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Washington, D.C.—The leader of the nation’s largest independent union of federal employees today pledged to fight an 11th hour Bush administration executive order removing from the union’s bargaining unit some 1,500 employees of the Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms and Explosives (ATF) in the Justice Department and certain employees from the Tax and Trade Bureau (TTB) in the Treasury Department.

“This outrageous act seeks—without any supportable justification—to strip from these hard-working men and women the collective bargaining rights they have had for more than 30 years,” said President Colleen M. Kelley of the National Treasury Employees Union (NTEU).

“This is an action we take very seriously and will move aggressively to counter,” Kelley said. “NTEU will be pursuing all of our options to overturn this anti-union act.”

NTEU represents some 1,500 ATF employees. In January 2003, pursuant to the Homeland Security Act, the agency, which had been under the Treasury Department, was split. It moved ATF employees into the Justice Department, while the segment remaining in Treasury was renamed TTB. NTEU represents both professional and non-professional employees in the two agencies.

NTEU is still examining the full impact of the executive order, but it appears that all bargaining unit employees at ATF and certain workers at TTB would lose their collective bargaining rights under the White House action. DHS divisions listed in the executive order do not appear to include any NTEU bargaining unit employees.

“NTEU represents a number of employees involved with law enforcement and homeland security,” President Kelley said. “In more than 30 years, collective bargaining has never interfered with agency missions, and in fact, has created strong, professional and stable workforces.”

She noted that in April of this year, NTEU signed new collective bargaining agreements covering both ATF and TTB employees and that the agreements—approved at the highest levels of the agencies—say directly that employee involvement in the “formulation and implementation of personnel policies and practices affecting their conditions of employment” benefits the “effective administration of government.”

Federal sector collective bargaining rights allow employees to negotiate over workplace issues such as training, performance appraisals, shifts and schedules, and health and safety matters, as well as dignity, respect and fair treatment in the workplace. At the same time, existing law already protects managerial prerogatives needed to ensure the effective performance of agency missions. The executive order therefore represents “a gratuitous slap in the face for the hardworking employees of ATF,” Kelley said. By law, federal employees cannot strike.

As the largest independent federal union, NTEU represents 150,000 employees in 31 agencies and departments. NTEU has represented ATF employees for more than 35 years.