Delegates Redouble Fight for Labor Rights 

Convention delegates on Monday recommitted the USW to the fight for stronger labor rights and vowed to beat back the recent surge in union-busting aimed at exploiting working people. 

The delegates passed a resolution calling for the USW to leverage “every policy tool” to level the playing field for workers seeking a union contract and to work to defeat any elected official who stands in the way. 

In Canada, the USW will pursue “single-step certification laws in every federal and provincial jurisdiction,” the resolution asserted. 

And in the United States, delegates resolved, the union “will not rest” until Congress passes and the president signs a comprehensive update to labor law making it easier for workers to unionize and win fair contracts. 

Since the last convention, USW activists achieved key victories advancing workers’ rights, including the rollback in 2023 of a falsely named “right-to work” (RTW) law in Michigan. 

Delegates watched a video recounting how union members painstakingly elected pro-worker majorities in the legislature as well as a pro-labor governor, Gretchen Whitmer, and then turned out for rallies to ensure they quickly killed RTW. 

“I think the Steelworkers were the biggest part in getting ‘right-to-work’ repealed,” Kent Holsing, a delegate and Local 12075 president in Midland, Mich., said in the video. 

Sadly, corporations continue attempting to pad profits on workers’ backs. Delegates gave a round of applause to members recently locked out of their jobs or forced into unfair labor practice strikes by greedy employers. 

“We are under attack,” observed Corey O’Daniel, a delegate representing Local 9-01197, who rose in support of the resolution to fight for greater labor rights. 

Delegates also passed separate resolutions redoubling the union’s commitment to bargaining ever-stronger contracts, to run strategic campaigns leveraging the union’s Building Power program, and to make affordable, quality health care a basic right in every country where the union represents workers.