator, a former football tight end, was plainly exhausted Tuesday as his speech stretched past 17 hours.

► From U.S. Senator Cory Booker:

Editor’s note: Sen. Booker has been speaking on the floor since 7 p.m. ET last night, reading letters from those impacted by the Trump and Musk administration’s chaotic cuts, calling on all Americans to make good trouble, appealing to non-partisan patriotism. As he said around the 17 hour mark: “You cannot love your country if you do not love your countrymen and women.” 

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