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McClatchy laid off 30% of its unionized workers; here’s how local coverage will suffer

Yesterday, the large news publisher McClatchy laid off more than 90 unionized journalists and media workers across 17 publications. They represent about 30% of all McClatchy workers unionized with The NewsGuild-CWA, at news outlets like The Miami Herald, The Sacramento Bee and The Kansas City Star.

These are journalists and other workers who have been asked to adjust, bend, mold and fit into an ever-changing business, some working for decades at McClatchy. They’ve done so seamlessly.

Their reward? They lost their jobs, cut by a company that should spend as much time figuring out how to use high-skilled employees as it does replacing their work with AI.

The departure of these talented reporters, visual journalists and writers will immediately leave gaping holes in local coverage for dozens of communities across the United States.

Oxford University Press workers win historic offshoring case

An impartial arbitrator ruled on Monday that Oxford University Press violated its contract with Guild members when it laid off 13 workers in 2024. The arbitrator ordered the company to resolve the issue with the News Media Guild, the NewsGuild-CWA local that represents workers at Oxford University Press. If the parties can’t agree on a remedy, the arbitrator will provide one by November.

“The ruling is historic,” said Tony Winton, the News Media Guild’s executive director, “because it vindicates language in many NewsGuild contracts negotiated to limit offshoring and use of non-bargaining unit personnel.”

Workers first organized in 2021 and won a collective agreement in 2024. Shortly after the agreement was signed, management fired staff and transferred their work out to the United Kingdom, violating the jurisdiction article in the contract.

The arbitrator wrote that the employer violated Article 1, Section 4 of the contract “when it laid off the 13 bargaining unit employees because of the assignment or reassignment of the protected work to non-unit employees.”

Statement from the Toledo NewsGuild on Block Communications’ decision to cease operations of The Blade

The Toledo Blade ended employees’ Labor Day weekend with an email Tuesday morning announcing it would close on Dec. 31 if it is not sold by then.

Prior to the announcement, the company had asked union employees to vote for a contract proposal that would have cut their severance in half, in addition to greenlighting giving away their work to Al, among other outsourcing. Workers voted that down, 46-25.

Union members’ objections were largely non-economical. This was reflected in Guild counterproposals.

Screenshot of 1937 edition of The Guild Reporter, the newspaper of The American Newspaper Guild

Newsletter: Happy Labor Day!

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.

U.S.-based employees of leading French newspaper Le Monde go on strike

Los Angeles – U.S.-based journalists and media workers at Le Monde, the largest national newspaper in France, are beginning a one day unfair labor practice strike Monday. Every worker voted to strike after the Los Angeles-based subsidiary SEM USA Corp. refused to bargain in good faith. Le Monde Union is affiliated with the Media Guild of the West (TNG-CWA Local 39213), which also represents journalists at the Los Angeles Times. The collective action comes after several months of unsuccessful negotiations with the newspaper’s management, which is based in Paris. The company has committed several unfair labor practices during the course of bargaining by failing to provide counterproposals for months during bargaining sessions, setting arbitrary deadlines to conclude negotiations and proposing changes to tentative agreements.

Workers handle a portion of editorial work and contribute to the production of La Matinale, the newspaper’s morning news app and overnight updates for Le Monde’s French and English websites. They also produce content for Réveil Courrier, the morning app from Courrier International, which is distributed from Los Angeles.

Workers at The Investigative Journalism Foundation unionize

Workers at The Investigative Journalism Foundation (IJF) have filed to join the Canadian Media Guild (CMG) as members.

The union filed with the Canada Industrial Relations Board (CIRB) on Thursday, September 3^rd, after a more than a dozen staff signed union cards. This will be a wall-to-wall bargaining unit including workers in the editorial, development and tech departments at the digital media company. These workers are based across the country, providing their skills and knowledge to the nationwide media sector.

News Media Guild President Vin Cherwoo dies

News Media Guild President Vinay Cherwoo, who labored for decades to improve the lives of generations of media workers, died Thursday after a long illness, his family said. He was 56.

Cherwoo was a New York-based sports editor at The Associated Press, where over the course of three decades he developed an expertise and deep knowledge of many professional sports. His service to the Guild started in the 1990s, when he was elected to the union’s Executive Committee and served as a rank-and-file negotiator on many contracts with the AP.

Federal judge calls potential harms “enormous” from Trump administration’s changes to journalist and student visas

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.

California Legislature passes NewsGuild-backed local news bill

A bill that would provide California newsrooms with tax credits based on how many journalists they employ was passed this week by California’s Senate and Assembly. The measure, California’s Community NEWS Act, now sits on the desk of Gov. Gavin Newsom.

Two NewsGuild-CWA locals, Media Guild of the West and Pacific Media Workers Guild, were part of a coalition led by Rebuild Local News that has advocated for the bill since it was first introduced in February.