Holding out for ransom demands in the form of benefit cuts to Social Security, Medicare and Medicaid, Senate Republicans today again refused to surrender their hostages—the nation’s economy and working families who will be hurt by the upcoming Republican sequester.

Republicans led the charge to defeat a Democratic plan that would have eliminated the across-the-board sequestration budget cuts for the remainder of 2013, which the Congressional Budget Office has estimated would cost 750,000 jobs.

A new report outlines how employers across the country are gaming today’s broken immigration system to exploit immigrant workers and evade both labor and immigration laws. The report by the National Employment Law Project (NELP) uses two dozen case studies—including the recent action at Palermo’s Pizza—as examples of employers’ use of immigration enforcement or the threat of it to retaliate against workers who seek their basic workplace rights.  

Angelia Wade is an associate general counsel at the AFL-CIO. She sends us this takeaway of the opening oral arguments at the U.S. Supreme Court in the case of Shelby County, Alabama v. Holder. This is a case of extreme importance for voting rights advocates.

Yesterday, the U.S. Supreme Court heard oral arguments in the case of Shelby County, Alabama versus Holder. It was a spirited oral argument that drew clear and noticeable reactions from otherwise staid attorneys as we sat in the lawyers’ lounge, an area for attorneys barred before the Supreme Court but who are unable to get in the courtroom if the courtroom is at capacity, as it was yesterday. We could only hear the argument, not see the justices. The comment that received the most attention was that of Justice Antonin Scalia, who claimed the renewal of Section 5 of the Voting Rights Act represented the "perpetuation of racial entitlement.” He further insinuated that no one in Congress was going to vote against the renewal of Section 5 in 2006, (Section 5 was renewed 98-0 in the Senate and 390-33 in the House) because lawmakers did not want to lose votes. He stated, "Even the name of it is wonderful, the Voting Rights Act. Who's going to vote against that?" He further claimed, “I don't think there is anything to be gained by any senator to vote against continuation of this act. And I am fairly confident it will be re-enacted in perpetuity unless—unless a court can say it does not comport with the Constitution.” But this case is not about the Court’s opinion of why senators or representatives vote the way they do, even if it is out of some kind of “political correctness” or fear.  

The AFL-CIO Executive Council today called on Congress to repeal—not replace—the economically destructive budget cuts that Republicans in Congress are using as leverage to demand Social Security, Medicaid and Medicare benefit cuts. If the sequester is to be replaced, in whole or in part, the council called for closing tax loopholes for Wall Street and the wealthiest 2%, which would minimize harm to the economy.  

Take a look at these videos of working families who are speaking out against Republican lawmakers' attempt to shove the economy to the edge of another manufactured fiscal crisis in order to extract painful benefit cuts to Social Security, Medicare and Medicaid and protect tax breaks and big loopholes for corporations and the wealthy. Working families demonstrated outside the offices of House Speaker John Boehner (R-Ohio) and Sen. Ted Cruz (R-Texas).

Today, AARP is asking working families to call Congress to tell their elected legislators they oppose the "chained" CPI that would cut Social Security benefits. 

In rallies across the country, working families made their voices heard this week and let Congress know that they want comprehensive immigration reform that includes a pathway to citizenship for the nation's 11 million aspiring Americans.

Working families are continuing to protest the actions of Peabody Energy, which they say is trying to abandon its responsibility to pay health care costs for thousands of retirees who worked for the company. Labor and faith leaders are joining workers and retirees in a St. Louis rally at the headquarters of Peabody.

Reps. Raúl M. Grijalva (D-Ariz.) and Keith Ellison (D-Minn.), Congressional Progressive Caucus co-chairs, released a statement yesterday that there is one simple way we can deal with the upcoming Republican-manufactured faux budget crisis designed to extract painful benefit cuts to Social Security, Medicare and Medicaid: eliminate it. 

A new voter ID law threatened to disenfranchise tens of thousands of voters who are mostly people of color in South Carolina last year. Florida officials tried to curtail early voting that could have kept African Americans and others from the polls. Texas went for a twofer in voter suppression with a restrictive voter ID bill and a redistricting plan that put the voting rights of millions of African Americans and Latinos at risk.

Thanks to Section 5 of the Voting Rights Act, the federal government was able to step in and preserve the people’s right to vote. But now the same forces behind the nationwide voter suppression effort are looking to the U.S. Supreme Court to repeal Section 5 and arguments begin Wednesday.