Thousands of union members and others participated in marches, rallies and picnics on Labor Day throughout the Los Angeles region and across the country on Monday, decrying actions by the Trump administration that they say weaken unions and harm workers while strengthening and emboldening major corporations and the wealthy.
A White House proclamation Monday said President Trump’s actions are “reversing decades of neglect and finally putting American Workers first” by rewriting tax laws and creating a better economic climate for businesses.
His critics say he is undermining, in historic ways, the government and labor-union infrastructure established to protect workers — and therefore hurting individual workers.
Participants at a massive Wilmington rally and parade — organized by the Los Angeles County Federation of Labor — united over a common foe: Trump.
“Donald Trump has gone too far,” said state Sen. Maria Elena Durazo (D-Los Angeles), as she and others linked typical Labor Day rhetoric directly to immigration raids. “On this Labor Day, we have an American president who takes parents from their children and workers from their jobs.”
The raids are no longer about border security, Durazo said, but “about breaking the backbone of our economy and terrorizing families.”
”Fighting for workers’ rights means fighting for immigrant rights,” said Angelica Salas, the executive director of the immigrant advocacy group CHIRLA.
The Trump administration, meanwhile, marked Labor Day by extolling the American worker and calling attention to new trade policies — including widespread tariffs — intended to spur a return of manufacturing to the United States.
“Every day, my Administration is restoring the dignity of labor and putting the American worker first,” Trump said in a Labor Day proclamation. “We are making it easier to buy American and hire American, breathing new life into our manufacturing cities, and securing fair trade deals that protect our jobs and reward our productivity. … Under my leadership, we are bringing jobs back to America — and those jobs are going to American-born workers.”
Tariff chaos at port
The effect of tariffs and their uneven rollout is widely debated, including within Trump’s Republican Party, although a Congress controlled by Republicans has not acted to stop them.
Trump’s tariffs — and the threat of them — have triggered unpredictable boom-and-bust cycles at L.A.’s ports, Mickey Chavez, president of the International Longshore and Warehouse Union Southern California District Council, said Monday.
Standing with his French bulldog Gucci under an ILWU tent after the Wilmington parade, the union foreman described how the mood has fluctuated dramatically at the nearby union hall where ILWU members wait for work.
“It’s been chaotic, more than anything, with the tariffs,” Chavez said as smoke from a barbecue a few tents over curled past his ILWU beret. “Either the workers really get a lot of work because they’re trying to beat the tariffs, or then [Trump] sets out more tariffs and the work slows down.”
The uncertainty has made it difficult for workers to plan, particularly those at the lowest level, who are most affected by slowdowns.
“If he sends out a tweet or makes a decision, we never know if there’s going to be work or not, so it’s been in flux,” the fourth-generation ILWU member said.
Chavez’s great-grandfather first joined the union in the 1940s and his family has worked at the ports ever since. But he has never experienced anything like this before, where work is so dependent on the whims of a single man, he said.
Trump bans most federal bargaining
On the same day as his Labor Day proclamation, Trump issued an order banning collective bargaining at the International Trade Administration and the Patent and Trademark Office within the Commerce Department; the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration’s National Environmental Satellite, Data and Information Service, and the National Weather Service; as well as at NASA and the U.S. Agency for Global Media.
Trump cited national security concerns as providing legal grounds for the unilateral edict. The latest action follows a March order outlawing collective bargaining for a majority of the federal workforce, citing the same justification.
Unions immediately filed suit, putting Trump’s action on hold.
A study from the left-leaning Center for American Progress estimated that Trump’s orders have stripped 82% of civilian federal workers of their right to bargain. The total number of workers whose contracts Trump has abrogated exceeds 1 million, an estimated one-fifteenth of American workers covered by a union contract.
In addition, Trump fired National Labor Relations Board member Gwynne Wilcox, although the National Labor Relations Act stipulates that board members serve for five years and her term was not to end until August 2028. Her dismissal has paralyzed the labor board by leaving it without a quorum. The U.S. Supreme Court declined to stop her dismissal as part of ongoing litigation.
At least one speaker at the Wilmington rally spoke of the need for organized labor to support California Gov. Gavin Newsom’s efforts to redraw state congressional districts to flip as many as five seats from Republican to Democrat — a strategy to offset actions taken in Texas — urged on by Trump — to do exactly the opposite.
Labor groups have already put millions of dollars behind it and have committed to help lead voter-mobilization efforts.
Unlike in Texas, Newsom’s plan must be approved by voters, who will have the opportunity to support it by voting for Proposition 50.
Passage of the measure at the ballot box is essential, state Assemblyman Mark Gonzalez (D-Los Angeles) said at the Wilmington event, because Trump is already “destroying the fabric of the labor movement” months into his second term.
California Republicans point out that the measure unravels reforms meant to make California districts more representative and competitive. Opponents of the retaliatory gerrymander include former California Republican Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger.
Festive vibes
In Wilmington, although the thousands of union members and allies were fired up, the rally and parade retained a festive vibe.
On a truck at the front of the procession, leaders of local and state labor groups danced with elected officials as Bob Marley and the Wailers sang about standing up for rights over a loudspeaker.
Hammerhead cranes at the nearby port facilities dotted the horizon as classic cars turned down E Street, and posters and T-shirts in the crowd advertised membership in an alphabet soup of union locals.
Children sharing space with political fliers in oversized wagons blew bubbles, and teenage girls from a local high school twirled pom-poms.
At the helm of a massive shiny black truck bearing the Teamsters insignia, a driver clenched a cigar between his teeth as he steered with one hand and pulled an overhead horn with the other. Representatives from the local branch of the sheet metal workers union carried a carefully crafted, welded brown California bear in the back of their truck.
Alongside carpenters and nurses and dockworkers, there were also representatives from a cadre of entertainment industry unions representing actors, writers and production workers.
Rallies across the Southland and the country were united under the banner of May Day Strong, a partnership of labor, political and environmental organizations. The targets of the rallies included federal agencies carrying out immigration raids, including U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement.
“The billionaires continue to wage a war on working people, with their cronies in the administration, ICE and law enforcement backing up their attacks,” according to the organizers’ toolkit. “This Labor Day we will continue to stand strong, fighting for public schools over private profits, healthcare over hedge funds, shared prosperity over billionaire-bought politics.”
