By Noam Scheiber
NY Times

Jonathan F. Mitchell, a conservative lawyer, is the lead counsel in several lawsuits against public-employee unions.

After the 2016 election, he served as a volunteer attorney on the Trump transition team, where he helped review future executive orders. In September, the president nominated him to head the Administrative Conference of the United States, a small federal agency that advises the government on improving its inner workings. His nomination awaits action by the Senate after the Judiciary Committee approved him on a party-line vote in March.

Ms. Block said the court’s decision last month indicated that the conservative majority might rule that the fees should be refunded retroactively. The decision referred to the fees as a “considerable windfall that unions have received,” adding, “It is hard to estimate how many billions of dollars have been taken from nonmembers.”

By Terri Gerstein and Sharon Block
NY Times Op Ed

It’s the American dream: We’re supposed to improve ourselves, get a better job, move on and up. But in too many instances, secret agreements between employers are stifling workers’ ability to parlay their hard work and experience into better-paying jobs and a chance to climb the career ladder.

On Thursday, the attorney general of Washington State, Bob Ferguson, announced that he had obtained agreements from seven fast-food chains, including Arby’s, Carl’s Jr. and McDonald’s, not to use or enforce “no poach” or “no hire” agreements. Under these arrangements, franchisees pledge not to hire job applicants who are current or recent employees of the company or any of its franchisees, without the approval of the applicants’ employers.... Read more about Ending the Dead-End-Job Trap

[Sharon Block] provides an overview of [Kavanaugh's] record and attempt to make the case that his record reflects a sustained and, at times, aggressive hostility to the role of the law in protecting the vulnerable and less powerful.

The Agri Processor dissent is significant for a number of reasons.  First, it reflects a broader trend in Kavanaugh’s record of being unsympathetic to the plight of immigrants. His dissent reflects a willingness to write groups of workers completely out of basic labor standards – here all undocumented...

By Dave Jamieson
Huffpost

His dissents involving undocumented meatpacking workers and a death at SeaWorld tell us a lot about the worldview of Trump’s Supreme Court pick.

The Agri Processor case provides a window into Kavanaugh’s thinking when it comes to workers’ rights. Like the conservative justices he would join at the Supreme Court, Kavanaugh has tended to side with employers in workplace disputes. If confirmed, he would almost certainly continue the Supreme Court’s run of business-friendly rulings in contentious, precedent-setting cases that have weakened labor unions and class-action lawsuits in recent years.

In his dissent, Kavanaugh argued that undocumented workers were no longer employees under the law due to the 1986 law passed by Congress. In Block’s view, Kavanaugh’s opinion sidestepped Supreme Court precedent and denied workers safeguards they deserved regardless of their legal status.

“It shows a willingness to go out of his way to write a whole group of people out of the protection of the [law],” said Block. “And I find that to be troubling.”... Read more about Brett Kavanaugh Ruled Against Workers When No One Else Did

Rachel M. Cohen
The Intercept

THE ANNUAL MEETING of the National Education Association, the country’s largest public-sector union, held in Minnesota this week, was much more high stakes than in years past. Typically, the convention is a chance for educators to vote on bread-and-butter issues like budget priorities and advocacy target areas. In the wake of a U.S. Supreme Court ruling that dealt a crippling blow to public-sector unions, they debated strategies to expand their membership, keep union members apprised of their rights, and recover from the...

By Sabri Ben-Achour and Daniel Shin
Marketplace

Tuesday's U.S. Supreme Court decision to rule in favor of Mark Janus in the Janus v. AFSCME case effectively changed the entire way public unions raise funds for their collective bargaining services. The ruling now bars unions from collecting fees from non-union members with the court citing this now defunct fee requirement as a violation of free speech.

The conclusion of the Janus v. AFSCME case brings a major disruptive change to how public sector unions would potentially operate, so what will these unions do next?

Sabri Ben-Achour spoke with Benjamin Sachs, professor of labor and industry at Harvard Law School for some insight.... Read more about What does the Supreme Court's Janus ruling mean for unions? It would be like the government no longer enforcing taxes