‘Century-old artifact’ | AAUP surge | Housing assistance

Wednesday, February 25, 2026

STRIKES

► From Apple Valley Health — MultiCare Yakima Memorial Hospital to seek replacement workers [scabs] for striking technical employees — Union leadership said the healthcare company informed them it is moving forward to find replacement workers [scabs] for employees on strike. While union officials acknowledge the provider has the legal right to pursue this action, they described it as disappointing. “The hospital has pulled out the biggest tools in their shed, right? And they’re going to take their biggest swing with putting this out there in terms of this threat with replacing employees, and I have a funny feeling that they’re going to be pleasantly surprised that this group is not giving up the fight,” said Rick Salinas with Teamsters Local 760.

LOCAL

► From the Yakima Herald-Republic — Hundreds of WA families could lose housing assistance under new rule — Hundreds of families across Washington could lose housing under a proposed federal rule to bar households with mixed immigration statuses from living in units even partially covered by a federal rental subsidy. The proposal, which was submitted to the federal register last week, is the second effort by the Trump administration to prohibit any federal housing help to families in which some members are eligible and others are not…It could have an outsized effect in Washington, according to federal data from 2024 analyzed by the left-leaning Center for Budget and Policy Priorities. At the time, Washington had 600 mixed-status families who lived in public housing or units funded by Section 8 housing vouchers — the fifth-largest number among all 50 states.

► From the Seattle Times — Net worth of Seattle-area households more than double the U.S. median — Our metro area’s median household income was about $112,400 in 2024, about 38% higher than the national median, according to census data. Meanwhile, the median net worth of all households in the Seattle metro area was an eye-popping $901,000 last year, according to Acxiom, a Conway, Ark.-based database marketing company that estimates household net worth…The median is the midpoint, meaning half of households have higher net worths and half have lower. A household can consist of a family, a single person or unrelated people, such as roommates.

► From the Kitsap Sun — Evictions rise again in WA, remain high in Kitsap — There were 23,969 eviction filings last year, according to data provided by the Washington State Office of Civil Legal Aid. That is the highest total dating back to at least 2013. “If you look at the overall trend, you’re seeing historic highs in the amount of unlawful detainer [eviction] filings in Washington state right now,” said Philippe Knab, an eviction defense program manager at the state office of Civil Legal Aid…Over half of the state’s eviction cases were filed in King, Pierce and Snohomish Counties, which all set record highs in 2025. Pierce County saw 3,655 evictions, 87 more than in 2024.

► From OPB — Armed ICE officer in Portland called 911 during confrontation: ‘I’m going to have to shoot this kid.’ — In October, a U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement officer grew frustrated by a “kid” tailing his unmarked Ford Explorer on a motorized bicycle. It was 3:30 p.m. in Northeast Portland…He told a 911 dispatcher to send local officers or else he would take matters into his own hands. “I need someone here now, or else I’m going to have to shoot this kid,” said Israel D. Hernandez, according to a recording of his emergency call exclusively obtained by OPB…At one point, an electronic chime breaks into the call, suggesting Hernandez had opened his door while the SUV’s engine ran. He acknowledged to the dispatcher that he was planning to get out of his vehicle. The dispatcher interjected. “Why? You can drive away. We have officers en route to you,” the dispatcher said.

► From the Renton Reporter — ‘Never again is now’: Remembering 125k incarcerated Japanese-Americans — On Saturday, the stories of living survivors Hana Konishi and Paul Tomita reverberated through the Expo Hall, mingling in the large space with readings by author Tamiko Nimura, discussions of art about the incarceration experience by Chris Hopkins, and updates from Stan Shikuma of Tsuru for Solidarity…At Shikuma’s station, he shared updates about the organization’s partnership with La Resistencia, including an invitation to all attendees to join a Solidarity Day event at the Northwest Detention Center in Tacoma that was hosted immediately after the event in Puyallup. There, survivors of Japanese American WWII incarceration spoke about the “parallels between their lived experiences and the current victims of mass immigration detention,” according to event materials.

CONTRACT FIGHTS

► From OPB — Portland Community College unions authorize potential first strike — The college defends its offer pointing to “growing uncertainty around federal funding” and mounting budget cuts from the state. PCC says it’s facing $18 million cuts in the current budget cycle, on top of $11.3 million it has already cut. College officials say they’re bracing for another $21 million in cuts in the 2027-29 biennium. Union leaders, though, say the college is making its own questionable spending choices. They say PCC has increased the budget for the college president’s office by $17 million and “allocating large sums to non-student-facing special projects and contingency funds.”

► From the National Catholic Reporter — St. John’s University says it no longer recognizes faculty unions after 56 years — “Our response is that the administration of St. John’s cannot unilaterally dissolve a collective bargaining unit that has existed for 56 years,” said Christopher Denny, a theology and religious studies professor who serves as president of the university’s Faculty Association…Denny and Cocozzelli had expressed concerns about the university’s intentions for the unions in November, shortly after St. John’s attorneys filed a response to an unfair labor practice complaint that the unions had brought against the university during contract negotiations. Asserting its identity as a religious institution of higher education, attorneys for St. John’s University argued that New York’s Public Employment Relations Board lacked jurisdiction over the university on First Amendment grounds.

ORGANIZING

► From the Houston Chronicle — Texas professor firings spur AAUP union surge statewide  — Two university professors were fired the same week in September — one at Texas A&M and another at Texas State — shortly after they each drew conservative outrage on social media. Over the next 30 days, about 800 faculty, staff and graduate students across Texas joined their union, according to the state’s organization of the American Association of University Professors, part of the American Federation of Teachers. Leaders with the group say it was a peak moment in a year already marked by rapid growth, as federal and state lawmakers target classroom instruction and personal speech in higher education.

NATIONAL

► From the AP — Court says the IRS can continue to share immigrants’ taxpayer data with ICE — A three-judge panel for the U.S. Court of Appeals for the D.C. Circuit declined to issue a preliminary injunction for the immigrants’ rights group, Centro de Trabajadores Unidos, and other nonprofits that are suing the federal government over the data-sharing agreement signed last April by Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent and Homeland Security Secretary Kristi Noem. The agreement allows U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement to submit names and addresses of immigrants inside the U.S. illegally to the IRS for cross-verification against tax records. In declining the preliminary injunction request, Judge Harry T. Edwards wrote that the nonprofit groups “are unlikely to succeed on the merits of their claim,” since the information the agencies are sharing isn’t covered by the IRS privacy statute.

POLITICS & POLICY

► From My Northwest — ‘Millionaire tax’ sparks fiery House hearing — April Sims, president of the Washington State Labor Council, AFL-CIO, which represents 650,000 unionized workers across the state, endorsed the tax and explained rich people should pay up. “Our tax code is broken. It’s a century-old artifact that has failed to provide a stable foundation for you all to build a state that Washingtonians deserve,” Sims said. “This budget challenge is the latest in a series of disruptions that have pulled the rug out from under working families, just as we were picking ourselves up from a previous crisis … It’s time for the wealthiest people in the history of this world who call Washington home to pay their fair share.”

► From the Washington State Labor Council:

► From the Business Standard — Trump’s speech ‘divorced’ from economic reality, says labour union — The speech was “completely divorced from the economic reality working people feel every day amid rising costs and vanishing jobs,” said Shuler. “President Trump boasted about a ‘golden age’ for workers, but he spent the past year rigging the rules for billionaire CEOs and Big Tech companies while kicking millions of Americans off their health care,” she said. Shuler said the labour movement was growing stronger in the face of Trump’s policies, and has now logged the largest number of unionised workers in 16 years.

► From the New York Times — House Narrowly Rejects Air Safety Bill After Pentagon Opposition — The House struck down aviation safety legislation on Tuesday that would have required planes to carry a type of tracking technology that federal investigators determined could have helped avoid a midair collision over the Potomac River last year that killed 67 people. The bipartisan legislation, known as the ROTOR Act, passed the Senate unanimously in December, and appeared poised to earn widespread support in the House…Thirty-five members of the House did not vote, and in a sign of the tension surrounding the legislation, G.O.P. leaders gaveled the vote to a close while some members appeared to still be casting votes.

► From Common Dreams — Why Labor Needs a Declaration of Political Independence — Overall, 57% of the respondents in our YouGov survey support the idea of an independent political organization for workers…No matter how you slice the demographics, aside from Democratic and Republican Party operatives, a new political party independent of the Democrats and Republicans is really popular. That’s why opening up a discussion about how to build a new working-class party stands a decent chance of increasing solidarity among the various political groups in the union rank-and-file. It allows leadership to respond to what the workers really want—a party that puts their needs and interests at its center rather than adopting watered-down policies designed to please billionaire donors.

The Stand posts links to local, national and international labor news every weekday morning. Subscribe to get daily news in your inbox.