Social Security, HUD act on Trump’s orders in move to emasculate unions

Enforcing President Trump’s crusade against federal labor organizations, his lieutenants at two large agencies have opened new fronts against government unions.

The Department of Housing and Urban Development (HUD) wants to evict all union offices from agency facilities, while the Social Security Administration (SSA) plans to “revise” 21 points in its union contract.

His actions are part of a coordinated, broad-based aggression against organizations representing federal employees and specifically their collective bargaining agreements.

If Trump is successful — his moves are being challenged in court — he would upset long-standing labor-management relationships that largely have existed in an atmosphere of cooperation rather than the confrontation he favors.

Federal employees are unlikely to appreciate contract revisions sought by an administration that also proposed to freeze their pay next year and cut their retirement benefits by $143.5 billion over 10 years.

The current dispute, however, is not over pay and benefits directly, but rather it focuses on Trump’s desire to emasculate federal labor organizations. So far, the agencies leading the charge have primarily targeted units of the American Federation of Government Employees (AFGE), the largest federal union. The Department of Health and Human Services, however, told the National Treasury Employees Union it should begin paying rent for office space in department facilities. “We will contest this at the negotiating table,” said NTEU President Tony Reardon.

A HUD proposal in a June 14 email to AFGE says: “The union shall have until July 15, 2018 to vacate all offices they currently occupy, return all government property they currently possess and cease using government resources. This applies to field and HQ.”

Referring to executive orders issued by Trump, a June 5 letter from Social Security to AFGE gives “notice of the Agency’s decision to implement all three Orders effective July 9, 2018,” even as it couches the decision as a proposal.

That letter provides a list of 21 contract items Social Security wants to change, including office space, employee rights, child care, elder care, equal opportunity, leave, training, health, safety, performance, discipline, grievance procedures, promotions — almost anything anyone can imagine.

The HUD proposal says the current collective bargaining agreement “is not in accordance with the text or spirit of Executive Order 13837,” which hit the federal workforce on May 25 along with two others.

That executive order, however, says agencies “shall implement the requirements of this order … to the extent permitted by law and consistent with their obligations under collective bargaining agreements in force on the date of this order.”

The current HUD contract allows the union to use agency facilities and does not expire until after the date HUD wants union offices vacated. The SSA contract was extended after expiring in 2015, and that extension does not end until a new agreement is reached.

Ashaki Robinson Johns, president of HUD Local 476, which includes headquarters and the Washington field office, said the department’s eviction notice is a “clear violation of the current contract as well as federal labor relations law. Office space is clearly covered by our current contract.”