March 31 (UPI) — A federal employee union filed suit Monday to block an executive order by U.S. President Donald Trump that stripped collective bargaining rights from hundreds of thousands of government workers.
The National Treasury Employees Union, which represents more than 150,000 U.S. government employees, filed its lawsuit in a federal court in the nation’s capital to reverse the president’s order last week which directed officials to “cease participating in grievance procedures.”
“Covered agencies and subdivisions are no longer subject to the collective-bargaining requirements,” read a memo sent by the U.S. Office of Personnel Management to the heads of affected agencies.
It exempted more than a dozen federal agencies — including the Environmental Protection Agency and the U.S. Departments of State, Defense, Homeland Security, Treasury, Veterans Affairs and Health and Human Services — from their legal obligation to engage in collective bargaining. The union maintained this violated federal labor rights and the U.S. Constitution.
“We will vigorously challenge yesterday’s illegal order and fight on behalf of union members across the nation,” union officials posted Friday on social media, calling it “union busting.”
Trump cited a section of the Federal Service Labor-Management Relations Statute in issuing the executive order, arguing that agencies with national security as their primary purpose can be made exempt from collective bargaining.
The NTEU wrote in its suit that Trump’s executive order “is inconsistent with this narrow authority.”
“The administration’s own issuances show that the President’s exclusions are not based on national security concerns, but instead a policy objective of making federal employees easier to fire and political animus against federal sector unions,” it read in part.
On Thursday, the American Federation of Government Employees joined other unions in stating it was preparing for “immediate legal action,” calling Trump’s order “bullying tactics” that represented a “clear threat not just to federal employees and their unions, but to every American who values democracy and the freedoms of speech and association.”
