In more than 100 events across the country Wednesday, working families rallied outside lawmakers’ offices, federal agencies, military bases and elsewhere to shine a spotlight on the impact of the sequester’s across-the-board cuts that will cost more than 750,000 jobs this year alone and to call for its repeal.

While most of the actions aimed at members of Congress were focused on Republicans who are using the sequester as leverage to get their way in Congress, in Beckley, W.Va., a group of more than 50 AFGE and other union members and community supporters received a shout out of support from Rep. Nick Rahall (D).

Working families rallied on Capitol Hill last week, calling on Congress not to make any benefit cuts to Social Security, Medicare and Medicaid. They also told Congress to close tax loopholes for big corporations and the wealthiest 2% and to prevent the sequester from going into effect and harming the country. 

More than 1,500 people rallied Tuesday on Capitol Hill in support of working families and to tell Congress not to make any benefit cuts to Social Security, Medicare and Medicaid. They also told Congress to close tax loopholes for big corporations and the wealthiest 2% and to prevent the sequester from going into effect and harming the country. Throughout the rally, working families spoke with a unified voice calling for "jobs, not cuts."

Mine Workers (UMWA) President Cecil Roberts and nine other union members were arrested in front of Peabody Energy’s corporate headquarters in St. Louis yesterday, as more than 750 members and retirees sang Amazing Grace and held signs calling for fairness. Several of those arrested had oxygen tanks, and many in the crowd were brought to tears as the arrested protesters were peacefully loaded into the sheriff’s van while Which Side Are You On played on the loudspeakers. The protesters arrived at Peabody after marching from federal bankruptcy court, where Patriot Coal’s lawyers were inside. Those arrested were released later in the day, according to the St. Louis City Division of Corrections. 

On a bright, chilly Friday before the Martin Luther King Day weekend, Lapronda Eason wheeled a garbage can through the gleaming halls of the Smithsonian Museum of American History.

Eason has been a caretaker, literally, of American history for almost 13 years. She’s a janitor, a custodian, or a BSW, as the job is called at the Smithsonian, a building service worker.

The distinctive timbre of Dr. King’s voice could be heard in the museum’s gleaming entryway. It was his famous “I Have a Dream” speech, which he gave in 1963 during the March on Washington for Jobs and Freedom.

The speech recording is part of an exhibit called "Changing America: The Emancipation Proclamation, 1863, and the March on Washington, 1963."

Saying there is no evidence that replacing the trained airport screeners of the Transportation Security Administration (TSA) with a private, for-profit corporate workforce would be safer or more efficient, the Sacramento (Calif.) County Board of Supervisors withdrew on Wednesday its request from last year to contract out its screener security operations.

AFGE is urging Congress to reject an attempt by Rep. Michael Fitzpatrick (R-Pa.) to extend a freeze on federal worker salaries that has been in effect for the past two years. AFGE National President J. David Cox said that the proposal is a "cheap political ploy" that would inflict serious damage to the already modestly paid working families whose members hold federal government jobs. Cox also pointed out the freeze would harm the communities where these workers live since they will spend another year unable to afford much outside of bare necessities. 

One of the proposals floated for months in the fiscal bluff debate in Washington, D.C., is a change to the formula used to measure inflation for Social Security Cost-of-Living Adjustments (COLAs) called the "chained" CPI. Let's be clear: This is a benefit cut. These COLAs make sure seniors' income keeps pace with the rising costs of housing and food. The "chained" CPI would cut future Social Security benefits by as much as $2,432 for someone who is 17 years old today. Studies from the Center for Economic and Policy Research (CEPR) show that not only is the "chained" CPI a benefit cut, it eventually will lead to higher taxes for most working people.

Young people around the country have been speaking out on the fiscal showdown. Check out this roundup of blog posts and see what it means to them.

AFGE is leading a coalition that is standing up to any further wage cuts for federal government employees. AFGE members are concerned that working families employed by the federal government will once again be the target of wage, benefit or pension cuts. In the past decade, federal workers have been targeted for $103 billion in cuts—an average of $50,000 per worker. Federal workers have not received a raise since January 2010; as of January 2013, new employees will pay nearly four times as much into their pension funds as current workers do.

Take a good look at that Thanksgiving turkey you pull from the oven, smoker or deep fryer Thursday. If a proposed new rule from the U.S. Department of Agriculture (USDA) is approved, it may be the last Thanksgiving bird you’ll be sure is free of—if you’re squeamish skip to the next paragraph—tumors, feces, scabs, salmonella and other defects.

The proposed rule would not only allow plant management to increase the speed of poultry processing lines by five times the current limit, it could eliminate the jobs of more than 800 trained federal food safety inspectors and turn many inspection duties over to plant employees.