Unions move to block Trump from nixing bargaining for federal workers

By Daniel Wiessner

April 7 (Reuters) - A group of unions on Monday asked a federal judge in San Francisco to bar the Trump administration from eliminating collective bargaining rights for hundreds of thousands of federal employees.

The American Federation of Government Employees and five other unions moved for a temporary restraining order that would block President Donald Trump's executive order excluding more than a dozen federal agencies from collective bargaining obligations pending further litigation.

The unions in a lawsuit filed last week say Trump's order violates the U.S. Constitution and federal workers' rights to unionize and collectively bargain.

And they said on Monday that the order was a retaliatory measure against federal-sector unions that have sued over Trump administration policies and the purging of the federal workforce.

"The message is clear that to avoid the draconian effects of the Exclusion Order, unions must fall in line with the President’s agenda, cease all efforts to speak out against or challenge in court the President’s policies, and demonstrate to the President’s satisfaction that they will 'work with him' in the future," the unions said.

The White House and the U.S. Department of Justice did not immediately respond to requests for comment.

Trump excluded from collective bargaining obligations agencies that he said "have as a primary function intelligence, counterintelligence, investigative, or national security work." The executive order significantly expands an existing exception from collective bargaining for workers with duties affecting national security, such as certain employees of the CIA and FBI.

The order applies to the departments of Justice, State, Defense, Treasury, Veterans Affairs, and Health and Human Services, among other agencies. It affects about 75% of federal workers currently represented by unions, according to filings in the unions' lawsuit.

Eliminating collective bargaining would allow agencies to alter working conditions and fire or discipline workers more easily, and it could prevent unions from challenging Trump administration initiatives in court.

At least two other challenges to the order are pending, including a lawsuit filed on Monday by a union representing U.S. Department of State employees who are stationed abroad. The president can exempt members of the Foreign Service from collective bargaining, but the union says Trump failed to make the required good faith determination that doing so was necessary.

And in a separate lawsuit, the National Treasury Employees Union says Trump's order would apply to more than 100,000 of its 158,000 members.

On the same day Trump issued the executive order, eight federal agencies filed a lawsuit against AFGE and dozens of the union's local affiliates seeking to invalidate existing union contracts covering thousands of workers. The Treasury Department has filed a similar lawsuit against the NTEU.

Monday's filing includes declarations from more than 40 union officials detailing the potential impact of Trump's executive order. AFGE President Everett Kelley in a filing said that many of the union's local councils and affiliates could cease to exist entirely, and that the union would be hobbled by the loss of dues that members pay.

"Based on decades of experience as a union leader, I know that a union’s bargaining power derives from the number of employees it represents at an agency," Kelley said.

The case is American Federation of Government Employees v. Trump, U.S. District Court for the Northern District of California, No. 3:25-cv-03070.

For the unions: Leon Dayan of Bredhoff & Kaiser; Dan Feinberg of Feinberg Jackson Worthman & Wasow

For the government: Not yet available

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