Welcome to a Tuesday night edition of Progress Report.
Earlier tonight, I went live with prominent labor journalist and author
to talk about the Trump administration’s unprecedented attacks on working Americans and organized labor. The whole conversation is above, with an insightful clip — it’s him talking, not me — lower down in the newsletter.I’d be remiss if I didn’t mention the huge Democratic victory in the Wisconsin state Supreme Court race, so consider this an acknowledgment and a tease for a piece I have coming out tomorrow that looks at how it happened.
Also: We’ll have yet another live interview coming to you later this week. Prepare to dig into one of the most compelling active campaigns to preserve democracy happening right now.
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History books now often depict Ronald Reagan’s firing of striking air traffic controllers in 1981 as the official opening salvo in the conservative war on organized labor. Future editions will likely add that after more than 40 years of elected officials slowly grinding down the union movement, Donald Trump’s went nuclear in that war on working people with several executive orders signed last month.
The first executive order purported to strip collective bargaining rights from 50,000 TSA agents; there was no legitimate legal basis for the decision, but if upheld, it would cancel their contract and give the agency full control over wages, working conditions, hours, and retirement.
Late last week, Trump took it exponentially further, announcing that he was unilaterally ending union bargaining rights for more than 750,000 federal employees from across well nearly two dozen agencies.
His stated reasoning, that all those jobs are critical to national security, is a laughable one, but this is an administration that shrugs at mistakenly kidnapping innocent people and shipping them off to rot in an El Salvadoran hell hole. The Trump team is taking a flyer, knowing that a favorable decision by a conservative judge would cripple the union movement in ways that the Gipper could have only fantasized about.
In assessing the total disaster that such a scenario presents, author and labor journalist Hamilton Nolan predicted ripple effects that would go beyond unions and prove catastrophic to the cause of economic justice writ large.
“You can see the labor movement being tested — they punch you in the face and they see what happens. And if nothing happens, they punch you harder. Private industry is licking their lips to attack their own unions,” Nolan said.
“Companies like Amazon and SpaceX are already trying to throw out the NLRB love the fact that they're not going to enforce labor law. We have to recognize that and we have to recognize that the only way to stop it is for us to draw on a line in the sand and tell them that something is going to happen if they keep doing this.”
What does drawing a line in the sand look like? The good news is that everyone can do their part, from organizing their workplace — mass unionization is really the only way to systemically wrest back a society dominated by oligarchs — to advocating for better local worker protections and joining protests movements like the Tesla Takedown.
In a wide-ranging conversation, we also touched on the movement by right-wing state governments to essentially disband public sector unions, which presaged the Trump administration’s national attacks; hot topics like tariffs and the political gambles being made by various labor leaders; and where we must go from here. It’s complicated by the laws preventing strikes by federal unions, as we discuss here:
Watch our conversation, then read Hamilton’s recent piece about the executive orders and the threat to working people everywhere.
We old timers remember the horrible deed Raygun committed against our air traffic controllers! Republicans are just tone DEAF regarding the country’s vital need for workers to conduct the work of running our federal government! No entire country can just dismiss its entire workforce in one fell swoop—and why in God’s name would any SANE leadership even consider such a moronic thing? These dodos obvi haven’t a clue about continuity, national security, the vital role our trained, loyal federal workforce plays in all of our lives, my God! The clown show Trump appointed couldn’t run ANYTHING, and they have not been properly vetted for education, experience and most importantly, security clearances! We have at the top of some agencies KNOWN Russian sympathizers!! Trump himself is actively working to destroy our federal institutions it has taken 250 years to build! They, in my opinion, are the ENEMY WITHIN!
YNWA Jordan!!
Vital issues raised in the interview. Unions may be our last hope for protecting worker rights and reducing inequality.
Jordan, I respect your messaging and really appreciate your conversations with guests, but in my ears, you mumble a bit. I think slowing down a bit would help me follow you better. Otherwise, please keep up the great substack!
That’s something I definitely need to work on — years as a print reporter and then behind the scenes producer will do that to you, especially as a New Yorker! Thank you for the note and encouragement, they are both helpful!