Capitol Insights: ACCA Fighting for Employers’ Rights

Posted on:

June 21, 2023

One of ACCA’s top priorities is ensuring that our members are protected from legislation and regulations that will burden their businesses. The President’s Cabinet appoints drive many of these burdensome regulations and laws, which then work their way through Congress.

Recently, ACCA has been fighting for our members on two fronts to ensure you are not penalized as business owners and employers.

Opposing Nomination of Secretary Julie Su to Head Department of Labor

In April, ACCA President & CEO Barton James reached out to the Senate Committee on Health, Education, Labor and Pensions and put Chairman Bernie Sanders (VT) and Ranking Member Bill Cassidy, M.D. (LA) on notice that ACCA opposed the appointment of Acting Secretary Julie Su to replace Secretary Marty Walsh as head of the Department of Labor, due to her troubling record at the California Labor and Workforce Development Agency.

In the letter, James said, “Under Ms. Su’s leadership at the California Labor and Workforce Development Agency, she supported initiatives that threatened business models that have created prosperity for millions of workers and entrepreneurs. Su played a significant role in the passage of A.B. 5. The language embraced in Su’s approach would have left millions wondering whether they could continue to work as self-employed individuals or would have to seek jobs elsewhere. This led to controversy and chaos, with over 200 industries and occupations seeking and securing exemptions from the law. The law proved so unpopular that voters of California overwhelmingly rejected it by passing Proposition 22 in 2020.”

“Moreover, Ms. Su oversaw the implementation of California’s emergency COVID-19 workplace safety rule, which unfairly held employers liable for something they neither caused nor created. Under the rule, employers were required to provide weekly testing to all employees and paid leave for an infinite duration to any employee who tested positive, regardless of whether they contracted the virus at work or not. The rule imposed by Ms. Su was overly broad, unworkable, burdensome, and wholly unfair. Ms. Su never produced a single study supporting the notion that employers were contributing to the rampant community spread of COVID-19.”

ACCA is not the only organization nor people concerned with this potential appointment. Senator Joe Manchin (WV) informed the Biden Administration that he has “deep reservations” about Secretary Su (Source: Axios). If Sen. Manchin does not vote in her favor, she will likely not have the support needed for confirmation.

ACCA will continue to monitor this appointment process and inform its members of any developments which could affect their business.

Urging Congress to Reject the PRO ACT

Another key area where ACCA is fighting for its members in Congress surrounds the Protecting the Right to Organize (PRO) Act, H.R. 20 and S. 567. ACCA opposes the PRO ACT, because it would radically rewrite federal labor laws and restrict employers’ rights.

Some of the most egregious provisions would:

Strip away workers’ privacy rights and key protections guaranteeing workers’ free choice through secret ballots in union representation elections;
Require workers to pay union dues as a condition of employment even in states that have Right-to-Work protections;
Force small businesses that rely on independent contractors to lay off workers and potentially close;
Change the legal standard for joint-employer liability, reducing opportunities for our country’s small and local businesses through subcontracts, licensing, and franchising;
Violate employers’ right to attorney-client confidentiality on complex labor law issues, making it harder for businesses, particularly small businesses, to secure legal advice;
Impose government control over private contracts;
Infringe on the due process rights of employers; and
Expose the economy to a flood of “blackmail” strikes used by unions to attack businesses simply to destroy the business and for anti-competitive purposes, even though these tactics were overwhelmingly banned by bipartisan majorities in Congress in the 1940s and 1950s.

Many of these individual policies have been previously rejected by the courts and legislatively on a bipartisan basis. Introduced during the last Congress, the PRO Act passed the House and gained significant support in the Senate.

ACCA needs your help fighting this legislation that will impact your business negatively if passed. Now is the time to tell your elected officials why they should stand up for your rights as an employer and reject the PRO Act. It’s easy to do this, just use the pre-written Action Alert that ACCA has available here. Together, we can be a loud voice to tell Congress our industry won’t stand for them infringing on our rights!