Notes from the CWA Convention – Pittsburgh 2025

Due to concerns about the dignity and safety of Canadian delegates crossing the U.S. border, a smaller than usual group of CWA Canada members attended the biennial convention of our international union, the Communications Workers of America, in Pittsburgh this week.

Unions in the United States share our outrage at Trump’s attacks against the press, free speech, academics, the LGBTQIA2S+ community, and people of colour. Canadian union members have additional concerns about the harm these and other attacks have on the economy and the well-being of Canadian workers.

In addition to undermining, and in some cases making radical changes to, social, judicial, and legal institutions, Trump also has unions on his hit list. This reversal of decades of hard-fought labour gains was the topic of much discussion, and delegates pledged to work closely with other groups fighting back against this systemic erosion of worker rights.

A major change has been the U.S. government banning language that promotes diversity in the workplace, what Americans call Diversity, Equity, and Inclusion (DEI) language, common in large employer hiring policies.

Delegates were outraged at this and affirmed the union’s commitment to fight for social justice issues like equal pay for equal work, safer workplaces, anti-racism programs, paid maternity and paternity leave which many states don’t have, help for workers with mental health issues, and basic sick leave as many states do not require companies to pay that.

There was anger that Washington has cancelled funding to the country’s largest public news provider, National Public Radio. Union members, including those at CWA Canada and the NewsGuild-CWA (TNG), voted to use the unions’ power to join the fight to restore funding.

Delegates also passed a motion calling on the U.S. government to help stop the war in Gaza, find a long-term solution to the conflict, and recognize a two-state solution – something Canada and many European countries are already calling for.

Among all the positive work, we did have a disappointing result at the NewsGuild-CWA Sector Conference, which was held just before the CWA Convention. For five years, we at CWA Canada have tried to get TNG to respect our rights under our Canadian autonomy agreement, including our right to negotiate a withdrawal from the Guild Mobilization & Defense Fund. We want to use our contributions for our own Canadian-run fund, but unfortunately the TNG leadership has not negotiated in good faith. They finally insisted the matter go to the Sector Conference, then recommended voting down our amendments. We have always worked co-operatively with TNG on media and labour issues and want to continue to do so – but as equal partners in CWA. We will fiercely protect our hard-won Canadian autonomy, and our decisions will be made by CWA Canada, not TNG.

As always at these international meetings, American issues dominated. But as we know, what happens south of the border eventually trickles north and potentially affects us all.

Fortunately for CWA Canada, belonging to CWA continues to be a mutually beneficial relationship.