Sitting in the break room, our weekly roundup of labor news in Minnesota and beyond. This week: how Trump’s first executive orders affect workers; Nurses union posts more gains; Lawmakers seek to expand whistleblower protections for public officials; and which sectors grew the fastest in 2024 in Minnesota.
In his first week in office, Trump signed a wave of executive orders and reversed more than 40% of Biden’s executive orders on everything from immigration to the environment.
Agency leaders are still trying to interpret the orders — and the White House is still clarifying them — and the effects on the broader labor market won’t be clear until some time later. But three sectors stood out as likely to feel the most direct impacts of Trump’s executive actions: construction, food production and processing, and the federal bureaucracy.
Construction
Trump ordered agencies to stop making payments through two of Biden’s signature policy achievements: the Inflation Reduction Act and the Infrastructure Investment and Jobs Act. Both laws have already funded a slew of good-paying job-building infrastructure across the country, with hundreds of millions more expected if implemented despite Trump’s executive order.
The order caused massive confusion; The Federal Highway Administration stopped payments. Politico Flagged road and bridge projects — even those in the construction community — were in jeopardy, and states and cities could end up with massive bills. The White House later provided clarification that the order only applies to funds supporting the “Green New Deal” and that agency heads can disburse funds “as they deem necessary.” This could kill new jobs to install renewable energy infrastructure.
Congressional Democrats also cried out against the president interfering with funding passed by the Legislature. Trump’s nominee to lead the federal budget agency says the executive branch has the right to withhold spending, or “seize” money. The issue could end up before the courts.
Food production
Trump signed a series of executive orders laying the groundwork for his promised mass deportation operation, including allowing military service members to act as immigration and border enforcement officers and direct security interior to secure contractors to set up detention facilities.
Deporting undocumented immigrants is popular with Americans (at least in the abstract), despite the country’s reliance on millions of them in critical industries like agriculture, meat processing and food processing. poultry, dairy production and construction. There are approximately 11 million undocumented immigrants in the United States, many of whom have been in the country for a decade and have legal residents in their household.
It’s unclear how targeted Trump’s deportation program will be. U.S. agricultural industry groups have urged him to spare their sector and many are confident he will. CNN interviewed a dairy farmer in South Dakota who supported Trump and was confident his industry won’t be affected given the fallout from a roundup.
“How are they going to do that?” He said. “Within two days we won’t have any food.”
It’s not difficult to know whether Trump will roll back protections that former President Joe Biden instituted for undocumented immigrants who were victims of labor abuses. The threat of deportation makes undocumented immigrants more vulnerable to labor abuses like wage theft, which has ripple effects throughout the labor market by giving an advantage to hapless businesses.
Federal workforce
Trump signed executive orders making the federal civilian workforce of more than 2 million people easier to fire and harder to replace. It also returned workers to the office full-time and laid off equity and inclusion initiatives on diversity. Notably, Trump has yet to touch Biden’s executive order requiring federal contractors to pay a minimum wage — currently, $17.75 an hour.
Trump froze new hires for civilian positions across the federal government, except for military or positions related to immigration enforcement, national security or public safety. The order also spared Social Security, Medicare and veterans’ benefits.
Sen. Tina Smith posted on social media that she received a report that the Minneapolis Veterans Affairs Health System had “rescinded offers to dozens of people” for critical roles. Asked for comment, a spokeswoman for the Minneapolis VA shared a press release saying the White House had clarified its order that Vas could continue to fill essential positions.
Trump also ordered federal agencies to end remote work arrangements and ask employees to return to the office full time, although the order also allows the leading agency to make exceptions.
Congress passed a bill promoting teleworking in 2010, but since pandemic remote work, conservatives have turned against the practice. The world’s richest man and Trump adviser Elon Musk claimed on social media that only 1% of government workers show up in person and work 40 hours a week, excluding government workers. safety and maintenance. But according to the U.S. Office of Personnel Management, teleworking is no more common in the federal government than in the private sector and only 10% of federal employees are fully remote.
The Order could force remote federal workers in Minnesota to move to Washington, D.C. or leave their jobs, and they may not be replaced given the hiring freeze. Workforce reduction through voluntary terminations is part of the point, Musk and his former partner in “government efficiency” Vivek Ramaswamy wrote in the Wall Street JournalL.
It’s unclear how many workers that could affect. There are just over 18,000 federal employees in Minnesota, not including military personnel, federal contractors, federal law enforcement officers or U.S. Postal Service workers, according to the Congressional Research Service.
Trump revived a version of a policy from his first term that was never implemented called Schedule F, which aims to reclassify tens of thousands of workers to make them easier to fire. The order is a response to the Trump administration’s belief that federal employees in the “deep state” are thwarting their agenda, while critics say it is an attempt to strip apolitical workers of their rights and eventually replacing them with Trump loyalists. The order already faces a legal challenge from the National Treasury Employees Union.
Finally, Trump ordered an end to all diversity, equity, and inclusion programs in the federal government and placed all DEI officers on immediate administrative leave pending termination.
He also reversed executive orders from his predecessors dating back decades, including one by former President Lyndon Johnson, requiring government contractors to adopt nondiscriminatory practices in hiring and employment, NPR reported.
A bill that would expand whistleblower protections for government employees who report fraud, waste and mismanagement is moving through the Legislature with bipartisan support.
Sen. Andrew Mathews, R-Princeton, introduced the bill (SF475) in response to more than a year of news stories about abused and defrauded state social service programs, from child nutrition to health services. autism through tutoring.
The legislation, which passed the Senate Labor Committee on Thursday, also has the support of unions representing public sector workers.
Meg Luger-Nikolai, a Minnesota education attorney, said the bill provided a “shining” to whistleblower protections that workers have already reported illegal conduct. The bill would allow educators to report mismanagement, such as districts banning rainbow flags, rejecting integration aid or failing to adopt new mandates around phonics instruction.
“We really appreciate this legislation,” Luger-Nikolai said. “We believe this will democratize the public workplace.”
Hundreds of nurses at North Memorial’s Maple Grove Hospital voted Thursday to unionize, the latest victory for the Minnesota Nurses Association which has led several successful campaigns at large hospitals over the past year.
“This is a monumental moment for all of us,” Maple Grove Hospital nurse Emily Campbell said in a statement. “By joining the MNA, we have shown our commitment to standing together for the betterment of our workplace and the patients we serve.
Union supporters say it will help them address long-standing complaints about wages and workloads.
The Minnesota Nurses Association has added more than 1,400 nurses in the past year, including 56 nurses at Hazelden Betty Ford’s Center City campus last week. Nurses at Robbinsdale Hospital’s other North Memorial hospital are already unionized.
Meanwhile, he also suffered some bruising defeats at Mayo Clinic hospitals, where workers voted to oust the union with the support of the National Right to Work Foundation.
Education and health services saw the greatest job growth in Minnesota in 2024, followed by government, according to data from the state Department of Employment and Economic Development released this week.
Over the year, education and health services added 41,090 jobs, government added 20,196 jobs, hospitality added 1,099 jobs and construction added 196 jobs. These sectors led the state’s 1.3% workforce growth in 2024 because every other sector, from professional services to manufacturing, declined.
As usual, the state has a lower unemployment rate and a higher labor force participation rate than the country as a whole. Minnesota’s labor force participation rate – the percentage of employed people of working age who were employed or looking for work – was 67.8% compared to 62.5% nationally.
Average hourly profits rose 5.4%, nearly double the inflation rate of 2.9% and higher than the national wage growth rate of 4.6%.
“Employers continue to create good-paying jobs, and more Minnesotans are looking for work this month – both positive indicators for Minnesota’s economy,” said Acts Commissioner Matt Varilek.
Minnesota continues to struggle with a shortage of workers, which is expected to worsen with an aging population if they are not replaced by new residents from around the country and world.
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