Farmworker rights | What your taxes pay for | Public employees & AI

Wednesday, April 15, 2026

LOCAL

► From the Chinook Observer — Timberland Regional Library trustees take public questions about ongoing budget crisis — Many with questions about the mass staff layoffs set to go into effect May 15 left unsatisfied, however, as TRL has reengaged in negotiations with the library workers union AFSCME Local 3758. “We’re meeting with the union this coming week and continue to work forward,” said Board of Trustees President Brian Mittge. “There was just some new discussion that our staff brought forward to us this last week that I think will move us in a positive direction.”…AFSCME Local 3758 has publicly disputed TRL’s application of the collective bargaining agreement in regards to the layoffs, and has warned of possible legal challenges if the layoffs go forward as planned.

► From the Wenatchee World — CVCH educates farm workers on heat risks as wildfire season nears — As part of the program, the health center will begin visiting agricultural sites this summer to deliver education and resources directly to workers. “We more accurately are reaching out to the folks who are disproportionately affected, which may or may not be the same thing,” Styles said. “Our aim really is to just share education and personal protective equipment with people who will be impacted by it the most.” She continued by saying CVCH specifically applied around farm workers because it aligns with how the health center started as a clinic to help people who worked in agriculture.

NATIONAL

► From Capital & Main — ICE Has Arrested Dozens of Delivery Drivers at the Gates of a San Diego Military Base — While undocumented people have long avoided military bases because of the possibility of deportation, a pilot program launched last year at Camp Pendleton is trapping people with temporary permission to be in the U.S. so that officers can send them to immigration detention facilities and try to convince them to agree to deportation. According to local attorneys, Alkhawaja is among dozens of people detained by ICE at the gates of the U.S. Marine Corps base even though they had temporary permission to be in and work in the U.S.  “It’s a business,” Alkhawaja said. “This is what I found out in the detention center. We are just numbers that generate income to big corporations.”…“I haven’t had a single judge say that the authorities on Camp Pendleton have the right to hold them and that ICE has the right to cart them off to detention and keep them there,” McGoldrick said.  “That’s what I find astounding,” he said. “Over and over and over again, the district court rules that this detention that’s happening on Camp Pendleton is a violation of due process, but they just keep doing it because most people don’t have an attorney that can get them out.”

► From the Miami Herald — Miami unions want fair pay, conditions for World Cup workers: ‘Promises are not enough’  — Other host cities, like Seattle, have clear agreements and enforcement mechanisms regarding hiring skilled labor, paying livable wages and ensuring safety standards, said Chris Beckford, vice president of South Florida’s AFL-CIO chapter, which represents workers across 60 local unions. Though he had hoped something similar would happen in Miami, Beckford said no enforced accord yet exists…Labor leaders called on the host committee to use Miami-Dade County’s prevailing wage — the standard wage for a given profession, as determined by the county — as a baseline and to require transparency from contractors about how much they’re paying their workers. The coalition is also calling for the host committee to screen all vendors for prior labor violations before awarding contracts.

► From Common Dreams — With Help From Trump-GOP Law, At Least 88 Big US Corporations Paid $0 in Federal Income Tax Last Year — Dozens of America’s most profitable corporations avoided paying any federal income taxes in 2025, according to an analysis out on Tuesday from the Institute on Taxation and Economic Policy. The 88 companies—which include Tesla, Southwest Airlines, Live Nation, Palantir, Citigroup, and many others listed in the S&P 500—brought in a collective $105 billion in pretax income last year. ITEP found that 2025 saw a spike in corporate tax avoidance, enabled in part by new loopholes created by the One Big Beautiful Bill Act signed by President Donald Trump and by his 2017 Tax Cuts and Jobs Act, which reduced the corporate tax rate to 21% from its previous 35%.

► From Common Dreams — OPINION: The Average Taxpayer Shelled Out Over $4,000 for War and Weapons Last Year  — Around half of Americans are struggling to afford basic necessities. But last year, instead of investing in programs that help people make ends meet, the president and his friends in Congress passed a Big Ugly Bill that cut taxes for the wealthy, slashed health insurance and food assistance for millions of Americans, and added billions in new spending for war and mass deportations…More than half of the Pentagon’s sum went to private, for-profit military contractors—the top CEOs of which now make over $25 million a year on average. Put another way, you spent about 50 days working and paying taxes last year just to feed the war machine—and 23 days working to pay those Pentagon contractors and their millionaire CEOs.

► From AFSCME:

► From People’s World — People’s World May Day Town Hall to feature national labor leaders  — As part the effort to make this May Day the biggest ever, People’s World is sponsoring a special online town hall event this Thursday, April 16, at 8:00 p.m. Eastern time. A panel of labor movement leaders from across the country will lead a discussion to strategize and plan for International Workers Day. Fred Redmond—Secretary-Treasurer, AFL-CIO…Faye Guenther—President, UFCW Local 3000.

POLITICS & POLICY

► From the Stranger — Which Democrats Killed the Bill for Farmworkers Rights? — Backed by emotional testimony from the state’s union farmworkers and the powerful Washington State Labor Council, from the outside, it looked as if the bill was going to pass the Senate with strong Democratic support. And then all of a sudden, it didn’t…Most of all, supporters of the bill tell The Stranger it was the romantic messaging power of Washington’s agricultural lobby that tipped the balance, convincing enough Senate Democrats ignorant of the realities of farm labor over the fence into opposing a bill they believed would hurt an idealized vision of family farmers…Saldaña’s claim that a preliminary vote tally came up 3 short means 8 total Senate Democrats opposed the bill to keep it from being safely introduced for an official floor vote. Without that floor vote we don’t know where every Senate Democrat stands on the issue of farmworker collective bargaining rights.

► From the Washington State Standard — Trump backs Braun to unseat WA’s Gluesenkamp Perez in US House race — “John Braun has my Complete and Total Endorsement,” the president wrote. “HE WILL NEVER LET YOU DOWN!” Braun, who is state Senate minority leader, also hauled in endorsements from U.S. House Speaker Mike Johnson and House Majority Leader Steve Scalise on Tuesday, cementing himself as the GOP torchbearer in the high-stakes contest…“John Braun needed this endorsement. And he’ll be beholden to it. But voters in Southwest Washington deserve a representative who answers to them and won’t just do what they’re told by a national political machine,” [Rep. Glusenkamp-Perez] said.

Editor’s note: with truly dismal approval numbers in Washington state (69% disapproval among independents!) it’s an open question how helpful or harmful this endorsement pay be. 

► From the Columbian Basin Herald — Task force recommendation could protect WA public employees’ jobs from AI advances — Advocating for the recommendation at the task force’s April 11 meeting was task member Cherika Carter with the Washington State Labor Council, AFL-CIO. “Today, AI is no longer just a tool,” she said. “It can directly shape wages,  performance evaluations and job security through automated decision-making systems. “At its core, this recommendation is about alignment,” she added. “If AI is shaping the fundamental terms for workers, we want to make sure that we have opportunity and have a say.”

► From News From the States — Immigration enforcement to be funded for 3 years under US Senate GOP plan — U.S. Senate Majority Leader John Thune said Tuesday he plans to use the complex reconciliation process to fund immigration enforcement for the next three years, though it wasn’t immediately clear if House Republicans were on the exact same page…Schumer said Democrats would use the marathon amendment voting session on both the budget resolution and the later reconciliation bill to hold Republicans’ “feet to the fire on DHS, on the war, on so many other issues.”

► From KUOW — Tax season was supposed to bring big refunds. So far they’re less than expected — And Americans appear to be shrugging their shoulders at the tax changes. A recent survey by the Bipartisan Policy Center, a Washington think tank advising on federal policy, found 62% of respondents either thought the tax changes harmed them or made no difference. Even among Republicans, only 35% said the changes favored them. “There’s a bit of a disappointment in how much those refunds are,” said Tom O’Saben, the director of tax content and government relations at the National Association of Tax Professionals. “People are quietly, perhaps, happy but not to the extent where I would call it significant.”

► From the AP — Sexual abuse allegations are spurring calls for a broader reckoning in Congress — [Former Rep. Jackie] Speier, who entered politics by first working as a congressional aide and experienced harassment from a supervisor, said that part of the problem in Congress is that members are given wide latitude to run their offices. All 535 lawmakers are bosses of their own hand-selected staff. “There’s really no one overseeing you,” Speier said. “There’s a sense of entitlement that kind of overtakes many of these members.” Speier, alongside then-Rep. Bradley Byrne, led the effort to pass legislation to make it easier to report sexual harassment and discrimination, including banning nondisclosure agreements to protect members of Congress.

INTERNATIONAL

► From Euro News — German pilots’ union announces further strikes at Lufthansa this week — “There is absolutely no movement on the part of the employers,” said Andreas Pinheiro, President of VC. “Neither Lufthansa and Lufthansa Cargo have made an offer regarding company pension schemes, nor has Lufthansa CityLine made a viable offer for a new collective bargaining agreement on remuneration, nor has Eurowings made any offer regarding company pension schemes.”

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