Republican social issue demands, labor money cuts anger unions

President Joe Biden arrives for a visit to AFL-CIO headquarters, Wednesday, July 10, 2024, in Washington, as AFL-CIO president Liz Shuler, left, cheers. | Evan Vucci/AP

WASHINGTON—Cuts in Labor and Education Department funds, and controversial Republican “social issue” demands dominated the discussion, and angered unions and Democrats, as House members crafted the money bill for the two departments, plus the Health and Human Services Department, for the fiscal year starting October 1.

The measure passed on a partisan 31-25 vote in the House Appropriations Committee on July 10 and is headed for the House floor, where the ruling Republicans hold a narrow edge. It’s also virtually dead on arrival in the Democratic-run Senate, setting up more showdowns over spending later this year.

One big cut—by a third—would be at the National Labor Relations Board. The Republicans on the money panel want to roll back its funds to pre-coronavirus levels. In the current fiscal year, the NLRB, which handles most labor-management relations cases in the private sector, received its first actual dollar increase in a decade.

One GOP move bars the Labor Department from using any money to implement the DOL’s rules cracking down on bosses’ misclassification of workers as “independent contractors” not covered by labor law, workers’ comp, or jobless benefits. Another bans NLRB from implementing its “joint employer” rule that says a corporate office and a local franchise owner are equally responsible for obeying or breaking labor law.

The GOP crowed protecting “independent contractors” would “liberate 64 million American women, seniors, and others balancing work with family responsibilities to participate in the freelance economy,” more commonly known as the gig economy.

“Adequate funding for worker protections, job training, public health, and education is essential to the well-being of all working families, but the allocations for FY2025 contained in this bill are grossly inadequate, reflecting a dangerous disregard for our nation’s needs,” Jody Calemine, the AFL-CIO’s new Legislative Director, wrote lawmakers.

“Specifically, the legislation slashes funding for the National Labor Relations Board (NLRB) by $99 million, despite historic increases in union election petitions and unfair labor practice charges. It would cut funding for the Wage and Hour Division by $25 million, the Occupational Safety and Health Administration by $75 million, and the Mine Safety and Health Administration by 5%, all of which would lead to a dramatic reduction in enforcement of job safety, minimum wage and overtime laws.”

“As we warned, a crisis is coming in federal labor law,” the NLRB Staff Union said in a recent tweet. “Election petition and unfair labor practice charge filings with the NLRB are at 15-year highs, but the agency has lost nearly 40% of its field staff from FY2010. Enforcing the law requires civil servants.”

“The legislation is an assault on education and job training, abandons ongoing public health crises, and eliminates funding for reproductive health. Democrats united against this bill that would harm hardworking Americans,” Rep. Rosa DeLauro, D-Conn., the committee’s top Democrat, added. She calculated it would cost 72,000 teachers their jobs.

And the School Administrators (AFSA) rounded up other organizations in their campaign to save a $2.1 billion Education Department program to recruit and retain principals, assistant principals, and other K-12 school leaders nationwide.

The Title II-A program is “the federal government’s sole direct investment in K–12 professional learning. It mandates rigorous professional learning standards, requiring districts to expend funds on research-based practices such as coaches, mentors, and professional learning communities.”

“Republicans’ proposed funding would gut public education and hamstring the delivery of Social Security benefits” by cutting staff in its D.C. offices and Baltimore headquarters, due to telework, added Rep. Lois Frankel, D-Fla.

The GOP-crafted measure would also “prevent women from accessing reproductive care in any way possible,” said Frankel. She also singled out a hiring freeze at Social Security, “reducing its staff to the lowest levels in more than 50 years, despite an increase of more than 40 million Social Security beneficiaries during that period,” a committee Democrats’ fact sheet says.

Meanwhile, the Republicans crowed about freezing Pell Grants, “banning the administration’s student loan bailout,” and eliminating all money for Planned Parenthood and other maternal care providers.

They also claimed to “reduce funding for ineffective, duplicative, and controversial K-12 education competitive grants by $1 billion (50%).” And the GOP told the Centers for Disease Control it couldn’t use any money on its continuing investigation of the health effects of the pandemic of gun violence, especially from mass shootings.

And using migrants crossing the U.S.-Mexico border as a political piñata again, the Republicans crowed about a 60% funding cut “for nongovernmental organizations facilitating the flow of minors illegally crossing the border.”

That would harm humanitarian groups who clothe, feed, and shelter the unaccompanied kids, and often provide them with bilingual lawyers to help them navigate the complex and confusing U.S. immigration and asylum system.

The Republicans “decimate support for children in K-12 elementary schools, furthering Republicans’ goal of eliminating public education,” a Democratic fact sheet says. They also decried eliminating access to contraception and the addition of “numerous partisan and poison pill riders related to abortion and reproductive health.”

If the Senate doesn’t take those poison pills out of the bill, off past practice Democratic President Joe Biden will, with his veto pen.

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CONTRIBUTOR

Mark Gruenberg

Award-winning journalist Mark Gruenberg is head of the Washington, D.C., bureau of People's World. He is also the editor of the union news service Press Associates Inc. (PAI). Known for his reporting skills, sharp wit, and voluminous knowledge of history, Mark is a compassionate interviewer but tough when going after big corporations and their billionaire owners.