Trump is decimating federal employee unions one step at a time : NPR

Sharda Fornnarino received the news in early August.

The Department of Veterans Affairs was finishing almost all its collective bargaining agreements. The agency gave unions only days to get out of federal buildings.

“We got used to the weekend, and empty our office space,” says Fornnarino, an outpatient surgery nurse at the Rocky Mountain Regional Center on the outskirts of Denver, where she is also local director of National Nurses United.

Federal employees have had the right to join unions and collectively bargain working conditions since the 1960s. Unlike private sector workers, government employees cannot negotiate wages or strike. But through collective bargaining, they help shape disciplinary procedures, the lézae policies of the parents, how extra time is managed and much more.

Giving workers an example in the policies of the workplace, thought says, leads to less friction in the workplace and a more effective government.

But President Trump has abandoned that idea. Instead, it is argued that federal employee unions represent a danger to the country. In March, an executive order is issued that ends collective bargaining rights for more than one million federal workers in approximately 20 federal agencies. Almost immediately, many agencies arrested the automatic deductions of the union fees of employee payment checks, reducing a critical source of cash flow to the unions. Just before Labor Day, Trump issued a new executive order, adding around a half boxes from the agencies to the list.

The unions have filed demands, claiming that Trump is taking reprisals against them for opposing parts of their agenda. The lower courts temporarily arrested the March order; The government appealed.

Two Courts of Appeals said the Trump administration could advance while the litigation continues, citing the sole responsibility of the presidents to protect national security. In their failures, the judges indicated that the Trump administration said the agencies should not cancel the collective bargaining agreements while the dispute was pending.

But last month, the administration sent updated agencies to the orientation, they could continue to finish most of the union contracts, but not those with the National Treasury employee union, due to litigation. To date, nine agencies have canceled contracts, according to the American Federation of Government employees.

At the end of August, a judge of the Ninth Circuit Court of Appeals requested a vote on whether the case must be tested and Banc, by a panel of 11 judges. That vote could happen this month.

“I hope that this will be reversed,” says Fornnarino, while acknowledging that for now, his union protections have disappeared.

Disputes about well dedicated

As elected union representative, Fornnarino spent time legalizing greater training for nurses, particularly those who are floating to different dedications and greater work security.

“We were able to put some protections in its nursing station, increased police presence both in the emergency room and in psychological unit,” she says.

Fornnarino says that the changes have benefited both nurses and veterans they serve. But the VA sees it differently. The agency said that last year, the employees of the negotiation unit such as Fornnarino spent 750,000 hours of time financed by taxpayers in union activities.

“Without collective bargaining obligations, those hours can now be used to serve veterans instead of the union chiefs,” the VA in a press release said announcing the termination of the contract.

Fornnarino mocks that suggestion. “I really feel that she is a child or propaganda,” she says.

National Conerns Security applied unequally

In his executive orders of March and August, Trump relies on a provision in the federal law that gives him authority to end collective bargaining rights in agencies that have national security as a main function. Adjusted presidents have used that authority in moderation. Trump is applying it to a wide strip of agencies, including the Environmental Protection Agency, the Department of Justice, the National Meteorological Service and the Global Media Agency of the media of the United States, which excessively the voice of America.

The president’s justification is that he harms national security when unions can obstruct management. In an “informative sheet” issued together with the March Executive Order, the White House cited the many legal challenges that the unions have brought. “Certain federal unions have declared the war on the agenda of President Trump,” the document said.

Notable, the executive order excludes the agencies that have supported it, including those that represent the employees of the application of the law and customs and border protection.

That is special for the employee of the Department of Agriculture, Cole Gandy, who trains CBP workers parked in entry ports on how to inspect agricultural imports for pests.

“They have to know how to find mistakes, how to collect them, how to present them to identify another person,” says Gandy, who is also president of the National Association of Agriculture Employees.

Those CBP employees still have their union rights, while Gandy members in NaaE, including those who identify the errors found in the ports, do not.

In fact, everyone used to be part of the same union, but the inspectors of the ports were split after the attacks of September 11, because their role was considered essential for national security.

“They are the first line of defense against terrorism in the United States,” says Gandy.

Naae and other unions have pointed out these inconsistencies in their demands. While the litigation continues, Gandy has tried to assure the members that this is not the end.

“We are going to fight to be a union until we can no longer,” says Gandy.

Fears of a brain leakage

Throughout the federal government, some workers do not expect to see what happens. They are renouncing now, after having decided that a government work is no longer. Many workers fear the unions that have gone, gained an example in matters such as teleworking policies or family license that make a difference in their quality of life.

“Although they came to the federal government Because of their passion for public service, they would and Tutime and Tutime and Tutime and Tutime and Tutime and Dugtime Foodtime and Dugtime and Dugtime and Dugtime Foodtime and Dugtime and Dugtime and Dugtime and Dug -toutime and Dugtime and Tutime and Tutime and Dugtime and Dugtime and Dugtime and Dug -tutime and Dugtime and Dugtime and Dugtime and Dugtime and Dugtime and Dugtime and Dugtime and Dugtime and Dugtime and Dugtime and Dugtime and Dugtime and Dugtime and Dugtime and Dugtime and Dugtime and Dugtime and Dugtime and Dugtime and Dugtime and Dugtime and Dug Dugtime and Dugtime and Dugtime and Dug -tutime and Dugtime and Dug Chapter 282, representing about 9000 FDA employees through Mid Atlantic.

Althegh, the FDA has not yet ended the union’s contract, has ordered the union to pack its offices.

Lee says that the government is losing chemicals, toxicologists, engineers and others that ensure that drugs and medical devices are safe and effective and food ingredients are not poisonous.

“It is already, in my opinion, harming the public because we are losing that institutional knowledge. We are losing that issue of banners,” says Lee. “As much as the current administration believes that they are all quickly replaceable, they are not.”