Today’s News & Commentary — October 16, 2017

Today, the Department of Labor will announce 23 members of the president’s apprenticeship task force.  The Wall Street Journal reports that the group will consist of corporate executives, labor unions, and governors and that the task force will be charged with developing a plan to expand the use of apprenticeships in the United States.  “Expanding apprenticeships will help Americans learn the skills they need to fill jobs that are open right now and in the future,” said Secretary of Labor Alexander Acosta.  Members of the task force “will provide varied perspectives that will help guide the administration’s strategy on growing apprenticeship programs nationwide.”

The conservative party won Austria’s national election on Sunday in a major upset, the New York Times reports.  The election represents a rightward shift for Austria, which has traditionally been led by the center-left Social Democratic Party.  Sebastian Kurz, Austria’s 31-year-old foreign minister, led the conservative party to victory, and in doing so “seiz[ed] on issues like limits to immigration and the threat posed to Austrian identity by Islam.”

Colin Kaepernick filed a grievance that accused NFL teams of collusion to keep him out of the league.  His legal representative said that the collusion claim was filed “only after pursuing ever possible avenue with all NFL teams and their executives,” reports the Washington Post.  Legal experts think that the claim will be difficult to prove because although the players’ union has a collective bargaining agreement with the league that prohibits teams from conspiring about signing decisions, that same agreement states that “the mere fact that a player is unsigned and evidence about the player’s qualifications to be on an NFL roster do not constitute proof of collusion.”