The Oregon Labor Dispatch: May 22, 2025
- Oregon AFL-CIO
- 17 hours ago
- 9 min read
The Oregon Labor Dispatch is a weekly email and blog series designed to keep Oregon’s workers informed of the latest news about unions, worker power, and much more. Each week, we bring you a curated selection of news stories, graphics, and information about upcoming events and actions. When Oregon’s Labor Movement is connected, updated and informed we are able to be stronger advocates for all working Oregonians.
If you have a news story, event or action you’d like to see featured in the Oregon Labor Dispatch please email us at communications@oraflcio.org.
💥2025 Oregon Labor Organizing Summit
June 17 in Portland
We know that when unions are strong, Oregon is strong. With so much uncertainty in the world today, one thing remains certain: Unions are the most effective means for workers to gain power on the job and in our communities to demand the dignity and respect we all deserve. That’s why on June 17, 2025 the Oregon AFL-CIO is hosting the 2025 Oregon Labor Organizing Summit in Portland.
This one-of-a-kind event will feature national speakers, like keynote speaker AFA-CWA President Sara Nelson and LaborLab Executive Director Bob Funk, organizing experts, and a host of workshops.
This event is limited to union members, leaders, and staff of labor organizations.
🗓️ UPCOMING EVENTS
Oregon Labor Candidate School: Solidarity Social
TODAY: May 22 in Salem
Join us today, May 22nd, at the Salem AFSCME Office for our Spring Solidarity Social. Exhibits from the AFSCME Labor History Museum will be on display, and special guest speakers will be announced as we get closer. Tickets are $20 to help offset the cost of food and beverages.
The Dance to Wake Up the Earth: Teach In on May Day and Our Histories of Resistance
May 27 in Portland
Join AFT-Oregon’s Politics, Policy, Legislation, and Solidarity (PPLS) Council for an evening of political education, community, and reflection. We'll share dinner together before diving into a panel discussion and Q&A with Ben Cushing, President of PCCFFAP, and Andrea Haverkamp, AFT-Oregon Political and Legislative Organizer. Together, we’ll explore the history of general strikes, the radical roots of May Day, and how these legacies inform our movements today.
Fund Oregon Now: Rally to Invest in Our Future
June 5 in Salem
Join SEIU 503 at the State Capitol to rally on June 5th from 12:00pm - 2:00pm to fight for a state budget that reflects Oregon's values, protects essential services and invests in Oregon workers. Oregonians depend on state services to make ends meet, to care for and educate children, to maintain affordable and quality healthcare and so much more. We know that the time is now to act and assure that we continue to fund important services in our state, no matter what the federal government says!
Summer Institute for Union Women
June 22-26 in Burnaby, Canada
SIUW is a comprehensive leadership institute with skills-building workshops, cultural activities and education sessions designed to expand our understanding of solidarity and rebuild connections across our region. This event is for all cis and trans women, non-binary, queer, questioning, and those who are comfortable in a space that centers our experiences. The fee is $940.Click here to register
Portland Pride Festival 2025
July 19 & 20 in Portland
Join Oregon’s Labor Movement at Portland’s Pride Waterfront Festival and Parade. The Oregon AFL-CIO and affiliates will have a booth at Pride and will march in the parade on Sunday.
📣 TAKE ACTION
URGENT: Tell Your Representative to Vote Yes on SB 916
Senate Bill 916 is a landmark piece of legislation designed to extend unemployment benefits to striking workers. The bill passed the Oregon Senate on March 20, but we have work to do to ensure it reaches Governor Kotek’s desk to be signed into law.
Tell Congress No Cuts to Medicaid
Right now, Congress is considering a reckless budget package that would make the 2017 tax giveaway to billionaires and giant corporations permanent, and expand the tax cuts for the rich by cutting $1.5 trillion from essential programs like Medicaid.
Tell Congress to Fund the Arts
Congress needs to hear from you as it makes decisions about next year’s funding for the National Endowment for the Arts (NEA) and National Endowment for the Humanities (NEH). Contact your Representative today to ask that they join the bipartisan group of House members supporting increased funding for the NEA and NEH in FY26.
As AFSCME members and members of the broader Portland community, we have deep concerns with the City’s recent announcement that the contract for Multnomah Safe Rest Village (MSRV) will be transferred from Sunstone Way, a union employer, to Urban Alchemy, a non-union employer with concerning practices as an employer and service provider.
Please take a few minutes to send a pre-written letter to your representative and senator: Tell them to demand SMART apprentice Kilmar Armando Abrego Garcia's return to the United States so he can receive due process!
Donate now to the AFGE Federal Employee Defense Fund Help fund the fight against the attacks on America’s civil servants!
🛠️ RESOURCES
The Oregon AFL-CIO’s compendium of resources to address federal threats against workers from immigration to LGBTQIA+ rights.
📖 MUST READ
May 22, 2025 | AFL-CIO
House Republican leaders passed this shameful bill in the middle of the night for one reason: They didn’t want the American people to see the deep and harmful cuts they’re imposing in the light of day. This budget gave Congress a choice: stand with the working people, seniors and kids, or deliver another massive giveaway to billionaires and big corporations. Every single member of Congress who voted for this bill chose to write the richest 10% a fat check on the backs of working-class families already struggling to pay their bills.
May 19, 2025 | AFL-CIO
AFL-CIO President Liz Shuler delivered a keynote address at the Foreign Policy for America Leadership Summit today, where she called for a new approach that leaves behind “the neoliberal policies we have largely tried for the past three decades [that] have not worked” and advances “a new vision that is rooted in the needs of working people.”
🏔️ OREGON LABOR
May 20, 2025 | OPB
A bill is moving through the Oregon Legislature that aims to combat wage theft by allowing unrepresented construction workers to sue property owners and contractors for unpaid work — not just the subcontractor who pays them directly.
May 20, 2025 | The Statesman Journal
The Oregon House voted May 19 to pass Senate Bill 599, which prohibits landlords from inquiring about or discriminating on the basis of a tenant's immigration or citizenship status.
🏛️POLITICS
May 21, 2025 | Dept. of People Who Work for a Living
The AFL-CIO’s Department of People Who Work for a Living (DPWL) recently held a series of hearings across the country to provide a platform for working people to express their views on the current administration’s policies, the impact of those policies on their lives and what working people want from their government.
May 14, 2025 | CNN
Lawmakers repeatedly pressed US Health and Human Services Secretary Robert F. Kennedy on canceled medical research and mass layoffs during Wednesday hearings on Trump administration proposals that could lead to even broader cuts.
May 15, 2025 | Bloomberg Law
Two independent agency officials challenging their terminations by President Donald Trump must persuade federal judges who’ve already endorsed parts of the administration’s arguments against their reinstatement. National Labor Relations Board member Gwynne Wilcox and Merit Systems Protection Board member Cathy Harris—both of whom prevailed in district court—will press their cases during oral argument Friday at the US Court of Appeals for the District of Columbia Circuit.
May 19, 2025 | The Washington Post
The House Budget Committee passed a massive tax and immigration package central to President Donald Trump’s agenda late Sunday, overcoming opposition from hard-line conservatives over spending. Four fiscal conservatives — all deficit hawks aligned with the ultraconservative House Freedom Caucus — changed their vote to “present,” allowing the legislative package to be recommended “favorably” to the House, 17-16.
⚠️FEDERAL ATTACKS
May 17, 2025 | The Washington Post
A federal appeals court on Friday lifted a block on an executive order from President Donald Trump that seeks to strip union rights from federal workers at dozens of agencies and offices. Trump in March issued an executive order that said that parts of the United States Code that protect federal workers’ rights to organize and collectively bargain would no longer apply to agencies including most or all of the Departments of Treasury, Defense, Veterans Affairs, State and Justice.
May 202, 2025 | Reuters
Everett Kelley, president of the American Federation of Government Employees, the biggest federal workers' union with 800,000 members, cited comments made by Trump's budget chief Russ Vought when he said government workers needed to feel "trauma."
May 19, 2025 | The Washington Post
The White House pushed Monday for Republicans to support President Donald Trump’s massive tax and immigration package, which narrowly passed the House Budget Committee late Sunday.
May 22, 2025 | The Washington Post
House Republicans approved President Donald Trump’s sprawling tax and immigration agenda Thursday morning, sending to the Senate legislation that the GOP hopes will transform the federal government and the economy and power the White House’s drive to deport immigrants and build up the military. Trump’s One Big Beautiful Bill, as the measure is formally known, extends trillions of dollars in tax cuts from his first term along with new campaign promises — including no taxes on tips and overtime wages — and hundreds of billions of dollars in new spending.
May 19, 2025 | NBC News
A federal district judge on Monday tossed out the takeover of the U.S. Institute of Peace by the Trump administration and the Department of Government Efficiency, declaring that actions by "illegitimately-installed leaders" were "unlawful" and had to be declared "null and void."
May 19, 2025 | Fast Company
Federal judge and Trump appointee Matthew J. Kacsmaryk issued a ruling on Friday that will significantly alter the protections that transgender employees are entitled to in the workplace. The decision impacts the current guidance on workplace harassment from the Equal Employment Opportunity Commission, in a move that reflects the agency’s new priorities under the Trump administration and new acting chair Andrea Lucas.
May 19, 2025 | Common Dreams
On the heels of the U.S. House Budget Committee's Republicans striking a deal to advance their megabill following a failed vote last week, a trio of organizations on Monday released a report detailing how the legislation could negatively impact tens of millions of American children.
🚨ATTACKS ON IMMIGRANTS
May 19, 2025 | The Washington Post
The Supreme Court said Monday that the Trump administration can cancel temporary protections for up to 350,000 Venezuelans — a major undoing of a Biden administration decision that allowed those migrants to live and work in the United States for humanitarian reasons.
🫱🏼🫲🏽 THE LABOR MOVEMENT
May 20, 2025 | Labor Notes
State and local governments have begun taking concrete steps towards a clean energy economy, and for now, even under Trump, green union jobs are increasing. Meanwhile, unions have partnered with climate activists to win legislation for more such jobs. Six states have passed “climate jobs” bills to expand renewable energy and raise labor standards for that construction. Four more have union coalitions advocating for such legislation.
📣 STRIKES & COLLECTIVE BARGAINING
May 21, 2025 | Las Vegas Review-Journal
Operating Engineers Local 501 has finalized its first contract with The Venetian hotel-casino, covering hundreds of workers at one of the Strip’s largest properties. The five-year agreement applies to approximately 400 employees and includes wage increases, annual bonuses, medical coverage, free craft training and a defined-benefit pension plan, according to a news release.
📊 THE ECONOMY
May 18, 2025 | The Colorado Sun
“With these price tags, we’ve told them, and they haven’t even flinched,” Kim Cordova, Local 7’s president and international vice-president for UFCW, told The Guardian.
👥 ORGANIZING
May 17, 2025 | Current
Sesame Workshop employees won certification of their vote for representation under the Sesame Workers Union Thursday and will now seek their first collective bargaining agreement with management. In votes cast in April and counted in a National Labor Relations Board office in New York City, the group formally joined the Office and Professional Employees International Union Local 153. The bargaining unit includes early childhood education experts, fundraisers, facilities staff, producers and paralegals.
🖼️ GRAPHICS TO SHARE
Comentários