| | | | |  | | By Olivia Olander | | | TEA LEAVE-S? Employers in a handful of states this year must adjust to expanded laws for paid or unpaid leave effective Jan. 1, which is “consistent with the emerging trend,” said Joy Rosenquist at employer-side firm Littler. Nearly a dozen states and D.C. require paid family and medical leave, according to the National Conference of State Legislatures, as Congress has so far failed to come to an agreement on federal paid leave. But a few states are going farther. Illinois is at the top of the list. The state enacted a “Paid Leave for All” law that’s unprecedented in scope, as it mandates that the benefits be used for any reason and has fewer exceptions than similar laws in other states, said Molly Weston Williamson, a paid leave expert at the Center for American Progress. Workers in Colorado, meanwhile, now have paid family and medical leave benefits after becoming the first state to enact them through a ballot initiative, Weston Williamson noted. Minnesota also just saw an ordinance go into effect for paid “sick and safe time” — covering illness, caring for others and recovering from domestic or sexual abuse. Unpaid leave, too: Laws newly effective this year for reproductive loss and bereavement unpaid leave reflect an overlapping and emerging trend in state legislatures, said Glenn Jacoby, a policy associate at NCSL. California on Jan. 1 became the second state — behind Illinois — to enact a law specifically giving employees the right to unpaid time off for reproductive loss, including miscarriage and failed adoption; Illinois also enacted specific laws requiring unpaid leave for bereavement. The changes in state law come as Congress has for years been unable to pass paid family leave. Weston Williamson said she believes the push for new protections in recent years is a recognition that federal paid leave policy is “inevitable.” “It’s more of a question of when, not if,” Weston Williamson said. A working group of House members is expected to introduce a bipartisan framework for paid leave soon. GOOD MORNING. It’s Monday, Jan. 8. Welcome back to Morning Shift, your go-to tipsheet on labor and employment-related immigration. Send feedback, tips and exclusives to nniedzwiadek@politico.com and oolander@politico.com. Follow us on X, formerly known as Twitter, at @NickNiedz and @oliviaolanderr.
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| | O’BRIEN BACKS EMBATTLED FACILITY: Teamsters President Sean O’Brien is calling for an embattled immigrant center, which advocates and House progressives have tried to close, to stay open and operate at full capacity. “While we are aware of the recent comments from ICE that it is reviewing the situation at Adelanto … we call on the Administration and ICE to protect our members’ jobs,” the letter to President Joe Biden, sent late last month and reported first in Shift, reads. Teamsters represent nursing staff at the facility, O’Brien wrote. The National Federation of Federal Employees, which also represents staff at the Immigration and Customs Enforcement facility, has also called for it to stay open. Background: “Adelanto holds few detainees, though it has a capacity of 1,940. Its population dropped dramatically in 2020 after an outbreak of COVID-19 tore through the facility, prompting a federal judge to order the release of detainees and to prohibit new intakes and transfers,” the Los Angeles Times previously reported. ICE spokesperson Jenny Burke said in an emailed statement no final decision has been made on closing the facility, but that “ICE must consider the effect of ongoing litigation that prevents full use of the facility,” costs and other factors. Reuters previously reported ICE could save $44 million by shutting it down. FIRST IN SHIFT: AFL-CIO President Liz Shuler at the Labor Innovation and Technology Summit this week will call for unions to be the leading counterweight against “destabilizing forces,” including artificial intelligence, according to prepared remarks shared first with Shift. “The single best movement ready to do that — the only movement ready to do that is — our movement. Our unions,” Shuler’s speech reads. The summit starting Tuesday in Las Vegas, led by SAG-AFTRA and the Tech Institute at the AFL-CIO, is intended to advocate for worker voices in rapidly developing technology. More union news: “American Unions Long Backed Israel. Now, Some Are Protesting It,” from The New York Times. Even more: “EV Maker Lucid Illegally Fired Workers for Supporting Auto Union, US Labor Board Alleges,” from Bloomberg.
| | | HAPPENING TODAY: Top HELP Committee Republican Sen. Bill Cassidy on Monday plans to release a staff report outlining what he calls instances of unfair favoritism by the National Labor Relations Board toward unions. The report specifically focuses on NLRB staff who allegedly worked unfairly with unionizing Starbucks workers, and on the NLRB’s decision in Cemex, which widened the path for unions to win representation of workers. For example, it cites an internal agency watchdog who found an NLRB regional director practiced “gross mismanagement” in a Starbucks union election in Overland Park, Kansas. Cassidy (R-La.) is also expected to send a letter to NLRB General Counsel Jennifer Abruzzo questioning what changes she’s made since the internal report on the Overland Park store was released, among other inquiries. BORDER DEAL SOON?: “Text hopefully this week,” top Republican negotiator Sen. James Lankford (R-Okla.) said of the possibility of an immigration deal between Congress and the White House. The comments came on “Fox News Sunday,” our Burgess Everett reports. The White House has been taking a more aggressive posture on the border ahead of a possible shutdown, “arguing that the GOP is imperiling a funding deal and border security policy with increasingly unreasonable demands,” our Jennifer Haberkorn and Myah Ward report. FOR YOUR RADAR: The House Rules Committee is scheduled to vote Tuesday on a resolution disapproving of the NLRB’s joint employer rule. More Hill news: “Johnson strikes his first bipartisan deal — a $1.7T funding accord,” from our Caitlin Emma and Jennifer Scholtes.
| | FLRA SUED: An administrative judge at the Agriculture Department is suing the federal government’s labor-management agency, seeking to end union representation for himself and dozens of colleagues. At issue is a union election that happened decades ago, when a bargaining unit combined in 1998 to include judges as well as “nonprofessionals,” such as legal assistants and administrative support assistants. The judge, James Holden, argues in a lawsuit that the Federal Labor Relations Authority unlawfully certified the union to include both groups, and also that the government failed to keep proper records. Combining the units should have required a majority of “professional” employees to agree to the decision, but records don’t show whether that was the case, the lawsuit alleges. The case calls attention to alleged record-keeping issues at an agency that certifies units lasting “more or less forever,” said Dave Dorey, senior litigation counsel at the Fairness Center. The organization, which advocates against public unions, helped file the suit. The FLRA declined to comment.
| | NO LAUGHING MATTER: A budding comedian fired from an NPR member station has been ordered back to work, after a third-party arbitrator found some of his jokes to be funny, Vice reports. Pennsylvania-based WHYY fired the employee, Jad Sleiman, after management found comedy clips online. “Though parts of some jokes were deemed potentially inflammatory, many were found to be either funny or an astute critique of some institution of power,” Vice reports on the arbitrator’s review. (He was still ordered to delete the clips, according to outlet.) A spokesperson for the station told Vice it was reviewing the arbitrator’s decision. “People keep asking, ‘Is it going to be weird going back?’,” Sleiman told Vice. “I’m like, yeah, for them.” EXCEEDING EXPECTATIONS: “US employers add a surprisingly strong 216,000 jobs in a sign of continued economic strength,” from The Associated Press. More in the workplace: “Why It’s So Hard for a Robot to Straighten a Candle Wick,” from The Wall Street Journal.
| | | FOUR DAYS ON THE FORCE: A police department outside Denver is experimenting with a 32-hour work week, CNN reports. Like the shortened arrangements that have sprung up at some small and medium-sized companies in recent months and years, the department expects employees to get the same amount of work done in fewer hours, CNN reports. Staffing levels haven’t changed, and the department hopes the change will boost recruitment and retention, the outlet reports. “They have such a diversity of types of jobs,” Golden, Colorado, city manager Scott Vargo told CNN of the police department. “So … it was a good, I’ll say ‘microcosm’ of the city as a whole.” “We figured if we could do it there, that would be a real good opportunity for us to see, ‘is this something that we could transfer elsewhere?’”
| | | | GLOBAL PLAYBOOK IS TAKING YOU TO DAVOS! Unlock the insider's guide to one of the world's most influential gatherings as POLITICO's Global Playbook takes you behind the scenes of the 2024 World Economic Forum. Author Suzanne Lynch will be on the ground in the Swiss Alps, bringing you the exclusive conversations, shifting power dynamics and groundbreaking ideas shaping the agenda in Davos. Stay in the know with POLITICO's Global Playbook, your VIP pass to the world’s most influential gatherings. SUBSCRIBE NOW. | | | | | | | | | — “The prostitute nudging sex workers to file their taxes,” from The Washington Post. — “Harvard student groups issued an anti-Israel statement. CEOs want them blacklisted,” from CNN. — “Pioneering Nuclear Startup Lays Off Nearly Half Its Workforce,” from HuffPost. — “The Absolute Worst Outfits Ever Worn to a Job Interview,” from The Wall Street Journal. THAT’S YOUR SHIFT! | | | | Follow us on Twitter | | | | Follow us | | | | |
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