This federation convenes at a dangerous moment for our democracy. Greedy corporations and billionaires are collaborating with their allies in the Trump administration to rob working people of our votes, our voices and our access to justice. Actions taken by this administration over the past year and a half, including the killing of our union brother, Alex Pretti, on the streets of Minneapolis while he engaged in First Amendment activity, constitute the greatest threat to our democratic form of government and constitutional freedoms in our lifetimes.
Every free and independent union, however, is a democracy. We are built on the fundamental belief that every person counts and every voice matters. We pull everyday people together to stand up to the rich and powerful. We are the final check on the corporate power that seeks to dominate our government and our economy. Our very existence here or anywhere in the world is a bulwark against authoritarianism. Wherever we go, we make democracy happen. That’s why the labor movement is uniquely equipped to lead the fight for a democratic government that works for all of us.
Rule by the People
As a starting point, we must defend rule by the people and the right to vote.
We strongly oppose restrictive voter ID laws that disenfranchise segments of the population by disproportionately impacting workers, women, people with disabilities and communities of color. We advocate for policies that make it easier for all to vote through national standards for early voting, mail-in voting, time off to vote and registration. We oppose any measures that block fair access to the ballot box and support the restoration of the franchise to those who have served their time. We condemn in the strongest terms the U.S. Supreme Court’s decision in Louisiana v. Callais, a ruling which, alongside Shelby County v. Holder, guts the Voting Rights Act of 1965 and threatens our multiracial democracy, allowing states to dilute the votes of people of color and of all working families. Such moves cannot stand. We will fight to restore and strengthen the Voting Rights Act and strengthen our multiracial democracy for generations of voters.
Every decade, we draw new district lines that ensure that every vote is weighed equitably; and those very votes will determine whether working families will have a living wage, affordable health care and paid sick leave—but yet again, politicians and their billionaire friends are rigging the process across the country by redrawing the lines to serve their own interests instead of the communities’ needs. We support fair redistricting that does not reduce or minimize the voting power of working people, people of color and marginalized communities.
We must end corporate domination of our government. We support public financing of campaigns, limitations on individual contributions to candidates and parties, and public disclosure of political expenditures. We support efforts to rebalance the judiciary, from appointing judges with experience fighting for working people to reforms that ensure the judiciary reflects the population. We support the independence of boards, commissions and administrative law judges as devised by Congress so that workers may get a fair and impartial hearing to enforce their rights and not be subject to corporate agendas or the whims of a president.
Building Independent Worker Power Through the ‘Labor-First’ Standard
The unions of the AFL-CIO resolve to mobilize our members, union families and retirees into a political movement advancing the interests of all working people in all areas of our economy and society, especially to protect and expand the right to organize and collectively bargain as a means to counterbalance the efforts of corporations, oligarchs and any who would oppress working people for the sake of power and profit. We will partner in common cause with anyone who will join us to build an economy that works for all, not just the wealthy few.
The unions of the AFL-CIO pledge to educate, engage and mobilize union members, retirees and union families year-round, wherever they are, to advocate and vote on working people’s issues at all levels of government. Further, no candidate for public office will earn our support without explicitly supporting and defending the right of working people to organize, collectively bargain and defend their contracts.
We will listen to their concerns and speak with an independent voice for the priorities of working people and retirees in the broader work of our movement, and in partnership with our allies.
We will resource and support the infrastructure needed to build and sustain an effective political movement in every state and locality in our country. This will include encouraging and supporting union members to run for political office, to ensure that working people are represented at all levels of government, and so policy and legislation puts the welfare of working people before the interests of corporations and the wealthy elite. No candidate for public office will earn our support without explicitly supporting and defending the right of working people to organize, collectively bargain and defend their contracts. And it should be especially noted that increased women’s representation in elected office leads to improved policy outcomes regarding child care, health care and equal pay, making it vital for us to continue to support pro-worker women candidates in elections at every level of government.
Democracy and a voice at work is at the heart of being in a union, as unions exist as a tool for workers to express their desires and secure their needs; we resolve to also protect the voice of working people in our civil society. We will reject efforts to make voting harder, or to silence the voice of the people. We will harness our power to defend our right to vote, defend our right to vote by mail or in person, ensure free and fair elections and uphold the constitutional rights of all people in our country.
Rebuilding and Strengthening the Public Sector Workforce
A government that is responsive to working people requires a strong public sector workforce at every level of government, to serve and protect the public, not any one person or party. With rights at work and union representation, they are the public’s first line of defense against corruption, waste and the rollback of democracy.
And that is why public sector unions have become a target of the wealthy interests that are trying to subvert our democracy. The single biggest act of union-busting in U.S. history was committed last year when President Trump canceled the collective bargaining rights and contracts of 1 million federal workers. He has moved to reclassify tens of thousands of federal workers to eliminate civil service protections, so that he may fire at will those who serve the public and replace them with those who serve him. After launching the attack on their rights and freedoms, Trump next went after their jobs, in some cases decimating the ability of the federal government to carry out the people’s business. Federal workers and their unions, with solidarity from all of the labor movement, fought back by organizing, mobilizing, filing lawsuits and moving legislation in an unprecedented fashion.
We will rebuild and strengthen the rights of federal government workers. That means restoring the bargaining rights and every canceled collective bargaining agreement, through the Protect America’s Workforce Act, the Rights for the TSA Workforce Act, and other measures to ensure the union-busting is undone and never happens again. We will oppose the bypassing of Congress to close or reorganize agencies and programs with unlawful reductions in force, impoundments or withholding of appropriated funds. We will support and ensure the fair treatment of federal workers and contract workers during government shutdowns. We will pass the Saving the Civil Service Act and protect the right to due process through an independent Merit Systems Protection Board and Federal Labor Relations Authority. We will fight for fair pay and retirement for federal workers and contract workers, and the restoration of diversity, equity and inclusion programs and Executive Order 11246 to ensure the federal government and its contractors are a model for equal employment opportunities.
State and local government employees are confronting similar existential threats to their livelihoods and right to join a union. Far too many of these workers still do not have the right to collectively bargain, and anti-worker politicians in states like Florida are intent on eroding what rights their workers do have. All of labor will fight back against these assaults on collective bargaining at the state and local level. And at a federal level, we will fight for passage of the Public Service Freedom to Negotiate Act to guarantee collective bargaining rights for all state and local government employees, and support and defend their civil service protections, including federal merit staffing requirements for those operating federally funded programs like Medicaid, the Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program and unemployment insurance. And because attacks on these workers are attacks on the critical services they proudly provide, we will defend those services from short-sighted austerity agendas, money-grabbing privatization efforts and ideological attack.
Defending the Freedom of the Press
Our democracy depends upon a citizenry informed by truth, shielded from government interference and empowered by the transparent dissemination of ideas. As a federation representing broadcast, print, and online journalists and media workers, and as an institution steadfast in its devotion to the First Amendment, the AFL-CIO stands up for a free and independent press.
Today, that free press is under siege. Journalists are not merely observers, but targets—subjected to assault, arrest and criminalization while documenting daily news events. The denial of access to information and the systematic threats issued by those in power have created a chilling environment for reporters and compromised the very principles upon which our democracy and free society rests. Media consolidations and private equity, driven by greed, are seeking to cut costs by eliminating local news coverage or replacing human labor with artificial intelligence, threatening Americans’ access to accurate and relevant information.
Journalists and other media workers have fought back with new organizing and collective bargaining to protect their jobs and freedoms. The entire federation stands with them and will defend their work to get information into the hands of citizens, monitor the corridors of power, challenge falsehoods with evidence, and expose corruption and hypocrisy without fear or favor, so that we may have a real and functioning democracy. We will continue to fight media consolidations that threaten print and broadcast jobs and the public’s right to be informed. We will advocate for Congress to restore funding to public media. We condemn the layoffs of journalists and the dismantling of a free and independent press. We will challenge the use of or threats to use federal regulatory agencies to silence journalists, and we will advocate for press safety.
A Fair Regulatory System
Sound, effective and strong regulations and regulatory policy from federal agencies are critical for making sure the laws we democratically pass to protect working people are actually implemented. While the statutes enacted by Congress set the foundation and legal framework, most laws require regulations to be carried out. But it takes too long to secure policy that makes our workplaces safer, protects our wages and benefits, secures our financial system, and ensures our air and water are clean, and our consumer and business products are safer. And corporate influence and political and ideological opposition to life-saving and other critical regulations have taken over the regulatory process. Anti-worker members of Congress have pushed dozens of legislative proposals to shape that process in industry’s favor, and pro-corporate courts have issued decisions lethal to agency deference and regulatory review.
American workers need a government and regulatory system that protects working people rather than corporations. That system needs to be modernized and reshaped to provide needed protections in a timely manner.
For a fair regulatory system, we will:
- Elevate the critical role for evidence-based rulemaking with agency deference to protect workers and the public, including supporting public campaigns, streamlining agency processes and depoliticizing the rulemaking process.
- Support legislation that is a comprehensive blueprint for modernizing, improving, and strengthening the regulatory system to protect workers and the public.
- Oppose all legislative efforts under the guise of regulatory “reform” and eliminating “red tape” that instead would make it more difficult or impossible for agencies to issue regulatory safeguards.
- Support reforms that impose strict deadlines on White House review of regulations so that agencies can issue protections without delay; streamline the regulatory process to correct undue industry influence, enhance transparency and equity, and promote worker and public participation; reshape cost-benefit analysis that currently favors corporate financial interests over robust safeguards; and aggressively recruit and fill agency vacancies of regulatory enforcement and inspections staff.
Supporting Academic Freedom and Higher Education
The freedom of students to learn and of educators to teach and develop new knowledge is the central pillar of higher education. It is essential for the functioning of democracy, prepares students to be engaged civic actors and provides for the common good.
Academic freedom also protects a student’s right to be exposed to a diverse range of ideas; college and university teachers and researchers’ right to investigate and teach issues without government interference or censorship; and the right of college educators to speak as citizens without fear of retribution. While academic freedom has been under attack for decades, the current attacks on institutions and individual college and university educators have increased and, in some cases, have resulted in workplace discipline, loss of employment or threats of violence against the individual and their family. Rather than promoting the life-saving research, open contest of ideas and freedom of expression that have made U.S. higher education the envy of the world, powerful donors and government officials are attempting to influence and limit the content of research and teaching. Unfettered access to knowledge and information are the foundation of democratic governance. To preserve democracy, the freedom of thought and speech, we must preserve academic freedom.
We support protections for educators to discuss all relevant matters in the classroom; researchers to explore all avenues of scholarship, research and creative expression, and to publish the results of such work; educators and students to be free from institutional censorship or discipline when addressing matters of institutional policy or action or when speaking or writing as citizens; and the expansion of collective bargaining as a powerful means to promote and preserve academic freedom and to protect all members of the academic community from political attacks.
Support for Robust Civic Education
Unions have long served as essential democratic institutions that educate, organize and mobilize workers to participate in civic life and advocate for economic and social justice. There is currently a growing concern that K–12 and postsecondary students are not being adequately prepared for informed and meaningful participation in civic and democratic processes, and the rise of misinformation and disinformation underscores the urgent need for media literacy, critical thinking skills and civic knowledge.
We reaffirm our historic role as champions of democracy by promoting and supporting robust, high-quality civics education in all schools and we encourage state and local labor bodies to collaborate with educators and community partners to advocate for comprehensive civics curricula that include the history of the labor movement, workers’ rights, democratic participation and economic justice.