Ball without billionaires | KGW propaganda | Millionaire’s court fail

Tuesday, May 5, 2026

TODAY’S MUST-READ

► From the NW Labor Press — What KGW doesn’t want Portland to know — There is a version of this story that KGW’s corporate parent, TEGNA Inc., would prefer you read. In that version, a well-meaning company expressed its views about unionization, workers made a free and informed choice, and whatever happens next is just the normal mechanics of labor law playing out. That version is fiction…Fliers made false claims about IBEW Local 48’s record of protecting members’ jobs. One communication singled out an individual KGW employee by name, the shop steward for the existing bargaining unit, in a manner that the union can only describe as an attempt to intimidate and harass…I want to be precise about what I mean when I call this propaganda, because the word carries weight. What I mean is that KGW repeatedly and deliberately communicated falsehoods; that it used the machinery of employment, the power differential between a corporation and the individuals who depend on it for their livelihoods, to create an atmosphere of fear and surveillance; and that it targeted individual workers in ways calculated to make them feel exposed and alone.

CONTRACT FIGHTS

► From the UCSD Guardian — AFSCME 3299 announces open-ended strike — Beginning on May 14, American Federation of State, County and Municipal Employees Local 3299 will launch an open-ended strike. Citing unfair labor practices, employees represented by AFSCME 3299 will withhold their labor indefinitely. AFSCME 3299 represents almost 39,000 employees in service and patient care across the University of California. This open-ended unfair labor practice strike follows an ongoing series of contract negotiations between AFSCME 3299 and the UC bargaining team that began over two years ago in January 2024.

► From the NW Labor Press — New contract at last at Safeway bakery — It took a while, but production workers at Safeway Clackamas bakery have a new agreement with Bakers Local 114 that raises wages $4.50 an hour over its four-year term. The first year raise is retroactive to July 19, 2025, when the last contract expired. The contract covers 49 members who produce house brand bread and buns sold in local Safeway stores. Talks slowed to a crawl for months as the company dug in its heels about whether to pay the increased health premium.

► From Starbucks Workers United:

 

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ORGANIZING

► From the Chicago Sun Times — University of Chicago Press workers form union — Employees at the University of Chicago Press have formed a union called UCP Workers Guild to push for fair wages, protections from artificial intelligence and better work conditions, according to an announcement Monday. Out of more than 270 employees at the press, 139 workers are eligible to join the union, which is part of the Chicago News Guild. If all join, it would be the News Guild’s largest unit, according to the Guild.

NATIONAL

► From the New York Times — A ‘Ball Without Billionaires’ Kicks Off the First Monday in May — At the Ball Without Billionaires, the spotlight was not on A-list celebrities or the gala’s controversial lead sponsors and honorary chairs Jeff Bezos and his wife, Lauren Sánchez Bezos, but on the workers that power the companies under Bezos’s vast empire. Those include the staff at Amazon, Whole Foods and The Washington Post. “The Met Gala tells a story about who matters, who gets celebrated,” said April Verrett, president of the Service Employees International Union. “And we decided to make ourselves the protagonists.”

► From the Sports Business Journal — Nneka Ogwumike praised for WNBPA leadership during CBA talks — WNBPA President and Sparks F Nneka Ogwumike has become a “seminal figure in the history of women’s sports” after she “shepherded the union through tense and lengthy labor negotiations” to reach a new CBA, according to Ann Killion of the S.F. CHRONICLE. The agreement is “perhaps the most significant in the history of women’s sports,” and follows a labor showdown between the league and players.

► From the Hollywood Reporter — IATSE Files Formal Charges Against Kennedy Center After It Lays Off Workers — The union for theatrical stage employees says that the Kennedy Center is violating its union contract by laying off or terminating all workers in its Instant Charge and Group Sales and Subscription departments, effective April 27, rather than meeting its legal obligation to bargain over the impact of the temporary closure. Management also confirmed it will not replace the workers, according to IATSE. Twenty five workers were impacted. “This is not a normal closure-related layoff,” said International IATSE President Matthew D. Loeb. “The Kennedy Center appears to be using a temporary closure as cover to permanently eliminate union jobs in violation of its contract and federal labor law.”

► From the Pittsburgh City Paper — Newspaper Guild members allege anti-union discrimination in Post-Gazette offer letters — After offer and rejection emails went out Wednesday and Thursday, Guild representatives said Venetoulis had not rehired around 40% of PG newsroom staff. That included all but one current union officer. The Guild noted that those affected included members of the team that won a Pulitzer for coverage of the 2018 Tree of Life synagogue shooting. “It doesn’t matter how good I am at my job, or how eager I am to cover this city. Venetoulis doesn’t care about that,” PG digital editor Natalie Duleba said in a release. “They just care that I’ve been a vocal and visible face of our strike and our union.”

POLITICS & POLICY

► From the Washington Post — Supreme Court clears path for Louisiana to redraw map in redistricting fight — In an unsigned opinion, the court granted a request by the plaintiffs to expedite the transmission of the Voting Rights Act opinion, which limits consideration of race in the drawing of electoral maps, to a lower court. Normally, it takes 32 days for a Supreme Court ruling to be formally conveyed to lower courts, but Monday’s order cuts that timeline short, allowing Louisiana to more rapidly redraw its maps in the hopes of yielding more wins for Republicans.

► From the Washington State Standard — WA Supreme Court bats down referendum attempt targeting income tax — Washington’s Supreme Court on Monday denied a conservative political committee’s request to pursue an attempt to repeal the state’s new income tax law with a referendum this fall…In the ruling, justices said the income tax’s so-called “necessity clause,” which shields it from a referendum, is valid. The law “undisputedly generates revenue for the state’s existing institutions and hence is similarly subject to the ‘support of state government’ exception to the referendum power,” reads the decision signed by Chief Justice Debra Stephens.

► From the Washington State Standard — Candidate filing begins, kicking off Washington election season — Expect turnover in the state Legislature, where all 98 House seats and 24 of 49 Senate seats are up for election. In the House, there are 14 open seats as representatives retire or run for other offices, such as the Senate, where five members are not returning. In Congress, nine of the state’s 10 members in the U.S. House are seeking re-election…Statewide, the Supreme Court will be in the spotlight with five of the nine seats on ballots this year. Recent appointees Colleen Melody and Theo Angelis are vying to retain their positions. Chief Justice Debra Stephens is the lone incumbent running this year.

► From the Colorado Sun — Key labor bill clears Colorado legislature, faces governor’s veto for second year in a row — The bill would repeal an 80-year-old unionization rule unique to Colorado that mandates workers hold a second election before their union can operate, following a simple majority vote to unionize in the first place. In the second election, a three-quarters majority of a company’s workers must sign off in order to negotiate labor matters as a union…The bill was approved by lawmakers along party lines. It now heads to Polis’ desk where it likely faces a veto, despite wide support from the governor’s own party. Polis vetoed the same bill when the legislature passed it last year, and his office indicated he will veto the 2026 version, too.

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