Do we have a spending problem? I argue no. Short 🧵 Here's a graph of all program spending EXCEPT Social Security and Medicare from 1950-present (with projections through 2056). It's already way below average, moving towards historic lows. So clearly that part of the govt isn't a "problem."

Inequality is costing middle class households tens of thousands of dollars

A new @epi.org report found that US companies are spending more than $1.5 billion a year on union-busting consultants and lawyers. They’ll spend unlimited money crushing workers’ voices and then claim there’s no money for better conditions.

Spanberger insists she’s OK with collective bargaining in theory, just not in practice. buff.ly/8zHe3WS

Thanks to NYHTC, the essential work of housekeepers — so often ignored or demeaned — pays enough in NYC to lead a life of dignity. That’s the power of a union. At this moment of staggering inequality, we need more of it.

LIRR workers struck and won. Strikes work. If you want to learn how to fight and win better pay for you and your co-workers too, contact us.

If you’d like to forego retirement and instead use your deferred wages to fund the lifestyles of the creators of Trumpcoin, Whalepanda, Asspennies, and Poocoin, Senate Banking is working hard on a bill to make your dream (others might call a nightmare) a reality.

A pyramid scheme always needs new marks. The final frontier for crypto is trillions of dollars in workers’ deferred wages. Senate Banking may move a bill this week to grease the skids for the crypto bros to slide right into your pension and walk off with your money.

CONGRATS: We are incredibly proud of our members who won or were finalists for 2026 Pulitzer Awards. Democracy depends on their journalism and it’s why we fight for – and win – strong contracts to protect our members’ ability to do their work.

UPDATE: VA Central Office is instructing facilities to return to the status quo for all AFGE-represented employees. This includes EVERYONE covered by the Master Agreement before the August 6, 2025 Termination.

That speech alone cost each of us about $7.20 more each time we fill up the gas tank.

In the lose-lose tit-for-tat of the Iran War, the Trump Administration is considering responding to Iran’s blocking of the strait of Hormuz by blocking the strait of your doctor’s office.

Collective action matters. When we fight, we win. ✊

Higher ed workers in Virginia are fighting to be included in VA’s historic collective bargaining legislation. @aaupmason.bsky.social’s Tim Gibson makes it clear why faculty & all those who teach deserve this right. @aaupvirginia.bsky.social @ucwva.bsky.social

I met with AI data labelers in Kenya who are organizing their colleagues to fight the brutal working conditions and horrible pay given to the workers at the "bottom of the AI supply chain." They believe the NDAs they've signed are unenforceable so are speaking out: www.404media.co/ai-is-africa...

Sacrifices. Maybe we could sacrifice masks on our secret police.

The SAVE Act summed up: we must disenfranchise millions of working class US citizens from being able to vote so that we can ensure 20 (TWENTY) noncitizens who somehow ended up registered in Georgia and who are no longer registered don’t somehow get registered again.

At every USL game this weekend, USL players paused play for 60 seconds in a powerful show of solidarity. They’re united and ready to fight for the fair contract they deserve. As the players stand still, America’s unions stand with them. #StandUpForStandards

A Starbucks manager blows up after being called out by customers for barista harassment and union-busting 😳 THIS is what solidarity looks like!

The Department of Labor was created to protect all working people. Weakening labor enforcement that protect wages and safety on the job because they are union members is a blatant and outrageous attack on *all* workers’ rights.

That vest didn't get dirty sitting on the sidelines. Shoutout to every woman in the trades who earns her place every single day. We see you. We stand with you. #WIC2026 #WomenInConstruction #LIUNASister #UnionStrong

SCOTUS stands up against POTUS on issues where capital opposes POTUS (Fed independence, arbitrary tariffs...). Anywhere else?

“One protesting strategy has been shown time and again to be most effective in the US: nonviolence.” @owasow.bsky.social www.theguardian.com/us-news/2025...

Call US Senators and tell them to vote against the SAVE Act. It has already passed the US House. In its current form, it means that 100 years after women earned the right to vote, we are facing down the implementation of a 21st century poll tax for women.

Yesterday morning kids were sent running from their bus stop in panic because ICE showed up. This guy at today’s ICE Out of Lindenwold protest is a must watch 😭. @maddow.bsky.social

Walmart just became a trillion-dollar company, joining the ranks of corporate giants at the very top. Meanwhile, some Walmart workers start as low as $14/hour, and thousands still rely on SNAP & Medicaid to get by. That gap isn’t accidental. It’s a choice about who this economy is built to reward.

GERMANY: Verdi announces more public sector strikes www.yahoo.com/news/article...

New: UAW reaches landmark tentative contract deal with Volkswagen in Chattanooga Tennessee, including 20% across-the-board pay hikes www.bloomberg.com/news/article... "This contract is proof that if you stand up and stick together, you can win a better life”

New from me: It is not just that the US is experiencing democratic backsliding. Authoritarianism has emerged more quickly than in other benchmark countries. This graph from John Burn-Murdoch sums it up. 🧵 donmoynihan.substack.com/p/autocracy-...

Union workers solved the trolley problem, you're welcome

A vision for the future: a 13-member Supreme Court and 4 new nominees who understand the take care clause limits the presidential pardon power, as no founding father would have countenanced a lawless dictator.

Trump is as easy as they come. Nursing home firms donated $4.8M to Trump's super PAC in Aug. Their executives got a lunch in Aug. at Trump's golf club where they asked him to revoke a rule to increase staffing to prevent patient neglect. His administration revoked the rule. https://seiu.co/3Mgepcx

I wrote this yesterday about the hero city of Minneapolis www.youtube.com/watch?v=IKOW...

The latest from NY Magazine shares what NYSNA nurses have known all along – travel nurses can't replace the care that NYC staff nurses provide. Hospitals must settle fair contracts with their dedicated nurses! https://nymag.com/intelligencer/article/nurses-strike-nyc-hospital-safe-union.html

This is how we should honor #AlexPretti … by sharing this video of him with a veteran who had died at the VA Hospital where he worked… @katiecouric.bsky.social @hcrichardson.bsky.social @ruthbenghiat.bsky.social @joycewhitevance.bsky.social @rbreich.bsky.social youtube.com/shorts/tCa-r...

Good news: reports say HHS is restoring funding to NIOSH, the agency that researches workplace safety. The labor movement led the fight to restore this critical funding. We made it clear: worker safety isn’t optional. Restore NIOSH workers!

The corollary of this is that many far-right groups have gotten less militant: they know ICE is doing the dirty work of terrorizing minority communities, so they don't have to. Alongside their own propaganda, Patriot Front members put up posters encouraging readers to call the ICE tip line.

No warrant presented. Breached the door. Children present. Guns pointed. Tasers threatened. Hands on the resident. Masks covering faces. Dressed in camo fatigues. Terrorized family. Donald Trump’s America. Anyone’s home could be next.

Rene Good was not engaged in hateful rhetoric. Her last words were “dude, I’m not mad at you.” Even when you talk like that, you might get shot in the face by ICE. So - no - it’s not the rhetoric.

I can't say this loudly enough: THEY ARE TRYING TO NORMALIZE THE KILLING OF CIVILIANS FOR PARTICIPATING IN FIRST AMENDMENT PROTECTED PROTEST ACTIVITIES.

Since Plato is in the news: What was Plato's status at the Nazified university? This 1934 diagram from the journal "Völkische Kultur" shows one response. It puts Plato in a cosmopolitan lineage of degradation leading to Kant which was, in a common antisemitic trope, portrayed as suspiciously Jewish.

This is insane. I’m not even a Platonist, and this is insane. It’s Soviet-level absurdity.

AGMA Statement on Washington National Opera and The Kennedy Center: We stand with WNO Artists and the Company. Link: www.musicalartists.org/agma-stateme...

So about this…

NEW: Post-Gazette to shut down 240-year-old paper after SCOTUS slaps down company’s bid to evade court order “Instead of simply following the law, the owners chose to punish local journalists and the city of Pittsburgh,” said Goldstein, president of @pghguild.com newsguild.org/pittsburgh-p...

Yes exactly. If protesters stand in front of cars, it’s fine to kill them, if someone is *inside* a car, then it’s fine for law enforcement standing in front of them to shoot them in the face.

A paramilitary force stalking our cities answerable not to any local authorities but only to Trump - made possible by the One Big Beautiful Bill. This great chart from @epi.org paints the startling picture. We’re now spending 80x more on ICE-related activities than on protecting American workers.

“Hitler’s “Mein Kampf” was not one of the books removed from the Naval Academy library, and as heinous as that book is, it should be accessible to scholars and students of history. However, this makes the removal of Maya Angelou’s “I Know Why the Caged Bird Sings” inexplicable.”