The Electrical Worker Online (2024)

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With so much attention being paid to the presidential election this year, it can be easy to forget that the state and local levels are where a lot of decisions are made that affect workers. From heat safety to captive audience meetings, who wins and loses these "down-ballot" elections can make a lasting difference in a working person's life.

Heat Safety

It's no secret that summers are getting hotter, and dangerously so. The U.S. Health and Human Services Department estimates that approximately 2,300 people died from heat-related illness in 2023, triple the annual average between 2004 and 2018. And a report from advocacy organization Public Citizen found that environmental heat is likely responsible for some 170,000 work-related injuries each year. The Occupational Safety and Health Administration is at work on a rule to establish heat safety standards at work, but the process has taken years.

States, by contrast, can often create — or dismantle — standards much faster, making a very real difference for workplace conditions. But it depends on who's in power.

After Austin and Dallas passed ordinances requiring minimum standards like water breaks for workers, the Republican-controlled Legislature passed what was dubbed the "Death Star" bill in 2023 that prevented those common-sense and life-saving precautions from going into effect.

Florida followed suit with a similar law this year.

By contrast, the city of Phoenix, which last year saw temperatures at or above 100 degrees for 133 days, is moving to protect its workers. In a 7-0 vote, the City Council passed an ordinance requiring employers to provide access to rest, shade, water and air conditioning, as well as training on recognizing the signs of heat stress. The rule applies to city contractors and their subcontractors who work outdoors, including construction workers.

The measure was supported by the labor community, including the IBEW.

Some 100 IBEW members who work for the city fall under this protection, Local 640 Business Representative Dan Anderson said.

"We've been working hard over the years to get a worker-friendly council," Anderson said. "The councilors who are up for reelection this year surely saw this as a good move for them, as well as city employees."

Decertification

IBEW members in states like Texas and Florida have their union-negotiated contracts on their side when it comes to heat and other safety standards. But those protections can fall by the wayside when a state legislature pushes anti-union laws that put the very life of a union at risk.

In states across the country, Republican governors and legislators are trying to find ways to decertify public sector unions. In Florida, they succeeded, and at least one IBEW local has already fallen victim. (See "Decertification: Florida's Battering Ram to Break Down Unions " below.)

While those efforts were defeated this year in Iowa, Louisiana and Utah, there's nothing stopping those politicians from trying again next session.

In Iowa, it took the strength of IBEW members across the state and alongside labor allies to beat back a particularly nefarious decertification attempt. Building on existing anti-union legislation from 2017, the bill would have would have decertified a union if the employer failed to submit a list of eligible voters for the recertification process, putting the onus on the union to do the work of the employer by suing them for not turning in the list.

The IBEW lobbied heavily against it, said Shane Nelson, Des Moines Local 55 assistant business manager. He and others met with Senate committee members, party leaders from both sides and other legislators in case it made it to the floor for a vote. Thanks to their perseverance, that didn't happen. But the fight's not over, Nelson said.

"We expect it to be back next session," he said, noting that Local 55 has roughly 140 members in public sector utilities across the state who would have been affected by the bill.

Going on Offense

It's not just public sector unions that are impacted by state laws. Issues like captive audience meetings, where employers mandate that employees who are organizing for representation listen to anti-union propaganda, can be subject to state-level oversight.

These meetings, where employees are often not allowed to ask questions or hear opposing viewpoints, are incredibly popular with employers. One analysis of National Labor Relations Board elections found that 89% of companies with organizing campaigns conduct captive audience meetings.

And they work. According to the Economic Policy Institute, average union win rates drop from 74% to 47% when this tactic is used.

With a pro-worker majority in the House, Senate and governor's mansion, Minnesota passed a ban on such meetings last year, as did Maine. This year, Illinois and Washington followed suit, bringing the total number of states with such a protection to eight.

And these states aren't stopping at captive audience meetings. Illinois is using its pro-labor majority to pass a number of bills that support working families, including legislation to require project labor agreements on carbon capture and sequestration projects.

"Local unions in Illinois remain active in the legislative process, and we continue to elect pro-labor candidates, and then lobby them to make sure they follow through on their promises," Sixth District International Representative Shad Etchason said. "Elections at every level of government matter, and this is why."

Washington now has laws on the books to develop rules for the construction industry to provide better conditions for workers who menstruate or express milk. And striking workers will now have access to health care through the state's insurance exchange. It's all made possible because of ongoing efforts by the IBEW and the broader labor community to get out the vote for pro-labor candidates, said John Traynor, a member of Everett, Wash., Local 191 and legislative director of the Washington State Labor Council, an affiliate of the AFL-CIO.

"It's important to engage in the process," Traynor said. "By passing policies like these, and by electing and reelecting pro-worker champions to office, we continue our work of expanding worker protections. Educating our membership on why all this is important is an effective way to engage them and to re-energize our movement."

What Winning Means

While Illinois and Washington have enjoyed pro-union trifectas in the governor's office and both houses of the legislature for a while, it's a new phenomenon in Minnesota and Michigan, thanks to the efforts of organized labor in recent elections.

In Michigan, that majority led to a repeal of its so-called right-to-work law last year, the first state to do so in decades. And IBEW members aren't stopping there.

"Michigan is on the move," Sixth District International Representative Joe Davis said. "Rolling back right-to-work was only the start. We've nearly solidified prevailing wage into law, and we're moving the ball on unemployment insurance."

Davis said he and other labor advocates are looking to expand the unemployment insurance benefit from 16 weeks to 26 and increase the weekly payout.

"Most would be surprised that this is a big issue at this time, but construction workers know that employment good times do not last forever," Davis said. "We must be prepared for the slow work periods even when there's low unemployment."

Michigan members aren't taking anything for granted in the legislative realm. They're supporting redistricting efforts to keep the state's House and Senate voting maps fair and representative, and free from gerrymandering.

"There is an energy starting to take off here in Michigan," Davis said. "People are seeing what can be done with the correct people in office."

For more information on the IBEW's policy priorities and election resources, visit ibewgov.org.

A number of decisions that affect workers' well-being are made at the state and local level. Who wins and who loses "down-ballot" elections can determine everything from whether workers have adequate heat safety standards to the legality of captive audience meetings.

Decertification: Florida's Battering Ram to
Break Down Unions

A law aimed at gutting Florida's public sector unions has started bearing fruit, and IBEW members are getting caught in the crosshairs.

The Republican-dominated Legislature passed, and Republican Gov. Ron DeSantis signed, a law last year to make it all but impossible for many public sector unions to maintain their certification.

Most of those unions must now have at least 60% of members paying dues. If not — and the law also prevents the automatic deduction of dues payments from an employee's paycheck — the union has to be recertified with a vote of members.

With Florida being a so-called right-to-work state — where employees are allowed to free-ride, enjoying the benefits of a collective bargaining agreement without contributing their share of the costs of negotiating and enforcing that contract — unions already face an uphill battle when it comes to getting members to pay their fair share.

"I've heard people say things like, 'Why should I pay dues when I can get it for free?' Or, 'I'll pay dues when I see how it goes,'" Jacksonville Local 177 Business Manager Alan Jones said. "I'm afraid it may take losing representation for them to see the difference and how it will impact them. I hope it doesn't come to that, but it's certainly possible."

For members of Gainesville Local 1205, that day has come. The local's only public sector unit, representing employees who work for the city of Ocala, couldn't meet the threshold demands and lost its certification. Business Manager Lanny Mathis said that the local is not yet planning a recertification effort because the interest just doesn't seem to be there.

"I hate to say it, but at this point in time, they've won," Mathis said.

In a sign of just how partisan the law was, certain public sector unions, among them those representing the police, corrections officers and firefighters, were carved out of the onerous requirements. Those unions also tend to support Republican candidates.

"The law was really targeted at the teachers' unions, which have gone to battle with DeSantis. We were collateral damage," Fifth District International Representative Erik Jones said. "It doesn't make any sense. Utility workers, many of whom are public sector workers, are first responders just as much as the police and firefighters, but they don't have to jump through all these hoops every year."

Local 177 represents maintenance workers in Duval County Public Schools and will face its own recertification test this summer. Alan Jones said they don't have 60% of members paying dues, but they do have enough cards for an election.

He's hopeful that those members will remember that before Local 177 started representing them about 12 years ago, they went seven years without a raise. Now they get one every year. But even if the unit survives this round, it will have to do it all over again next year if it still doesn't meet the 60% threshold.

"It gets to the point where it gets tiresome," Alan Jones said.

That weariness and constant struggle isn't a bug of the bill but a feature. Mathis said unions are afraid to do anything that might upset their membership, including making endorsem*nts in races they would have before.

"It's keeping unions out of politics, which is intentional," Mathis said. "They're not just shutting down unions — they're shutting out our voice."

Even with their backs against the wall, IBEW members and other labor advocates were able to get some reprieve. Another part of the law required full audits every year, which could cost more than $10,000. But thanks to lobbying by IBEW members and others, the law was amended to require a simpler financial statement, something IBEW locals already do.

"Thank God we got rid of the audit requirement," Erik Jones said. "For a small local, that amount of time and money just isn't feasible."

Erik Jones noted that most employers value their relationship with the IBEW, so they aren't pushing for decertification, even in cases where a local may be at risk.

Still, the law is forcing locals to spend resources on things like tracking down dues instead of bringing in new members or doing any of the other multitude of duties required of a local.

"Most of these units are small, maybe 50 to 100 members, and they're spending at least one day every month calling members just to get them to pay their dues," Erik Jones said.

With an anti-union Republican supermajority in the Legislature and DeSantis not up for re-election until 2026, it won't be quick or easy to turn the tide, but IBEW locals aren't stopping when it comes to educating their members and getting them to the polls.

"Local elections have consequences," Mathis said. "Vote with your brain, not your emotions. Quit getting your news on Facebook and get on sites with your legislators' voting records. You've got to be educated on what's happening and why."

"It's keeping unions out of politics, which is intentional. They're not just shutting down unions — they're shutting out our voice."

– Lanny Mathis, Gainesville, Fla., Local1205 business manager

NLRB's Historic Progress for Workers
Hangs in the Balance

Without the National Labor Relations Board, the laws intended to protect the rights of workers to unionize and bargain collectively would be empty promises.

The NLRB is the enforcer, the agency created to police employers who break the law in order to derail organizing drives and delay contract talks — whatever it takes to avoid negotiating higher wages, better benefits and a safer workplace.

Whether the board uses that power to hold them accountable has everything to do with its members and the president who nominates them.

The NLRB under President Joe Biden has been the fiercest, most proactive defender of workers in modern history, boldly acting to restore the battered mission of the 1935 National Labor Relations Act: to protect workplace rights and encourage the growth of unions.

With a Democratic majority on the five-seat board and the agency's aggressive general counsel, Jennifer Abruzzo, workers who want to organize and join unions have greater rights and employers have fewer tools to stop them.

The previous board was controlled by management-side attorneys who doubled down on 40 years' worth of political assaults, court rulings and adverse policies that badly eroded the NLRA. Their tenure was a heyday for union busters, as well as the lawyers and consultants whose union-avoidance industry rakes in nearly half a billion dollars annually.

"It's as night-and-day as it gets," International President Kenneth W. Cooper said. "The darkest period in modern history for workers and unions followed by more justice and progress than there's been in generations. But there's a long way to go. You don't dig out of a hole that deep in just four years."

He said voters will decide in November whether the new era continues or the old one roars back.

"We know from bitter experience and because they're making no secret of their plans that a second Trump administration would slam on the brakes and reverse direction as fast they can," Cooper said.

Share of National Labor Relations Board Elections that Resulted in Union Certification Annually, 2008-2024; Through April 2024

The Biden-Harris NLRB's commitment to uphold long-eroded workers' rights has restored confidence in the board, leading to a surge in organizing petitions and union election victories over the past four years. Source: Center for American Progress analysis of NLRB data; Chart: Axios Visuals

In the past, the worst the NLRB could do in response to firings, discipline, threats and other tactics was order a new election — effectively a second chance for employers to chip away at union support. If they also had to cough up back pay and reinstate wronged workers, that was merely the cost of doing business.

The lawbreakers' strategy falls apart under Cemex, a Teamsters case against a cement trucking company that flagrantly violated its drivers' rights to unionize. Now, if the NLRB finds that unlawful tampering was the difference between a win and a loss for the union, it can order the employer to recognize the unit and go directly to the bargaining table.

In June, the board applied Cemex to a Las Vegas casino charged with egregious misconduct that included handing out 500 steaks branded "Vote No" two days before the election.

The casino's "extensive coercive and unlawful misconduct stemmed from a carefully crafted corporate strategy intentionally designed at every step to interfere with employees' free choice," the decision stated.

But the NLRB doesn't need a critical mass of wronged workers in order to act. Take the life-changing ruling in June against a contractor who refused to pay the wages and benefits negotiated by Niagara Falls, N.Y., Local 237.

The young woman who sought the local's help and at least two other employees are likely to be awarded more than $100,000 each, based on their work hours over several years.

"We're very happy about it," Business Manager John Scherrer said. He explained that the owner had closed his tiny shop but, with the union contract still in place, quietly began doing jobs again in Local 237's jurisdiction.

"If a company signs up and says they're going to do the right thing, it's good to know that we can count on the NLRB to hold them to it, to follow the CBA," he said.

Scherrer and local organizer Nick Coyle knew the regional NLRB staff to be attentive and professional, and were impressed once again.

"They do a very good job of helping us narrow-minded construction workers navigate the process," Coyle said with a laugh. "They've really been great."

While the contractor refused to turn over records or otherwise cooperate, the NLRB forged ahead, eventually identifying two other workers who'd been cheated. Coyle said there may be others.

Third District International Vice President Dennis Affinati praised Local 237's dogged pursuit of the case and said the board's attention to it shows how committed the agency is to seeking justice for workers — no matter how few are affected.

"We talk a lot about the big ways that the NLRB is expanding organizing rights and forcing employers to bargain in good faith, and under President Biden, that really is something we haven't seen to this degree in our lifetimes," he said. "But workers also need to know that the board is meant to be there for them as individuals, and when it's run and staffed by fair-minded people like it is now, that's exactly what happens."

Staffing levels, however, remain an urgent problem. The agency's $299 million budget has been virtually flat for a decade, leaving scores of field jobs open. Despite an extra $25 million passed by Democrats in 2022, Abruzzo says the agency needs at least four times as much additional funding.

Through efficiencies, she has managed to fill some vacancies. But they are stopgap measures at a time when the board's workload is exploding, the result of workers and unions feeling more confident about filing election petitions and unfair labor practice charges.

"You can do the math," Abruzzo told the Federal News Network in a May interview. The $25 million bump "basically kept our lights on," she said. "It did not allow us to do the necessary hiring of critical positions. … Our caseload continues to outpace our staffing capacity."

The agency won't get any help from House Republicans, who now control the purse strings. They are champing at the bit to bleed the NLRB dry, knowing they'd have a clear path if their party were to take the White House and both chambers of Congress in November.

Their animus is unchecked on a House committee that oversees labor and pension issues. The GOP majority routinely calls hearings to condemn the board's advancements for workers and lines up anti-union lawyers to excoriate Abruzzo and board Chair Lauren McFerran in absentia.

Abruzzo replaced the rabidly anti-union general counsel Peter Robb, who aided President Ronald Reagan in 1981 when he fired the air traffic controllers and began stacking the historically neutral NLRB with management lawyers. Biden fired Robb within an hour of being inaugurated on Jan. 20, 2021.

Abruzzo set a new tone as soon as she was confirmed that July, writing to staff: "[I]t is critical that the NLRB vigorously protect the rights of workers to freely associate and act collectively to improve their wages and working conditions. This memo should be seen as a road map."

The pace and scope of the policy overhaul that followed stunned the labor movement and enraged the business lobby.

One early change, broadening the interpretation of "make-whole" remedies, may help the Local 237 electricians as the NLRB determines how much money each is entitled to receive from the boss who scammed them.

The revised make-whole policy began with an Abruzzo directive and was affirmed by the board in a precedent-setting IBEW case involving telecom workers in California.

Although the Fifth Circuit Court of Appeals partially overturned the ruling, it remains NLRB policy to seek more than back pay and lost benefits for workers who are harmed financially by an employer's unfair labor practices. Reimbursem*nts could include medical bills, penalties for tapping into retirement funds, credit card interest and fees, and even the loss of cars and homes.

Cooper stressed that labor's adversaries will continue to use the courts and Congress to try to undermine the board's authority and that the only way to stop them is at the ballot box.

"It's the circle of life politically," he said. "The president nominates NLRB members, who have to be confirmed by the Senate. The House controls the budget. Federal judges decide whether board decisions survive. The president and Senate decide who those judges are. And we decide who goes to the White House and Congress.

"We are so close to real change — at the NLRB, the Department of Labor and every other agency that is finally prioritizing workers over corporate greed," Cooper said. "But to get there, we must reelect the most pro-worker, pro-union president of our lifetimes and give him a Congress that will support his vision and his values."

Inside the GOP Plan to Kneecap Unions

For 40 years, the American economic consensus was that the country did best when its richest got richer, even if it hollowed out the working class.

The three and a half years of the Biden administration have been a rebellion against death of the working family.

And it is working.

There are 14 million new jobs, including almost 890,000 new manufacturing jobs. Unemployment is the lowest since 1969.

The Republicans have a plan to slam on the brakes and reverse course. It isn't hidden. They're proud of it. It's a 920-page road map for the end of a revolution that's just starting.

It's called Project 2025, and while it was published by a coalition of conservative groups, one of its lead authors is head of policy on the 2024 GOP platform committee.

These are just a few highlights of how they plan to make life worse for working people:

• Repeal Davis-Bacon, which sets prevailing wage standards for construction projects. (page 604)
• End project labor agreement requirements. (604)
• Ban card check even when a company wants it. (603)
• Ban unions from advocating for their members except in meetings with management, with no limits on corporate political spending. (600)
• Make it easier to replace union workers with nonunion workers. (606)
• Let management create "employee involvement organizations" and then chose to negotiate with them instead of the union. (599)
• Let management pay people less for the same work because of who they are. (584)
• Ban all current and former union members from jobs in the administration. (31)
• Allow states to outlaw unions for five years, to "encourage experimentation." (605)
• Ban union pension funds from requiring PLAs on projects funded by union members. (607)
• Make it easier for employers to interfere in union elections. (602)

"When someone tells you who you are, believe them the first time," said International President Kenneth W. Cooper. "For too long, too many people who should have been our friends ignored working people. Democrats may have lifted the boot off our neck only when they remembered to, but the Republicans never stopped adding weight."

The Members and the Work:
The IBEW's Nonpartisan Federal Strategy

In a U.S. presidential election year, it can be easy to get caught up in partisan fighting and forget who your true friends are. Fortunately, the IBEW's policy agenda, from new nuclear jobs to apprenticeship standards and speedy permitting, cuts across party lines.

"It's extremely important for the IBEW to identify and help elect candidates, whatever the letter after their name, who are committed to creating good union jobs and securing our hard-won job protections and benefits," said International President Kenneth W. Cooper.

The IBEW's nonpartisan priority must always be — and only be — on the members and the work, Cooper stressed.

"What matters to us is that they support us and our families," he said. "It's what we ask our members to keep top of mind when they cast their ballots."

There are many common-sense and worker-focused parts of the IBEW's policy agenda that members should remember as they speak with officials and as they vote, added Danielle Eckert, assistant to the international president for government affairs.

"There's nothing stopping local voices from being heard," Eckert said. "We should be 'in the room' with all of our elected officials to help lay the groundwork for their support on the IBEW's legislative priorities."

One recent example of this strategy's success is the bipartisan passage of the ADVANCE Act, an IBEW-backed bill to make it easier for the Nuclear Regulatory Commission to develop and deploy new nuclear energy facilities. The new law builds on the pro-union, pro-worker language that the IBEW lobbied for and won in such legislation as the Inflation Reduction Act and the Bipartisan Infrastructure Law by directing the NRC to prioritize redevelopment of brownfield and retired fossil fuel sites. This supports the IBEW's objective of finding good jobs in the growing nuclear power industry for workers laid off when coal- and gas-fired power plants close.

There's lots more to do, Cooper said. "We need our members to help us push for more project labor agreements, for registered apprenticeships that train more of our brothers and sisters, and for expanded Davis-Bacon prevailing wage provisions on more public works projects," Cooper said.

Here are some other national-​level policies the IBEW is working on:

There is strong agreement among Republicans and Democrats that the U.S. power grid needs to be transformed to handle the country's growing electricity demand. Approving transmission line construction permits can create thousands of jobs for IBEW members, but these jobs are often held up because the process for granting permits, already lengthy and complex, gets further bogged down — sometimes for years — by lawsuits or other legal tactics.

Last year, independent Sen. Joe Manchin of West Virginia introduced the Building American Energy Security Act, something Cooper called "a good bipartisan first step" toward speeding up the permitting process in a way that achieves the country's energy objectives while respecting community input and following environmental laws.

After the fiery February 2023 derailment of 38 freight train cars near East Palestine, Ohio, Sen. Sherrod Brown, an Ohio Democrat, introduced the Railway Safety Act, which not only aims to prevent similar future disasters but also includes language to require rail car and engine inspections be performed by qualified and trained mechanical inspectors, something that would secure more work for the IBEW's Railroad Branch members. Brown's bill, along with Pennsylvania Democratic Rep. Christopher Deluzio's companion measure in the House, also would mandate two-person crews on freight trains, another IBEW safety priority. Both bills have co-sponsors from both parties.

Another rail-focused bill backed by the IBEW that has bipartisan support in both houses of Congress is the Railroad Employee Equity and Fairness Act. Companion versions introduced by Democratic Rep. Janice Schakowsky of Illinois and former Republican Sen. Rob Portman of Ohio aim to insulate payments made from the Railroad Unemployment Insurance Account from automatic, across-the-board budget cuts.

The Biden administration and the NLRB have found success in using the federal rulemaking process to make it easier for workers to gain union representation. A U.S. Supreme Court ruling in June, however, could hobble that process and threaten the NLRB's ability to administer labor law.

That's another reason the IBEW continues to support passage of the Protecting the Right to Organize Act, or PRO Act, which aims to strengthen workers' rights to organize, appropriately classify contract workers as employees and impose harsher punishments for employers that violate workers' rights. The act also would impose stiff penalties on employers that violate the National Labor Relations Act.

Companion versions of the PRO Act now making their way through both houses — introduced by independent Sen. Bernie Sanders of Vermont and Democratic Rep. Bobby Scott of Virginia — had the support of nearly half the Senate and 216 House members as this article was being prepared.

Lawmakers in both parties have shown a willingness to take on China over that country's actions that harm U.S. commercial interests. In March, the IBEW joined four other national labor unions in asking U.S. Trade Representative Katherine Tai to investigate, under Section 301 of the Trade Act, China's unfair policies and practices to undermine fair competition and dominate maritime, logistics and shipbuilding industries. Tai has pledged "to undertake a full and thorough investigation into the unions' concerns."