Due to an unforced error by Democrats, we lost the National Labor Relations Board majority two years earlier than expected. This is a huge setback for the hundreds of thousands of workers across this country organizing for a better contract. Let me explain. 🧵
The NLRB is America's leading labor law enforcement agency. In the last 3 years, union petitions have doubled because we have a strong NLRB that supports workers who choose to form unions, ensures that corporations allow free and fair union elections, and protects union workers if Big Business retaliates against them.
The term of our previous NLRB Chair, Lauren McFerran, just expired on December 15th. She was eligible for reconfirmation alongside a Republican, who'd be paired with her. This would've secured a 3-2 Democratic majority on the NLRB for the first two years of Trump's second term. @BernieSanders did the right thing. He cleared her nomination on August 6, but the Dems fumbled it.
On the morning of the 11th, Senate Democrats had a chance to move McFarren's nomination vote through – which would've led to a secondary vote to confirm. Senator Vance, Roberts, and Manchin were absent that morning. But we delayed the vote (for what I'm hearing described as "no reason") until Vance and Manchin returned, deadlocking the vote at 49-49.
We then failed to get word to Vice President Harris quickly enough to come and deliver the tie-breaking vote. In the 90 minutes that transpired, Senator Manchin returned first, swinging the vote in the other direction and ceding the NLRB to MAGA control two years earlier than necessary. These procedural blunders have massive implications for the American people, who deserve better from their elected officials. American workers deserve an explanation.
It will hurt the young folks organizing at Starbucks and the workers organizing at Amazon. It’s inexcusable and inexplicable that we did not prioritize confirming the NLRB appointees like we do federal judges and have ceded the Board two years before we needed to.
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