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March 5, 2021 | NORTHWEST LABOR PRESS
NORTHWEST
LABOR
PRESS
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CORRECTION
Pension rescue GRANT. We incorrectly
reported in our Feb. 19 issue that a COVID
relief bill under consideration in Congress
would rescue distressed union-sponsored
multiemployer pension plans through a
loan. The Butch Lewis Act of 2019
(S.2254) would have rescued the plans
via a loan, but the version of pension res-
cue in Section H of the House COVID relief
bill takes the form of a cash grant.
Hours: Mon-Sat 12-6 pm Closed Sunday
... Biden meeting
From Page 1
counsel at the NLRB, she’s been
working as special counsel for
Communications Workers of
America (CWA). Abruzzo will
need to be confirmed by the
Senate.
Trump’s IRAP apprenticeship
program sent to scrap heap
Biden also took steps Feb. 17 to
support the apprenticeship model
of workforce training, drawing
immediate applause from build-
ing trades unions.
First, he told labor leaders that
he’ll ask the U.S. Department of
Labor (DOL) to reinstate the Na-
tional Advisory Committee on
Apprenticeships.
Connie Ashbrook, a member
of Portland-based Elevator Con-
structors Local 23 who headed
up Oregon Tradeswomen Inc.,
had served on the advisory com-
mittee for seven years when
Trump took office in 2017. Up to
then the 27-member group had
been meeting quarterly to advise
the DOL on apprenticeship is-
sues. The new administration
ghosted them.
“There was no formal good-
bye,” Ashbrook told the Labor
Press. “I talked to the director of
the office of apprenticeship. He
A MESSAGE FROM THE PRESIDENT
Feb. 28 video on the @POTUS Twitter account – https://bit.ly/3bS9V5G
With Amazon warehouse
workers in Alabama voting on
a union, Joe Biden speaks out.
“I have long said America wasn’t built by Wall
Street. It was built by the middle class, and
unions built the middle class. Unions put
power in the hands of workers. They level the
playing field. They give you a stronger voice,
for your health, your safety, higher wages,
said, ‘We’re just going to wait
and see. You can assume you’re
still a member of the committee
until you hear differently.’” That
was the last she heard. The DOL
never called another meeting of
the committee.
Biden next told labor leaders
he supports Rep. Bobby Scott’s
National Apprenticeship Act of
2021, which would greatly in-
protections from racial discrimination and
sexual harassment. Unions lift up workers,
both union and non-union, but especially
Black and Brown workers.
“I made it clear — I made it clear when I was
running — that my administration’s policy
would be to support unions organizing and
the right to collectively bargain. I’m keeping
that promise.
“You should all remember, the National La-
bor Relations Act didn’t just say that union
crease federal funding for ap-
prenticeship and pre-apprentice-
ship programs, including pro-
grams that help recruit women
and people of color.
Finally, Biden signed a new
executive order rescinding the
2017 Trump executive order that
had created “industry-recognized
apprenticeship programs”
(IRAPs). The Trump order
are allowed to exist, it said that we should
encourage unions. So let me be really clear:
It’s not up to me to decide whether anyone
should join a union. But let me be even more
clear: It’s not up to an employer to decide
that either. The choice to join a union is up to
the workers — full stop.
“Today and over the next few days and
weeks workers in Alabama and all across
America are voting on whether to organize
a union in their workplace.” This is vitally im-
portant — a vitally important choice as
America grapples with the deadly pandemic,
the economic crisis and the reckoning on
race—what it reveals the deep economic
disparities that still exist in our country.
“And there should be no intimidation, no coer-
cion, no threats, no anti-union propaganda. No
supervisor should confront employees about
their union preferences. You know, every
worker should have a free and fair choice to join
a union. The law guarantees that choice. And
it’s your right, not that of an employer, it’s your
right. No employer can take that right away.
“So make your voice heard. God bless you
and may God protect the workers and their
families who are trying to figure out how to
make it, fairly.”
touted IRAPs as a new kind of
apprenticeship program that
could be designed and overseen
solely by employers and em-
ployer groups. Federal appren-
ticeship laws dating back to 1937
had mandated a role for labor
representatives in setting stan-
dards for federally recognized
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