Tag Archives: federal employee unions

Fighting To Preserve The Deep State

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Unionizing government employees was never a good idea. There are too many instances of unions making unfair wage or procedural demands that interfere with the working of the government. One of those areas is in the hiring and firing of employees. In private industry, the goal is to make a profit, and it is fairly easy to justify the firing of an employee if he is not helping to meet that goal. The government is not about either saving money or making a profit, and that complicates things.

On Monday, The Daily Signal posted an article explaining how federal employee unions are resisting parts of President Trump’s agenda.

The article reports:

Who ultimately decides how the executive branch works? Is it the president, elected by the American people, or career federal employees and the unions that represent them?

The American Federation of Government Employees, the largest union representing federal employees, sued the White House’s Office of Personnel Management last month, aiming to block new rules governing how federal employees are evaluated, disciplined, and removed.

The lawsuit represents only the latest in a long series of legal challenges the union has brought against President Donald Trump’s administration since January 2025. According to a July roundup AFGE posted on its website, the union had filed 18 lawsuits against the administration before the latest case.

These lawsuits have targeted a wide range of administration initiatives, including government-wide reorganizations, workforce reductions, collective bargaining restrictions, employee classification reforms, and changes to federal personnel rules.

AFGE has been far from alone in these cases. Democracy Forward, a left-leaning legal advocacy organization that has represented plaintiffs in numerous lawsuits challenging Trump policies, has represented AFGE or other plaintiffs in these cases. Such challenges have involved broad coalitions, including advocacy groups and local governments, alongside labor unions.

Critics argue that these cases amount to more than traditional labor litigation, representing a form of institutional resistance from federal employees and their allies against an elected administration’s effort to reshape the executive branch.

The union was not elected to run the country–the President was. That should end the discussion.

Rerouting Money To Good Use

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On Sunday, Hot Air posted an article about some of the changes being made in the way the U.S. Department of Veterans Affairs spends its money.

The article quotes an article at The Center Square:

“VA staff will now get to spend more time with Veterans, VA facilities can focus on treating Veterans, and VA can manage its staff according to Veterans’ needs and national security requirements, not union demands,” VA Secretary Doug Collins said. 

Earlier this month, Veterans Affairs canceled its contracts with most unions on Wednesday, saying the unions fight against the best interests of veterans. VA said the move follows President Donald Trump’s executive order from March to do away with public employee unions at the federal level after the 9th Circuit Court of Appeals lifted a preliminary injunction that previously stopped 21 agencies from implementing the executive order.

Before 1962, federal employees did not have the right to collective bargaining. On January 17, 1962, President John F. Kennedy issued Executive Order 10988 that granted federal employees the right to collective bargaining.Theoretically, an Executive Order by a President can be reversed later by a different President. This could get interesting.

The article at The Center Square reports:

When VA canceled those contacts, it cut the number of VA bargaining unit employees from about 375,000 to about 7,000. Trump’s executive order exempted public safety employee unions, so employment contracts covering VA police officers, firefighters and security guards represented by unions will remain in place.

VA is redirecting nearly $45 million per year in federal funds from unions to America’s Veterans by ending taxpayer-funded union time, reclaiming federal office space used for public union activities, and getting back federal IT equipment.

Ending taxpayer-funded union time is expected to save the most money. In 2024, VA spent $39.75 million to allowed 1,961 VA employees to spend nearly 750,000 hours working on behalf of government unions rather than VA beneficiaries. After ditching the union contract, the agency no longer has to allow union employees to do union work on taxpayer time. 

VA officials said that vast majority of these employees are back working full time for VA in the positions they were hired to do rather than doing work on behalf of the union. This includes more than 1,000 employees serving in direct patient-care roles.

VA also reclaimed more than 180,000 square feet of office space worth about $5.4 million that had been provided to unions free of charge. The space will be repurposed to serve VA beneficiaries, including expanded administrative and clinical services in several facilities across the country.

Our veterans deserve the best healthcare available.