A wave of Democratic lawmakers came out in support of allowing staffers to form unions after a Hill-centric Instagram account sharing anonymous horror stories about poor working conditions and terrible bosses exploded on the Capitol community.
For those working for members of Congress on Capitol Hill, low pay, long hours, and ego-driven bosses have long been an open secret. But an account called “Dear White Staffers,” the creator of which is unknown, spotlighted what organizers argue are systemic problems by sharing hundreds of anonymous stories in recent weeks.
Some of those who wrote in said that they applied for food stamps or other public assistance while working for a member of Congress. Others accused lawmakers of screaming at staff, directing them to complete their personal errands, or more nefarious behavior.
Those writing in noted that Democrats, who have long staked their electoral success on labor unions and movements, were some of the worst offenders and yet have not given their staff members the ability to form unions.
That may soon change.
After the account went viral, a group called the Congressional Workers Union announced an effort to allow staff members to organize. A majority of Democrats in the House came out to enable their staff members to unionize, including House Speaker Nancy Pelosi. According to a tracker from the left-wing advocacy group Demand Progress, 23 senators support the staff unionization push.
Efforts to organize staffers follow years of Democratic political firms, campaigns, and the Democratic National Committee forming unions.
Congress first paved the way for unions on the Hill when it passed the Congressional Accountability Act in 1995, subjecting itself to labor laws that Congress had been exempt from. The law grew out of former House Speaker Newt Gingrich’s “Contract with America” platform to require that “all laws that apply to the rest of the country also apply equally to the Congress.”
While some workers under the authority of Congress, such as police officers, formed unions, lawmakers never took the final step to afford their office staff the same collective bargaining rights. The House and the Senate must pass separate resolutions for each chamber.
Michigan Democratic Rep. Andy Levin, a lawyer with decades of experience working in labor issues, introduced a resolution this month to do so in the House. It has 144 co-sponsors so far.
Showing support for unionizing staff is a way for Democrats to signal support for labor organizing while their massive unionization protections expansion bill, the Protecting the Right to Organize Act, is stalled in the Senate.
“We’ve never passed a damn paragraph of legislation since 1935 to make it easier for private sector workers to organize,” Levin said, calling for passage of the PRO Act. “So, here’s one group of workers, who work directly with us, who are speaking up anonymously because they have no legal right to have a union … and they’re exposing their conditions.”
In the House, salaries for lower-level workers such as a staff assistant can be as low as $29,000, while those in senior roles such as chief of staff can make up to nearly $170,000, according to a 2020 Congressional Research Service report. Median pay was about $55,000 for schedulers, legislative assistants, and press secretaries. Salaries are somewhat higher for roles in the Senate: $74,634 for press secretaries and $67,875 for schedulers.
But union organizers argue that working conditions compared to the private sector lock those without family monetary support out of legislative jobs, contribute to attrition, and make young staffers too susceptible to the influence of experienced lobbyists.
“Decades of efforts to keep staff pay down, reduce the number of staff, and make conditions worse have resulted in a brain drain from the Legislative branch to the powerful special interests seeking to influence it,” the Congressional Workers Union said in a statement.
An analysis of 2021 payroll data by the House Office of Diversity and Inclusion found that median pay for all House jobs was $59,000, compared to $106,735 in the federal government and $64,920 in the private sector. More than half of Capitol Hill staffers are between the ages of 21 and 29, according to LegiStorm.
Even if the House passes the resolution, technical questions remain about the makeup of unions in congressional offices. Each of the 435 members of the House and 100 senators have the autonomy to decide pay levels and conditions for their staff, and there is a question about whether senior roles would be considered management. House Majority Leader Steny Hoyer told reporters that he had tasked House Administration Committee Chairwoman Zoe Lofgren, a California Democrat, with looking at the issue.
Some organizers envision staff members from each office unionizing individually. Levin compared the situation to waves of workers at individual Starbucks locations voting to unionize, starting with a Buffalo, New York, location in December and spreading to more than 50 locations in 19 states by the end of January.
Republicans, consistent with their history of being generally critical of unions, are not on board with the union push.
“I don’t think it would be productive for the government,” House Minority Leader Kevin McCarthy told Punchbowl News about a potential union.
The unionization effort faces even steeper odds in the evenly divided Senate. West Virginia Sen. Joe Manchin, the most conservative Democrat in the chamber, was less than enthusiastic when asked about the effort.
“If their staff is not being treated fairly, that should be looked into and taken care of,” Manchin told reporters, adding that he has been a “big supporter” of unions.
