WASHINGTON – With no major labor market reform since the 1930s, Democrats seize the opportunity to strengthen workers’ rights – including their ability to unite.
The House of Representatives on Tuesday passed the PRO (Protect the Right to Organize) Act, the most far-reaching labor reform in decades, according to the sponsors of the bill, with a vote of 225-206. Although it is experiencing an uphill battle in the 50/50 split Senate, President Joe Biden has said that labor reform is one of the top priorities of his government.
As a presidential candidate, Biden emphasized that he would ‘be the president of the union you’ve ever seen’. Last week, as Amazon workers gathered in Alabama to vote for unions, Biden called it “an extremely important choice.”
“While America is grappling with the deadly pandemic, the economic crisis and the reckoning of race – what it reveals is the great inequalities that still exist in our country,” Biden said on Twitter. ‘I call on Congress to send [the PRO Act] to my desk so we can call on a new wave of workforce and create an economy that works for everyone. ”
The PRO Act would strengthen the right of workers to strike for better wages and working conditions, strengthen the precautions to ensure that workers can hold fair trade union elections, and enable the National Labor Relations Council (NLRB) to impose fines on bosses who workers’ rights violated.
The House passed a version of the bill last year, but it was dead upon its arrival in the Republican-controlled Senate. This time, Republicans want to repeal the legislation that many large business groups face. The Chamber of Commerce says it would “destabilize America’s workplaces and draw up a long list of dangerous changes to labor law.”
The legislation is an attempt to strengthen unions following the erosion of membership.
‘The decline in union membership is not a reflection of workers’ choice. It is the product of decades of well-funded anti-union attacks, which have taken advantage of the weaknesses in our labor legislation, ”Bobby Scott, chair of Home Education and Labor, said in a statement on Tuesday.
But Democrats are unlikely to get the ten Republicans needed to get the bill at Biden’s desk.
“I am pleased that the House is approving this important bill,” Senate HELP Chairman Patty Murray, D-Wash., Said in a statement. “I will continue to fight hard to make sure we honor the vital workers who kept us going during this pandemic by getting the PRO law over the finish line.”
