This morning, the House Committee on Education & the Workforce is holding a full committee hearing entitled: “Unleashing America’s Opportunity For Hiring And Employment.” House Republicans claim the hearing will “examine how current economic conditions created by Biden administration policies are impacting employment,” however three witnesses before the panel have troubled histories working to undermine legislation that would give workers more rights and protections and increase entry into the workforce. This just further goes to show that MAGA Republicans don’t care about solving the actual issues that face our country. They’d rather play political games to further their own radical agenda.
Stephen Moore, Distinguished Fellow in Economics at the Heritage Foundation
- In 2000, Stephen Moore wrote that white males were the “new oppressed minority on college campuses” and that if women “were so oppressed and offended,” they wouldn’t show up “in droves in tight skirts to the keg parties.”
- That same year, Moore also wrote that female athletes “want equal pay for inferior work,” adding it was an “injustice” female players could “make millions of dollars a year, even though there are hundreds of men at the collegiate level […] who could beat them handily.”
- In 2014, Stephen Moore described a bill addressing pay equality as being a “laughably bad idea,” with the real crisis being stagnated male wages—Moore even suggested women making more than men could be “disruptive to family stability” as men would become “economically expendable.”
Chris Spear, President and CEO of the American Trucking Associations (ATA)
- During Spear’s tenure as ATA President and CEO, the trade group submitted a Supreme Court amicus brief supporting a company that tried to force a misclassified worker into an arbitration agreement—a process that typically favors employers in disputes over pay discrimination, family leave, and other issues.
- In 2021 and 2022, the ATA spent $4.28 million while lobbying on labor issues, including against the Protecting the Right to Organize (PRO) Act, joining other industry groups criticizing it as “devastat[ing]” small businesses.
- The ATA also lobbied against the “Protecting Older Workers Against Discrimination Act”—bipartisan legislation aimed at making it “easier for workers to prove age, disability, and similar discrimination claims in court” and supported by the AARP, AFSCME, and the National Partnership for Women & Families.
Jerry Akers, Franchisee and Owner of Sharpness, Inc. and Regional Developer of The Joint Chiropractic
- Since November 2020, Akers has sat on the board of the International Franchise Association (IFA), which describes itself as “the world’s largest membership organization for franchisors, franchisees, and franchise suppliers.”
- The IFA has routinely opposed legislation that would empower workers through wage increases and other measures. In August 2022, the IFA vehemently opposed the passage of California A.B. 257 which improved wage and health standards for fast food workers in California, arguing it was “a discriminatory measure designed to target the franchise business model.”
- The IFA also opposed the Protecting The Right To Organize (PRO) Act, saying it “tip[s] the scales in favor of organized labor” and is the “worst legislation for franchising ever,” despite the AFL-CIO praising it as a “landmark worker empowerment legislation” aimed at giving workers the ability to “freely and fairly form a union.”
- March 2019, the IFA said its business model put the industry in a “Catch-22 between their responsibilities under trademark law and under labor law,” making it hard to implement system-wide anti-harassment policies.