Labor News & Commentary August 18, 2024 California moves closer to banning captive audience meetings & more

[Omaha Steve]

https://onlabor.org/august-18-2024/

By Otto Barenberg

Otto Barenberg is a student at Harvard Law School.

In today’s news and commentary, Harris will meet with Teamsters leadership after receiving the union’s National Black Caucus’s endorsement; California moves closer to banning captive audience meetings; and Texas challenges the EEOC’s guidance for transgender employees.

On Friday, Vice President Kamala Harris agreed to participate in a roundtable discussion with leaders of the International Brotherhood of Teamsters. An outlier among major unions, the Teamsters have yet to endorse a candidate for president, and Teamsters President Sean O’Brien has indicated his openness to backing Donald Trump—having met privately with the former president earlier this year and spoken at the Republican National Convention last month.

But the union’s leadership is facing growing pressure from its members to support the presumptive Democratic nominee. Last week, the Teamsters’ National Black Caucus formally endorsed Harris’s candidacy, praising the Vice President as “a key partner in leading the most pro-labor administration in our lifetimes” and “a tough and principled fighter for workers’ rights and a leader who delivers on her promises.” The Caucus also noted that a Trump endorsement “would be a betrayal of the values that we have fought to uphold.” Moreover, after Trump expressed support for Elon Musk’s union-busting tactics in a conversation with the billionaire last week, O’Brien’s position seemed increasingly untenable. The Teamsters leader lambasted the former president’s remarks, saying: “firing workers for organizing, striking, and exercising their rights as Americans is economic terrorism.”

FULL story at link above.