A provision of President Joe Biden’s proposed $2.3 trillion infrastructure plan, the American Jobs Plan, would erode “right-to-work” laws in states that do not force workers to join a union, and would include a controversial “card check” system.
As described by the White House, the plan will “promote union organizing and collective bargaining,” in part through the “Protecting the Right to Organize (PRO) Act,” a Democrat bill that passed the House of Representatives earlier this year.
In the event that workers vote not to join a union, the PRO Act allows the National Labor Relations Board (NLRB) to set aside the results if an employer is found to have interfered in any way. The union will then immediately become certified if “a majority of the employees in the bargaining unit have signed authorizations designating the labor organization as their collective bargaining representative” in the year preceding the election.
“Card check” does away with the secret ballot, and it could allow union organizers to intimidate workers — which is why even former Democratic Party presidential nominee George McGovern opposed the idea in 2008. Then as now, Democrats claimed they were helping workers’ rights, calling “card check” the “Employee Free Choice