Remote work and layoffs loom large in state employee union negotiations — and other labor news

Take a seat in the Break Room, our weekly roundup of labor news in Minnesota and beyond. This week: State employees begin union contract negotiations; Minnesota posts strong job numbers despite economic uncertainty; union carpenters protest subcontractor Absolute Drywall; and whistleblower alleges serious data breach at National Labor Relations Board. 

State employees begin union contract negotiations

Negotiations kicked off this week between the state of Minnesota and tens of thousands of its unionized workers in what may shape up to be the most contentious round of contract talks in recent memory.

Members of the Minnesota Association of Professional Employees, which represents about 18,000 workers, continue to hold protests against Gov. Tim Walz’s order for most workers to return to the office 50% of the time beginning on June 1. The union has called for a full repeal of the rule and raised the prospect of a strike, though the soonest one could happen wouldn’t be until late in the summer.

The union says the flexibility and autonomy that comes with remote work has been a boon for recruitment and retention, while forcing workers back into the office will increase their costs and steal time away from their families.

In their opening offer, MAPE leaders proposed that their members have the right to work remotely unless the state can “clearly and convincingly demonstrate that essential job functions of the position cannot be completed when telecommuting.” The proposal would also have the state reimburse workers for parking expenses if they are mandated to be onsite on an incidental basis.

Walz said this week he has no plans to rescind or delay the return-to-office order, and brushed aside concerns that there wouldn’t be enough office space to accommodate workers after agencies began downsizing during the pandemic.

“I understand that there are disruptions for folks. But the ability to come back to work, work in there together 50% of the time is right in line with the majority, the vast majority of every other state government and most of our private employers,” Walz said at a news conference highlighting potential federal cuts to Medicaid.

Rules on layoffs will also be a key sticking point for the two sides, as the state stares down the likelihood of large federal funding cuts on top of a gloomy budget forecast for the near future. Minnesota Management and Budget, which is negotiating with the union, proposed creating “emergency layoffs” to be used in the event of “fiscal exigencies,” as well as epidemics, natural disasters and national security emergencies.

The new kind of layoff would allow the state to idle workers without having to follow the usual contractual procedures governing layoffs, like placing laid off workers in vacant positions at the same seniority level.

“We are deeply concerned about this proposal, especially given the timing. Workers are already being laid off across multiple agencies. Removing their only remaining protections in a moment of instability is unnecessary and harmful,” MAPE President Megan Dayton told the Reformer.

On Monday, the Minnesota Department of Health announced it was delaying layoffs for approximately 170 employees because a federal judge temporarily blocked the Trump administration from freezing $11 billion in federal health grants, including about $220 million for Minnesota.

In an internal memo obtained by the Star Tribune, assistant Commissioner Mel Gresczyk also acknowledged the agency made errors in determining layoffs, discovering some employees who received notices were funded by other grants and revenue sources. The Department of Health plans to issue new layoff notices, which will take effect May 14.

In its opening bid, the union also proposed tying cost-of-living raises to inflation and adding protections from job losses from artificial intelligence.

Job growth remains strong in Minnesota

Minnesota added 10,700 jobs in March, the biggest monthly gain in a year, despite massive upheavals in the global economy driven by the Trump administration’s trade war.

“The recent on again, off again round of tariffs continues to cause significant uncertainty among Minnesota companies … but even so, I have to say Minnesota’s job market has so far shown impressive resilience,” said Matt Varilek, commissioner of the Minnesota Department of Employment and Economic Development, at a news briefing on Thursday.

Minnesota gained 37,581 jobs over the year, faster than the national rate of growth. Unemployment ticked up slightly, but it was driven by more people entering the workforce, with the labor force participation rate increasing to 68.2%, among the tops in the nation.

Trouble may be on the horizon, however, as businesses that rely on products from other countries stare down steep tariffs and a souring consumer sentiment that’s likely to lead to a pullback in spending and layoffs. Tourist-dependent industries may also take a hit this season as international workers and customers stay away, either in protest of the Trump administration or fear of being caught up in immigration enforcement.

Trump’s efforts to slash the size of the federal workforce through layoffs and buyouts have also not yet appeared in the jobs data, since the mass firings of probationary workers has been tied up in court and those who accepted voluntary buyouts may remain on the government’s payroll through September. More layoffs are planned, affecting Minnesota’s roughly 18,000 federal workers, with agency heads required to submit plans for massive staffing reductions by Monday.

Jobs in state and local government, meanwhile, saw strong growth and added 1,500 jobs over the month in March.

Carpenters union protests Absolute Drywall

Members of the North Central States Regional Council of Carpenters picketed outside an affordable housing development in Burnsville on Wednesday to protest Absolute Drywall, a subcontractor on the site with a long history of labor violations.

The demonstration was part of coordinated protests across the country by the carpenters union called Tax Fraud Days of Action aimed at shaming contractors the union says drive down industry wages by skirting labor laws.

Absolute Drywall has been cited repeatedly for various labor law violations, including illegally employing minors and misclassifying workers as independent contractors to avoid paying overtime, health insurance and payroll taxes. Minnesota loses upwards of $136 million a year in tax revenue because of payroll tax fraud, according to an estimate by the Midwest Economic Policy Institute.

The company is currently being sued by the state Department of Human Rights for sex discrimination for firing a female worker who was raped by a co-worker on a job site. The company is also being investigated by state labor regulators for alleged wage theft on an apartment complex built by the owners of the Minnesota Vikings.

The carpenters union also criticized MWF Properties — the developer of the Pillsbury Ridge development they picketed — and its general contractor, Eagle Building Company, for continuing to hire Absolute Drywall even after its checkered past has become public.

Eagle Building Company told the Reformer the company does not condone the behavior laid out in the allegations against Absolute Drywall and would reevaluate its business relationship with the subcontractor after the legal process played out.

“We have a rigorous program in place to identify and prevent worker abuses on our job sites,” Nick Williams, vice president at Eagle, wrote in an email.

MWF Properties did not respond to a request for comment.

Whistleblower warns of DOGE intrusion into private NLRB data

Members of Trump’s Department of Government Efficiency initiative appear to have taken reams of sensitive data from the National Labor Relations Board, according to a whistleblower’s account detailed by NPR.

The intrusion into the agency, which investigates and adjudicates unfair labor practices, has alarmed labor experts, who say it could expose personal information about union members, proprietary corporate data and witness testimony — data protected by the Privacy Act and other federal laws.

“It could result in damage to individual workers, to union-organizing campaigns and to unions themselves,” Harley Shaiken, a professor emeritus at the University of California, Berkeley, told NPR.

DOGE’s effective leader, world’s richest man Elon Musk, owns companies with a number of cases before the NLRB, including alleged illegal firings of SpaceX employees. Lawyers for SpaceX have argued the NLRB’s structure is unconstitutional in that case.

In a report sent to Congress, NLRB information technology employee Daniel Berulis detailed how DOGE engineers were granted virtually unrestricted access to the agency’s computer system. Then they took steps to conceal their digital footprints across the system and appear to have exported gigabytes of data.

Berulis also noticed attempted logins from an IP address in Russia after DOGE accessed the system.

“If he didn’t know the backstory, any [chief information security officer] worth his salt would look at network activity like this and assume it’s a nation-state attack from China or Russia,” said Jake Braun, a former White House cyber official.

After Berulis raised concerns about the data intrusion, he found a printed letter taped to his door which included threatening language and a picture of him walking his dog.

The NLRB’s acting press secretary denies that DOGE was granted access to its systems. NPR reports that a day after its investigation was published, DOGE assigned two of its people to work part-time, remotely at the agency.