Author: Staff

Florida AFL-CIO Debuts Labor 2026 Campaign With Endorsement of Jose Javier Rodriguez for Attorney General

Staff |

FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE

May 27th, 2026

Contact:

Daniel Diaz, Communications Coordinator

ddiaz@flaflcio.org // media@flaflcio.org

(850) 755-4123

Florida AFL-CIO Debuts Labor 2026 Campaign With Endorsement of Jose Javier Rodriguez for Attorney General

The Committee on Political Education (COPE) of the Florida AFL-CIO unanimously voted to endorse Jose Javier Rodriguez for Florida Attorney General

TALLAHASSEE, Fla. – On Tuesday, May 26th, The Florida AFL-CIO Committee on Political Education (COPE) proudly kicked off their electoral endorsement season by unanimously voting to endorse Jose Javier Rodriguez for Florida Attorney General.

Shortly after the endorsement vote, Florida AFL-CIO President Kimberly Holdridge issued the following statement:

“The process behind this endorsement represented input from all facets of our movement and Florida’s labor force, and it comes with the determination and dedication of hundreds of thousands of our members to ensure that Jose Javier Rodriguez is elected to serve as Florida’s next Attorney General.”

FL AFL-CIO Director of Politics and Public Policy Dr. Rich Templin said of the endorsement:

“JJR has one of the strongest and most proven records of service for Florida’s working families.  He was a staunch ally and champion in the Florida House and Senate and as Assistant Secretary of Labor for Employment and Training of the United States and as an accomplished lawyer in his professional career defending thousands of workers in the courts. Florida’s workers and consumers couldn’t ask for a more qualified or principled Attorney General.”    

JJR’s early endorsement arrives ahead of the Florida AFL-CIO’s 2026 COPE Endorsing Convention on June 14th, where member delegates from across Florida’s working class will gather to consider, and vote on the congressional, statewide, and state candidates and resolutions that best reflect the priorities of working families this election season. 

The full slate of FL AFL-CIO endorsed candidates will be announced soon after the convention’s conclusion. Candidates and campaigns interested in participating can visit our convention page or email media@flaflcio.org to learn more.

###

May Day & Worker’s Memorial Day 2026: Show Solidarity in our Sunshine State!

Staff |

Since its inception, May 1st, also known as International Worker’s Day, Labor Day, or May Day, has represented a an opportunity to celebrate the solidarity of all working people, acknowledging that no matter where we were born, where we live, or what kind of work we do, we all deserve to have safe working conditions, fair treatment, a fair and living wage, and to go home safely to our families at the end of the day.

Immediately preceding this show of solidarity, organized labor across the world remembers April 28th as Workers’ Memorial Day, in which solidarity and remembrance is shown for the many treasured lives lost, disabled, or injured in or because of the workplace, highlighting the need for continued workplace reform and a shared promise to remember the dead, and fight for the living.

This year, as the AFL-CIO celebrates these historic holidays nationwide, the state federation wanted to put together an easy to use hub to stay tuned to the latest labor actions, events, and more taking place in Florida across. Please see below for a list of events going on by region in recognition of these historic days.

NOTE: The following list does not represent the totality of labor and solidarity actions taking place this week and is updated frequently.

Have suggestions or additions? Please email info@flaflcio.org with your event details. Other useful platforms for finding and organizing events this week/weekend include Mobilize.us and maydaystrong.org.

North Florida

Central Florida

South Florida

Working Families Lobby Corps: Roaring and Ready for 2026

Staff |

The 2026 Legislative Session is upon us, and Florida’s working families are ready to fight!

The past several months have been disastrous for working families. Our jobs, paychecks, healthcare and our very rights are under constant attack. Despite the threats, Florida’s labor community has been relentless in fighting back! We have organized with our community partners to push back against the federal government’s unnecessary and dangerous shutdown, protested the abduction of our neighbors by masked, government sanctioned militants, and stood up against federal attacks on free speech and our democratic institutions.

Despite the national problems though, the biggest threats to Florida’s families, communities and our way of life come from Tallahassee, not Washington D.C., which is why the Working Families Lobby Corps (WFLC) remains the most powerful, organized and effective tool to protect ourselves and support our movement. That’s why we need you in the fight.

The WFLC had amazing success during the past legislative session. We’ve stopped the elimination of critical child labors protections, protected the minimum wage, preserved our remaining collective bargaining rights and more. But these bills are coming back, and we will have to fight even harder against a more determined big business lobby and network of billionaire funded right-wing think tanks to protect what we can. In addition, this year, we’re not just playing defense. We will also be pushing for new and proactive policies to reverse the damage done to our public schools, expand worker protections, and support policies for good economic development.

We are mobilizing and preparing to once again be the strongest, most coordinated, and organized force for working families in the legislative process, and the success of the Working Family Lobby Corps is dependent on its greatest strength…you, our sisters and brothers!

We say it again with great emphasis: your participation in the Lobby Corps is more important now than ever before. With your solidarity we can—not just fight back—but build towards a better Florida for all of us.

Please use the following link to sign up for this year’s exciting program. Once we have your information, a member of our team will follow up and make sure you have all the information you need to participate.

Sign up with the WFLC Registration Form here: https://forms.gle/v8jNFpXC5hju81Ze7

We look forward to standing shoulder to shoulder with you in Tallahassee! Together, we win!

In solidarity/En solidaridad!

Florida AFL-CIO Slams Federal Government Shutdown that Supports Billionaires

Staff |

FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE

October 1, 2025

Contact: Rich Templin, (850)566-4348, rtemplin@flaflcio.org

Tallahassee – Today, as hundreds of thousands federal workers are forced to stay home from work and are questioning their families’ futures, the Florida AFL-CIO released a statement on the shutdown that will impact almost 100,000 Florida workers and their families. 

Kimberly Holdridge, President of the Florida AFL-CIO said, “Floridians need to know that this shutdown is all about devastating cuts to healthcare access in order to provide tax cuts for the richest, most powerful individuals and corporations in America.  As millions of our most vulnerable lose healthcare, a basic human right, mansions will be built, mega yachts will be purchased, and the unjust wealth gap will explode.  That is what this shutdown is all about.  It is not about politics or parties; it is about people.  Donald Trump and his billionaire buddies can end this now by allowing congressional leaders to negotiate and return basic healthcare access to everyday Americans.”  President Holdridge also said, “our hearts go out to all the workers who are devastated that they can’t do their jobs and to the Floridians who rely on their service.  We will stand with them and support them every step of the way.” 

This shutdown will lock out hundreds of thousands of federal employees from doing their jobs while forcing hundreds of thousands of essential workers—like TSA officers, VA caregivers, and Border Patrol agents—to work without pay. That reduces access to services and pulls billions out of local economies.

The Florida AFL-CIO will be mobilizing its 1.3 million union members, retirees and their families to flood congress with calls and emails demanding that Republicans in Congress step away from extremist Trump and negotiate for the American people.  Hundreds of thousands of worker’s jobs and access to healthcare for millions is on the line. 

The Department Of People Who Work For A Living Release Worker Hearings Report

Staff |

The AFL-CIO’s Department of People Who Work for a Living (DPWL) recently held a series of hearings across the country to provide a platform for working people to express their views on the current administration’s policies, the impact of those policies on their lives and what working people want from their government. The hearings found that working people are concerned about ongoing cuts to federal jobs, programs and services. Workers objected to the Trump administration’s callous disregard for career civil servants, many of them veterans, and the administration’s attacks on the institutions, programs and regulations that protect working people.

Get the report here.

The hearings featured testimony by workers and their representatives regarding the Trump administration’s attacks on the federal workforce. Witnesses expressed anger at insulting and dehumanizing characterizations of federal workers’ public service, and chaotic and lawless mass firings. They were also concerned that, due to staff reductions and other cuts to federal programs, public servants will not be able to serve their communities properly at agencies already struggling from high demand and limited resources. Witnesses cited how these cuts will have an outsized impact on seniors, veterans, people with disabilities and rural communities.

The hearings featured testimony by workers and their representatives on the wide-ranging assault by the Trump administration on workers’ rights and protections beyond the federal workforce. For example:

  • The Trump administration has moved to gut the National Institute for Occupational Safety and Health (NIOSH) and other critical worker safety agencies, such as the Occupational Safety and Health Administration (OHSA) and Mine Safety and Health Administration (MSHA), putting workers’ lives at risk.
  • A variety of moves by the Trump administration to curb worker power—for example, by stripping collective bargaining rights, abandoning project labor agreements and crippling the independence of agencies tasked with protecting workers’ rights—will have long-term downstream impacts that lower pay, benefits and other standards for all workers across the country.
  • Frequent attacks on institutions, initiatives and services that have provided equal access protections to underrepresented populations will hinder efforts to combat systemic workplace discrimination, denying workers a fair shot at a job or advancement. The Trump administration’s mass deportation program, with its disregard for due process, threatens the constitutional rights of every worker and poses serious disruptions in key industries and local economies.
  • Instead of taking a targeted, evidence-based approach to tariffs to protect domestic employment, the Trump administration has adopted a chaotic approach to tariffs. While some tariff actions taken to date have the potential to support workers, particularly in the steel, aluminum, auto and shipbuilding industries, the reckless, untargeted, on-again, off-again approach to other tariffs, including those with our most significant trading partner Canada, threaten to swamp the positive impacts.

Witnesses also expressed concern about the Trump tax plan and Congress’s approach to budget reconciliation. Medicaid and other government health programs support jobs and provide a crucial lifeline for communities and families across the country. The current budget resolution calls for dramatic cuts to these programs to give wealthy Americans a tax break. Workers expressed outrage that these potential cuts will cause millions of people—particularly from vulnerable groups—to lose their health care, and put further strain on an already overburdened health care system.

The DPWL hearings brought to light a growing frustration with the Trump administration’s anti- worker policies and the need for a new direction from the White House and Congress, with policies that support workers’ freedom, ensure fairness and provide security.

Get the report here.

2025 Biennial Convention

Staff |

Please join us September 6th and 7th for our 2025 Biennial Convention at the Buena Vistas Palace Hotel.

Delegate credentials for the 2025 Florida AFL-CIO Biennial Convention have been mailed to local union leaders.  If you would like to serve as a delegate for your local union at our convention, please reach out to your leadership. 

If you would like to join us as a guest, please complete and return this form.

Continue to check back here for further details!

2025 Sine Die Legislative Brief

Staff |

Please Note: The Florida Legislature has left the Capitol with an agreement to extend the 2025 Session into May, only to handle the unfinished budget. All bills that have not passed are dead. The following is a brief look at the final dispensation of some of the major bills we were following during the 2025 Legislative Session.

Attacks on Collective Bargaining for Public Sector Workers (FAILED)
SB 1328/HB 121
OPPOSED – These bills represented another attack on the rights of our public sector workers to join and remain in their unions. These come after two years of attacks on these workers’ rights through arbitrary and unfair policies and practices designed to make union membership more difficult. Our affiliates quickly organized to counter these attacks. This “death by a thousand paper cuts” strategy ran into a wall this year when the power of the Governor and the out of state, billionaire funded think tanks funding his political was replaced with a more independent legislature.

Public Employees Relations Commission (FAILED)
SB 1766/HB 1387
OPPOSED – These bills would have made changes to how PERC handles the certification and recertification of public sector unions that would have added needless new bureaucratic hurdles that workers and their organizations must navigate to exercise their collective bargaining rights.

Eliminating the Citizen’s Initiative Process (PASSED)
SB 7016/HB 1205
OPPOSED – The Florida Legislature has passed dozens of changes to state law over the years to make it more difficult for citizens to propose, petition and vote to make changes they want to the Constitution, usually in response to legislative inaction on key issues. Some of the most positive changes that have been made in Florida were made through constitutional amendments. These bills continue the years-long attack on the Citizen’s Initiative process in many ways. If supported by the courts, this will be the final nail in the coffin for the initiative process.

Eliminating Child Labor Protections (FAILED)
SB 918/HB 1225
OPPOSED – These bills would have stripped long standing labor protections for 16–17-year-olds and would have subjected children as young as 14 to potentially abusive treatment in workplaces This attempt by the tourism and service industries to solve their labor shortages on the backs of children failed after a hard-fought effort by the Labor community and our allies.

Weakening Minimum Wage Rights (FAILED)
SB 676/HB 541
OPPOSED – Florida’s Constitution guarantees all workers in Florida a state minimum wage, currently $13 per for non-tipped workers and set to rise in September to $14. These bills will change state law to allow workers/students to “opt-out” of their right if they work in structured work-study, internships, pre-apprenticeship programs, apprenticeships, or similar work-based learning opportunities, if these employees choose to opt out. This would have been a huge loophole in a hard-fought constitutional right.

Eliminating the Labor Pool Act (FAILED)
SB 1672/HB 6033
OPPOSED – Temporary workers and day laborers are some of the most abused workers in Florida. These are often workers trying to start careers or enter the workforce while providing for their families. Florida’s Labor Pool Act provides some basic legal protections for these workers, who, in most cases, are not fully protected by other state and federal laws. Some unscrupulous labor pool agencies and politicians wanted to take these protections away by completely repealing the Labor Pool Act so that they can abuse these workers at will to increase their profits. These bills would have stripped away critical protections for nearly one million workers in Florida.

The Nail in the Coffin of Florida’s Unemployment Insurance System (FAILED)
SB 1238/HB 1157
OPPOSED – Florida’s Unemployment Insurance System (UI) is already ranked dead last in the nation. The benefits are the lowest, the duration of benefits are the shortest and the number of unemployed workers who ever receive benefits is less than 10%. These bills would have put new barriers in place that would make sure that no workers ever qualify for unemployment, enriching big businesses who are supposed to pay for the system.

Imposing Term Limits on School Boards and County Commissions (FAILED)
SJR 802/HJR 679
OPPOSED – These Joint Resolutions would have allowed all the voters of the state to impose term limits on every county, whether the local residents want them or not. This is patently unfair and represented a “one size fits all” approach to governance structure in a state with 67 very diverse counties.

Charter School Industry Takeover of Local School Districts (PASSED)*
SB 140/ HB 123
OPPOSED – The charter school industry has been taking more and more money and power from our local school districts for years and these bills accelerate this trend exponentially by allowing for the conversion of public schools into charter schools without the input of educators or school officials and giving charter schools more control over the conversion process.

*The listed bills failed but in a last-minute, late-night move, this language was tucked into another bill that passed (HB 1105).

Don’t Say Gay at Work (FAILED)
SB 440 / HB 1495
OPPOSED – This policy would have gone far beyond regulating pronouns and imposed government control over free speech and activities in Florida workplaces. All nonprofit organizations and any private business that does business with the State of Florida or any local government would have been regulated and policed by this law. This extreme overreach that would have dictated how charities and certain private business, and human service organizations can train employees on LGBTQ+ issues, conduct other LGBTQ+ related activities, and even how employees can speak to each other. This was a critical workplace rights issue that should concern all workers.

Higher Education (FAILED)
SB 1726 / HB 1321
SUPPORT – Higher education in Florida has been enveloped by made up conflicts and controversies and the attacks have brought our entire system to the brink of collapse on the national stage. The culture wars and other factors have brought major attacks on academic freedom, the elimination of entire departments and a governance structure that has put the Governor (through his appointees) in complete control. These bills, while not identical, would have greatly improved our colleges and universities by returning some governance structures to their pre-Desantis state, including a return of the university and college president hiring process back into the sunshine.

Middle School and High School Start Times (PASSED)
SB 296 / HB 61
SUPPORT – These bills remove the mandated time change and give the school districts more authority to determine ways to combat sleep deprivation and manage school start times.

Join the 2025 Working Families Lobby Corps!

Staff |

Sisters, Brothers and Kin,

To say that the 2024 Election results would be an understatement.  While we ran a vigorous program utilizing our available resources to the best of our ability, we fell short of our goals.  Elections have consequences and now we must work even harder to vigorously advocate for policies that are best for our members and all of Florida’s working families.  The center of that advocacy is the Working Families Lobby Corps. 

The Working Families Lobby Corps needs to prepare to once again be the strongest, most coordinated, and organized force for working families in the legislative process and that is dependent on our greatest resource…you and your Sisters, Brothers and Kin!

The Working Families Lobby Corps organizes union members and activists to be in Tallahassee each week of the 2025 Legislative Session.  We have trainings, meet with legislators, attend committee meetings while having fun and solidarity along the way! 

This is not a lobby day event.  We must exert constant pressure on the legislative process and this program serves as the foundation of any success we have in Tallahassee. The Lobby Corps is in the process each and every day of the 9-week Session.  We say it again…with feeling…your participation in the Lobby Corps is more important now than ever before.

For Union Members: To register for the 2025 WFLC program, click here https://bit.ly/2025WFLCSignUP. 

The Florida AFL-CIO is part of a broad coalition of groups fighting for economic and social justice for workers.  If you are not a union member, send an email to info@flaflcio.org and we will work to add your efforts to our own. 

We look forward to seeing you all in Tallahassee and continuing the fight for Florida’s future! 

AFL-CIO Launches the Department of People Who Work for a Living

Staff |

If Elon Musk can make up his own government department, so can workers.

Today, the AFL-CIO has launched the Department of People Who Work for a Living (DPWL), a new campaign to hold Elon Musk’s Department of Government Efficiency, or DOGE, accountable and make sure the federal government is responsive to working people and not just to the whims of an unelected CEO like Musk.

“The government can work for billionaires or it can work for working people—but not both,” said AFL-CIO President Liz Shuler. “Elon is just getting started. And he has already tried to force workers doing essential services—including at the FAA and air traffic controllers even after the tragedy at Washington National Airport—to retire, gained access to the Treasury Department’s payment system with everyone’s private data, and is declaring entire government agencies like USAID shut down and blocking workers from accessing the building and their email. We will hold DOGE and Elon Musk accountable because we are certain that the people who keep our food and medicine safe know more about how to make government efficient than an outsider whose companies benefit from the very agencies he is infiltrating.”

Billionaire Elon Musk formed DOGE—an unaccountable pseudo-government department supposedly created to make the federal government work more efficiently—but for whom? Ideas floated by the DOGE so far would slash government services working people depend on like meals for children in need, roll back protections for workers, and cut programs like Social Security and Medicare. Everything seems to be on the chopping block, except the government contracts and programs that personally benefit Musk. 

The DPWL will report on proposed DOGE cuts and their impact on working people. And DPWL will provide its own recommendations for how the government can work more efficiently, proposed by the people who are the backbone of America’s economy: America’s workers.  

BACKGROUND

Working people have seen this movie before: so-called efficiency experts who come into the workplace without background knowledge and cut the workforce to make more profit. That model might work in the private sector, but government services aren’t lines on a spreadsheet—they have real world impacts on actual people in communities across the country.

Yet Congress has formed a DOGE caucus and established an official subcommittee to entertain DOGE ideas. The White House has renamed the U.S. Digital Service as the U.S. DOGE Service, and has given Musk free run of the White House and every agency. 

The Department of People Who Work for a Living will look out for the interests of hardworking taxpayers and the people who make our government and economy run. The DPWL will defend programs like Veterans Affairs benefits, Medicare and Medicaid that millions of Americans rely on and the more than 1 million union members—including over 600,000 veterans—who work hard every day to implement them. Policymakers in Congress and the White House will be presented with stark choices between these departments, and they will have to show the world which side they are on.

2024 Sine Die Legislative Brief

Staff |

The 2024 Legislative Session is in the history books. The big business special interests, largely sidelined over the past two years by the Governor’s culture wars, were back with a vengeance pushing legislation that will line their pockets at the expense of Florida’s working families. The Working Families Lobby Corps ran a strong program this year with hundreds of union members participating in the process over the nine weeks of Session. Check out our final Sine Die brief for the final status of some of the most important issues we tackled this year. While we weren’t always successful against the big business juggernaut and their cronies in the Capitol, we organized, we spoke out and we fought hard for Florida’s workers and their families. While the powers that be will continue to try and diminish our movement, they will never win and we will always continue to stand up for what is right.  

Download your 2024 Sine Die Legislative Brief here. The brief is a quick look at some of the bills that were tracked throughout the 2024 Florida Legislative Session and their final status.

Menu