How President Trump can restore sanity to America’s labor laws

In President Trump’s first two months in office, it’s become abundantly clear that his administration is serious and well on its way to getting our economy back on track after eight years of burdensome and detrimental regulations.

From President Trump’s “one-in, two-out” executive order, to his administration’s signal concerning the harmful and arbitrary overtime rule, the administration has gotten immediately to work cutting through bureaucratic red tape and unleashing employee freedom. Indeed, these are the free market ideals, commitment to putting Americans back to work, and pledges to grow our economy that swept Donald Trump into office.

{mosads}The nomination of Alexander Acosta, a former member of the National Labor Relations Board (NLRB) and assistant attorney general for the Justice Department’s Civil Rights division, to head the Department of Labor has provided yet another sign that the president will fulfill his campaign promises and reshape labor policy in a way that works for all Americans, workers and job creators alike.

However, there is still plenty of work to be done. Now that the President’s cabinet is filling out, it’s time for the Trump administration to appoint two new, pro-business board members to fill the vacant NLRB seats. President Trump’s appointment of Philip Miscimarra, a pro-employee and employer board member, as acting head of the NLRB is a great start, but these two additional seats must be filled quickly for the real work to begin.

When the NLRB was created decades ago by the National Labor Relations Act, lawmakers envisioned it as an unbiased arbiter of labor disputes to ensure that our nation’s workers were protected from unfair labor practices. What they did not envision, however, was a job-killing agency undertaking the bidding of Big Labor that makes it harder for businesses to open and operate, and in turn, hire new workers.

The last eight years have sullied the board’s reputation, as the Obama administration tirelessly employed it as a tool to do the bidding of union bosses. The list of egregious, labor-law-changing decisions made in recent years is quite long. From a Joint Employer Standard that deconstructs America’s franchise model to rules tipping the scales toward workplace unionization, such as ambush elections and micro-unions, each decision seemed worse than the next.

But finally, under President Trump, we have a chance to restore sanity to our labor laws and bring the NLRB back to its original charter: maintaining workplace fairness and balancing the interests of business, labor, and of course, employees across the country.

With President Trump in office and, if confirmed, Alexander Acosta at the helm at the Labor Department, we have an opportunity to restore balance to labor relations in our country by removing unnecessary constraints and unleashing our nation’s economic potential.

And that’s what American workers so badly want. They cherish their individual freedoms and recognize the interests of union bosses do not align with their own. This has been clearly evidenced by the drastic decline in union membership nationwide. Our economic policies should be focused on protecting workers and putting America first, not pandering to the desires of Big Labor.

That’s why it’s so important President Trump get to work installing pro-workers, pro-jobs, and pro-growth board members at the NLRB to counterbalance the strong union influence we have today. These vacancies present a real opportunity to turn the board’s agenda around, and to get to work rolling back many of the disastrous decisions of the past several years. President Trump must use his executive power to fill these seats — and soon — as it’s critical for our nation moving forward.

Heather Greenaway is a spokesperson for the Workforce Fairness Institute.

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