Trump Executive Order Strip More Federal Workers of Union Protections

source

Not trying to overact but I can think of this as war on workers.

On August 28, 2025, that's yesterday from the time of writing this article, the U.S. government signed a sweeping executive order that strips thousands of federal workers of their right to collective bargaining.

The agencies that will be affected include the International Trade Administration, the Patent and Trademark Office, NOAA’s satellite division, the National Weather Service, NASA and the U.S. Agency for Global Media.

Agencies of such repute and what was their justification for making this move? National security.

The Civil Service Reform Act of 1978 has a certain clause that allows presidents to be able to block union activity in areas that they deemed tied to security. And now that clause has been stretched, I would say overstretched to cover vast portions of federal service. Some of these places have very little to do with military secrecy or immediate defense for the nation.

Let's put it in another way.

This is technically a legal loophole that is being weaponized to crush workers’ rights.

It's not a new thing, whenever powerful people want to silence workers, they make moves and don’t usually say the move is about silencing workers, they find something to wrap it up with. The usual go to would be, for safety reasons, we want efficiency and well in this case, a matter of national security.

I stand to be corrected but do you think the Patent and Trademark Office really threaten national security when its employees start negotiating over their pay or how much workload is on them?

Will NASA not be able to explore space when the workers organize for fair conditions? The answer is no.

The truth of this matter is very simple, unions give workers a voice and power hates that voice. That blind obedience without questioning is what bosses and politicians want, Unions slow it down so the idea would be to silent the union.

When workers have the right to collective bargaining, it has a way of creating checks and accountability on authority and those in power know it so well.

For the federal employees hit with this order, they lose the ability to negotiate on basics like wages and cost of living adjustments, workplace safety protocols, job protections against arbitrary firing and fair grievance procedures.

The workers will now be told to simply obey. It’s a direct message from the top that says your rights stop where our control begins.

Yes it's affecting federal workers but for the rest of us, the warning is an even bigger deal. I'm taking this as seriously as I should. If this order is allowed to stand and stand for a long time, it inevitably sets a precedent that any government or even private companies emboldened by that crazy trend can weaponize security to take right to complain from any worker at all.

It has started in federal agencies but it can definitely move into state offices, universities, tech companies and beyond. Even that small supermarket you work in can become worse for you.

Federal employees will likely fight back in court as they should because this matter is as serious as can be. The unfortunate thing is that court battles take time and during that time, the workers will have to suffer this new order.

Screenshots were taken from YouTube