Judge Shields Federal Union Rights as Agencies Cancel Pacts (1)

A federal judge said the government must recognize collective bargaining agreements with some federal worker unions in the latest lawsuit to challenge Trump’s efforts to strip labor rights from administration employees.

Judge Paul Friedman of the US District Court for the District of Columbia said in a preliminary injunction ruling from the bench Tuesday that the administration can’t strip unionized employees of their federal labor rights and disregard CBAs for the duration of the AFL-CIO’s litigation against it. The judge’s reasoning, laid out after oral arguments, falls in line with his rulings in two other challenges to Trump’s March executive order which declared large swaths of the government exempt from labor protections.

The injunction covers workers represented by the International Federation of Professional & Technical Engineers, the American Federation of Teachers, the International Association of Machinists, and several other AFL-CIO member unions.

The ruling comes as a flood of government agencies move to toss their union contracts. The Department of Veterans Affairs announced last month it would no longer recognize pacts covering hundreds of thousands of workers. It was joined shortly after by others, including the Environmental Protection Agency, the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, the Food and Drug Administration, and the US Citizenship and Immigration Services.

Friedman, a Clinton appointee, previously said the EO was likely unlawful in cases involving the National Treasury Employees Union and the American Foreign Service Association and noted Tuesday that his analysis remained the same for the AFL-CIO challenge.

Those prior injunctions were stayed by appeals courts—along with temporary orders from a California federal judge. The US Court of Appeals for the District of Columbia Circuit held that NTEU hadn’t proven irreparable harm from the executive order, and the Ninth Circuit stayed the California order because of the historical deference given to presidents over matters of national security.

Much of the oral arguments Tuesday revolved around whether the circuit court rulings should factor into the AFL-CIO’s request for a preliminary injunction. Friedman ultimately, in issuing his own opinions, said the administrative stays were “certainly not binding.”

AFL-CIO jumped into the legal fight after the injunctions from Friedman and a California federal judge were stayed by appeals courts.

The AFL-CIO is represented by attorneys from O’Donoghue & O’Donoghue LLP, Altshuler Berzon LLP, and the union. The Justice Department is representing the administration.

The case is AFL-CIO v. Trump, D.D.C., No. 1:25-cv-02445, 9/30/25.