In today’s News and Commentary, a Colorado judge grants AFSCME’s motion to intervene to defend Colorado’s county employee collective bargaining law, Arizona proposes a constitutional amendment to ban teachers unions’ use of any public resources, and the NLRB is unlikely to use rulemaking to overturn precedent.

Yesterday, U.S. Magistrate Judge Varholak granted AFSCME’s motion to intervene to defend Colorado’s Collective Bargaining by County Employees Act, which is being challenged by the Douglas County Board of Commissioners. Under the law, which passed in 2022, county employees have negotiated numerous collective bargaining agreements throughout the state. According to Law360, the Douglas County Board of Commissioners had argued that AFSCME’s interests were identical to those of the defendants, the Governor and the Colorado Department of Labor and Employment Director. Citing Tenth Circuit precedent, Judge Varholak granted the motion to intervene because the government’s interests might not remain fully aligned with those of the union. AFSCME and the state defendants have filed motions to dismiss.

On Tuesday, Arizona lawmakers took the next step in advancing a constitutional amendment to restrict teachers unions’ use of public resources, including using school facilities for new employee orientations. Arizona’s House voted on the proposal, sending it to the Arizona Senate. If approved by the Senate, the proposition would go before Arizona voters. The amendment, if passed, would supersede all existing teachers unions’ contracts, ordinances, policies, or other agreements. In addition to preventing unions from using facilities for new employee orientations during working hours, the amendment would ban paid union leave and dues deduction. The president of the Arizona Education Association, Marisol Garcia, stated that “by taking away our collective voice,” Arizona lawmakers are “actually hurting the work and interests of the students in our schools.”

Finally, the NLRB has signaled that it does not intend to use rulemaking to overturn precedent. Industry groups had asked the NLRB to do so to overturn precedent. Bloomberg Law reports that at an American Bar Association conference on Wednesday, Board Member James Murphy indicated that in addition to being unlikely to use rulemaking, the NLRB would continue to observe the tradition of not changing precedent without three affirmative votes. As of yesterday, the Board faces a backlog of 482 pending cases.