Author: Jon Schleuss

Happy Labor Day!

I’ve got a gift for every member this Labor Day: The Guild Reporter archives. 

The Guild Reporter was the printed newspaper of The American Newspaper Guild, which became The Newspaper Guild, which became The NewsGuild-CWA we know today.

Former Guild President Bernie Lunzer digitized the physical copies of The Reporter a few years ago and we just put it online. Today. For the first time ever. 

More than 1,300 issues stretch back to our founding in 1933 and cover an enormous amount of news: publishers trying to exclude journalists from the National Labor Relations Act, First Lady Eleanor Roosevelt joining the Guild, Ernest Hemingway donating to the Toronto Guild’s defense fund, journalists and editorial workers unionizing at The New York Times, the first collective agreement at the Canadian Broadcast Corporation, the first days of our longest-ever strike and the issue after September 11, 2001. 

When I walked through the DCA airport at 6 a.m. this morning I saw a woman wearing a shirt that read, “feral for a free press” and I thought it might be a good day. It was. 

On Thursday, U.S. District Judge F. Dennis Saylor called out the Trump administration for imposing new restrictions on the duration of visas impacting international journalists and students. The changes impact F, J, and I visas and change how long students or journalists can stay, adding massive barriers if they need to extend their time in the United States. 

Happy Friday! This month workers from two publishing houses organized with our union, bringing 730 new members into our family in just two election-count days! And since then, two more newsrooms have unionized with us!

Workers at Hachette Book Group and the University of Chicago Press voted to join our union on July 7 and 8, respectively. Hachette joined the Washington-Baltimore News Guild (WBNG) and University of Chicago Press joined the Chicago News Guild. 

I called workers at both publishers after their wins to ask: why did y’all unionize and why do it now?

Contact: themainemonitorunion@gmail.com

The staff of The Maine Monitor announced the formation of The Maine Monitor Union, joining The News Guild of Maine, Local 31128 of The NewsGuild-Communications Workers of America. Management agreed to voluntarily recognize the workers’ union shortly after they went public.

Workers launched with overwhelming support and are unionizing to better fulfill The Monitor’s mission to deliver high-quality, nonpartisan investigative and explanatory journalism by ensuring equitable employment terms that attract and retain top talent.

“Our union will be a positive step forward for both union members and the overall organization,” Rose Lundy, senior reporter at The Monitor, said. “The Maine Monitor Union will strengthen our newsroom, make The Monitor more attractive to talented candidates and will give staff the ability to speak with one voice.”

On Wednesday June 24 staff at High Country News (“HCN”) based in Colorado ratified their first collective bargaining agreement after unionizing in early 2024. The agreement covers 13 workers including writers, editors, photographers, customer service specialists, membership development managers, finance and payroll employees and more. 

It’s been a minute since my last newsletter because we’re down a comms coordinator (scroll to apply!) and I’ve also been traveling the world for our union. More on those trips at the bottom because there’s more interesting member news up top. Happy Friday! I hope you’re about to have a good restful weekend. 

And, if you’re thinking, “Jon this is a lot to read!” I bolded all the important stuff! You can also just look at the pictures. Let’s dive in. 

Last week all seven journalists at the Centre Daily Times in State College, Pa. asked local management to voluntarily recognize their union after McClatchy, the newspaper’s owner, began placing journalists’ bylines on stories written by artificial intelligence.

McClatchy agreed to have an independent party review the union cards signed by workers and compare that to staff lists. Six McClatchy newsrooms have unionized in as many years and each one was voluntarily recognized by the company. 

I’m traveling to Ottawa this week to attend the CWA Canada National Representative Council meeting. As The NewsGuild-CWA president, I’m a member of the council and am excited to hear from local leaders across Canada on the issues they’re facing and solutions they’re coming up with together. There will also be elections for several CWA Canada officer positions, including the treasurer and secretary. 

ProPublica workers voted 92% to authorize a strike if management does not agree to a fair contract that includes job security protections, ethical guardrails around the use of AI and wage increases to keep up with the rising cost of living.