Going by his past rulings on federal appeals courts, GOP President Donald Trump’s nominee to fill Justice Anthony Kennedy’s vacant U.S. Supreme Court seat – federal appellate judge Brett Kavanaugh -- will be bad news for workers, unions and women if Kavanaugh makes it to the High Court. In 2007, Kavanaugh said the Defense Department had temporary authority to curb the collective bargaining rights of 700,000 civilian defense workers. AFGE and its allies later persuaded Congress to dump that. Kavanaugh also said undocumented workers can’t unionize under the National Labor Relations Act; in a 2008 case involving a Brooklyn kosher meat packer, the appeals court majority said they could. In 2015, Kavanaugh ruled that the U.S. Constitution protected not just union demonstrators at the Venetian Casino in Las Vegas, but the casino’s right to call the police on the peaceful protest. “Judge Kavanaugh has a dangerous track record of protecting the privileges of the wealthy and powerful at the expense of working people,” said AFL-CIO president Richard Trumka.
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