Union Membership Hits Sixteen Year High Because Of Trump
Credit: Unsplash
February 21, 2026

from The Guardian reports that union membership in the United States climbed by about 500,000, bringing the total to 16.5 million people. That is the highest it's been since 2009.

The increase is due largely to the Trump regime attacking workers' rights, most notably threatening the collective bargaining rights of federal employees.

Heidi Shierholz, president of the Economic Policy Institute, explained as much in a lengthy thread on Bluesky, but the key points are in these three posts:

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What has also helped with getting new members or helping other re-member the benefits of a union is the fact that the unions, especially the AFGE and AFSCME, have been fighting Trump's attacks in the courts and winning their cases.

After all, as the AFL-CIO giant Tom Donahue said, "The only effective answer to organized greed is organized labor." And there is no one greedier than the Trump syndicate.

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