President Joe Biden is traveling to Virginia and Louisiana this week to pitch his American Jobs Plan — also called an “infrastructure” plan. New bridges, safer highways and more broadband are easy sells. But that’s only half the story. Biden’s plan is a massive and coercive push to unionize the American workforce. Whether workers want it or not.
Biden’s plan is a wish list of changes sought by union bosses. It cancels right-to-work laws in 27 states that currently protect workers from having to pay union dues if they don’t want to join. It also rigs union elections by replacing secret balloting with a system called card check. Organizers will be able to see which workers vote “no” and intimidate them.
During the 2020 presidential contest, unions donated millions to Biden’s campaign, manned phone banks and got out the vote for Democrats. Now, it’s payback time.
The goal of the American Jobs Plan is to increase the ranks of dues-paying union members. When the next election rolls around, that will fund more campaign contributions to Democrats and more union help on Election Day.
Unionizing America is the strategy to secure a permanent Democratic majority. The rights of rank-and-file workers be damned.
Gig economy independent contractors such as Uber drivers also lose their freedom under Biden’s plan. It forces them to be “employees,” and therefore ripe for unionization. A similar plan imposed by California Democrats evoked popular outrage and had to be revoked. Unphased, Biden’s pushing ahead on a national scale.
Addressing the nation last week, Biden boasted that he’ll protect labor’s right to organize. News flash: It doesn’t need protecting. Only 10.8% of American workers are unionized because most workers don’t want to share their paycheck with union bosses. In the private sector, it’s even smaller, a minuscule 6%.
When a union tried to organize Amazon warehouse employees in Bessemer, Alabama last month, Biden blasted out a video on social media supporting the union drive. But the warehouse workers voted against organizing.
Congressional Republicans are bashing the $2.3 trillion price tag on Biden’s American Jobs Plan and the job-killing corporate tax hike to pay for it. Those are legitimate grievances. But the GOP should also be protesting the president’s assault on labor rights.
Biden boasts he’s a “union president.” Someone has to look out for the 90% of workers who don’t belong to unions. Republicans should make it their job.
On April 26, Biden announced that it is “the policy of the United States to encourage worker organizing and collective bargaining” and he called for an increase in “worker power.” Biden sounded like Karl Marx calling on workers to unite. In an unprecedented move, Biden is establishing a task force to throw the entire weight of the federal government behind organizing American workers.
Recent polls show a slim majority of Americans support the infrastructure plan. That’s because they haven’t seen the fine print making it nearly impossible for nonunion employers and workers to benefit. When union organizers show up at job sites, contractors will have to stay “neutral,” according to the slippery language in Biden’s plan, instead of making their case like Amazon successfully did.
To unionize America, Biden stretches the meaning of “infrastructure” to include anything he can pay for with your tax dollars. The biggest item is a whopping $400 billion to pay home health workers who will be given “an opportunity to organize or join a union and collectively bargain.”
In 2020, Service Employees International Union, which represents these aides, supported Biden, and candidate Biden pledged $450 billion for more health aide jobs. On your tab, of course.
Biden’s plan fleeces taxpayers and sabotages the rights of nonunion workers. All under the guise of “infrastructure.”
April’s jobs report, to be released Friday, shows 900,000 new hires. The economy is rebounding without Biden’s infrastructure bill. America needs better roads and bridges, but not at the cost of workers’ freedom. The GOP should stand firm on that principle.
PHOTO: SEIU protest. Photo by Spot Us. Attribution-ShareAlike 2.0 Generic (CC BY-SA 2.0).
Betsy McCaughey is a former lieutenant governor of New York and author of "The Next Pandemic," available at Amazon.com. Contact her at [email protected] or on Twitter @Betsy_McCaughey. To find out more about Betsy McCaughey and read features by other Creators Syndicate writers and cartoonists, visit the Creators Syndicate website at www.creators.com.
