OMG, look up! Is that a flying pig? That was my thought when I read the latest bulletin from the Republican-controlled House Education and Workforce Committee announcing a hearing that would be “Examining Proposals to Strengthen the National Labor Relations Act (NLRA).”

Congressional Republicans today failed in their latest attempt to roll back workers’ rights. The U.S. Senate defeated (45-54) a measure (S.J. Res. 36) to kill a new National Labor Relations Board (NLRB) rule that makes modest changes in the procedures for workers who want to vote on whether to form a union.

Congressional Republicans—backed by their corporate sponsors—are trying to ram through a resolution that would kill a new fair union election rule approved last year by the National Labor Relations Board (NLRB). Click here to send a message to your senators and urge them to vote “NO” on S.J. Res. 36 when it comes to a vote later this week.

A new rule on the way union elections are conducted will take effect April 30, the National Labor Relations Board (NLRB) announced today. The rule will help alleviate the delays, inefficiencies, abuse of process and unnecessary litigation which plague the current system for workers who want to vote on whether to have a union. AFL-CIO President Richard Trumka says it’s “good news”that the NLRB has taken

The U.S. Court of Appeals in Washington, D.C., today upheld the new democratic union election rule for aviation and rail workers issued by the National Mediation Board (NMBM) in 2010.

In last night’s 235-188 vote to block some modest proposed new rules from the National Labor Relations Board to reduce unnecessary litigation and modernize the way union elections are conducted, eight Republicans crossed party lines and voted against the attack on workers’ rights. Six Democrats voted for the bill.

Workers deserve a “fair, clear system for protecting their rights and making themselves heard in union elections,” four top Democratic lawmakers said in a letter to the National Labor Relations Board (NLRB) strongly supporting the board’s proposed changes in the way elections to form unions are conducted.

In June, the National Labor Relations Board (NLRB) issued a notice of proposed changes in the way elections to form unions  are conducted, which AFL-CIO President Richard Trumka called “a modest step” and a “common sense approach to clean up an outdated system” to ensure workers have a fair choice.

BREAKING: In a 221-69 vote, workers at the IKEA [Swedwood] plant in Danville, Va., voted to join the Machinists (IAM) today. The 318 employees assemble products for IKEA.

A union attorney this afternoon told a National Labor Relations Board (NLRB) hearing on proposed new union election rules that the current rules are actually just fine…“if you were living in the 1960s. The board needs to come into the 21st century,” said AFSCME attorney Margaret McCann.

These are commonsense changes to the election process, they inject fairness, provide certainty and update procedures in this technological age.