Donald Trump trashes Ron DeSantis’ ‘sellout’ to insurance industry (Florida Politics)

Like a stopped clock, disgraced ex-President* and con artist real estate developer DONALD JOHN TRUMP is right twice a day. It appears that Herr TRUMP, scion of con artists,  is right on this occasion. 

From Florida Politics: 

Donald Trump trashes Ron DeSantis’ ‘sellout’ to insurance industry  

by A.G. Gancarski

March 30, 2023

'The worst insurance scam in the entire country with the highest rates in the entire country.'

Donald Trump is doubling down on his attacks of Ron DeSantis‘ “bailout” of insurance companies.

In a new video, the former President again contended the Florida Governor favors privileged “globalist” insurance companies over the people of the Sunshine State.

“DeSanctimonious is delivering the biggest insurance company bailout in global history. This is a gift to insurance companies and a disaster for the people of Florida,” Trump said.

“He’s also crushed Florida homeowners whose houses were destroyed in the hurricane. They have been absolutely decimated. They’re getting pennies on the dollar.”

Trump then offered a denunciation of Florida’s Insurance Commissioner for doing “absolutely nothing.”

“While Florida’s lives are ruined, the hurricane was a disaster. The hurricane was actually handled very poorly and the insurance companies are being made whole. The people of Florida aren’t,” Trump said, decrying the “total sellout to the insurance companies.”

“The worst insurance scam in the entire country with the highest rates in the entire country. That’s Florida.”

This argument may feel familiar. Two weeks ago on Truth Social, the former President flogged the Florida Governor.

“He’s also crushed Florida homeowners whose houses were destroyed in the Hurricane — They’re getting pennies on the dollar. His Insurance Commissioner does NOTHING, while Florida’s lives are ruined. This is the worst Insurance Scam in the entire Country,” Trump contended.

Insurance Commissioner Michael Yaworsky was selected as a permanent replacement this month. DeSantis and members of the Cabinet — acting as the Financial Services Commission — unanimously elected Yaworsky to head the Office of Insurance Regulation (OIR). He had previously served in an interim role.

The insurance “BAILOUT” bashed by Trump refers presumably to two recent Special Session bills. SB 2A, passed in December, provided $1 billion from the state’s general revenue fund to bolster the reinsurance market, in an attempt to stop last year’s attrition of available providers. This followed up on a $2 billion allocation from a different Special Session in May for essentially the same purpose.

___

Gray Rohrer and Christine Jordan Sexton of Florida Politics contributed to this report.

A.G. Gancarski

A.G. Gancarski has written for FloridaPolitics.com since 2014. He is based in Northeast Florida. He can be reached at AG@FloridaPolitics.com or on Twitter: @AGGancarski

I’m a Tampa Bay teacher, not a martyr, in Gov. DeSantis’ culture wars | Column (Chris Fulton, Tampa Bay Times)

 My hat is off to Tarpon Springs schoolteacher Chris Fulton for this column skewering the screeds that serve as the emetic record of the misdeeds of our "local Mussolini," in the words of Presidential historian Michael Beschloss, who uses the term "fascist" to describe Flori-DUH Governor, RONALD DION DeSNTIS)

OPINION

|

Guest Column

Chris Fulton

I’m a Tampa Bay teacher, not a martyr, in Gov. DeSantis’ culture wars | Column

The essential life lesson that racism and bigotry are morally wrong needs to be served up hot with a warm side of historical context. Selective omission is itself a form of indoctrination.

Enlightening students as to both sides of any topic is part and parcel of a teacher’s job description; doing so nurtures empathy and allows learners to make informed decisions on where they stand. And those who argue against academic freedom and teacher autonomy are de facto advocates of authoritarianism. [ JIM COLLINS | 

I’ve been Mirandized. Anything I say can and will be used against me in a court of law. And I say: Bring it on! Go ahead and make a martyr out of me because my classroom is my turf, and I’ll continue to teach however I damn well please within the blurry parameters of my content area.

Chris Fulton [ Provided ]

Gov. Ron DeSantis’ declaration that Florida is the freest state in America leaves out the part about that freedom being a right-turn only, one-way street. As such, things are looking down for foot soldiers doing battle in the state’s educational trenches. Now taboo is any LGBTQ+ discourse, the assumption being that not saying “gay” will make it go away. Then there’s the governor’s union-busting Teacher’s Bill of Rights providing “civil remedies for teachers who are ... punished by their employers for standing up for what is right,” which sounds splendid but raises the basic question: What qualifies as “right”? And who gets to decide? Is it to be DeSantis and his rubber-stamp Legislature?The Virginian-Pilot ]The governor champions “teaching accurate American history without an ideological agenda.” To that end, he’s established a 50-hour Civics Seal of Excellence course for teachers, the underpinnings of which fly in the face of the constitutional separation of church and state. Sharp-eyed educators who have signed on for the $3,000 dangled carrot-upon-completion say the course has a distinctly Christian fundamentalist, conservative bias. No shocker there since the curriculum was developed in coordination with Hillsdale College, a private Christian liberal arts school in Michigan, and the Bill of Rights Institute, founded by conservative billionaire icon Charles Koch. So much for taking ideology out of the mix.

Are parents to be the arbiters of what is right? Should one parent, or a relatively small group of parents, have the power to dictate whether an acclaimed novel is taught? Parents who believe their precious child isn’t being exposed to the uncensored actualities of modern society via the internet and other forms of media are delusional. Cloistering kids is detrimental if our mutual goal is to produce capable critical thinkers.

Enlightening students as to both sides of any topic is part and parcel of a teacher’s job description; doing so nurtures empathy and allows learners to make informed decisions on where they stand. And those who argue against academic freedom and teacher autonomy are de facto advocates of authoritarianism.

Don’t students have the right to draw conclusions about our imperfect world without the disingenuous whitewashing of America’s sometimes dark, inexcusable history? The essential life lesson that racism and bigotry are morally wrong needs to be served up hot with a warm side of historical context. Selective omission is itself a form of indoctrination and excluding shameful facts as a way of sheltering learners from distasteful truths is as harmful to them as it is to society.When I teach “Huck Finn” — Mark Twain’s slyly disguised tirade against racism — I do so with a no-holds-barred approach. The fear-mongering tactic of politicizing critical race theory as causing white kids to feel guilty about both their skin color and the abhorrent mistreatment of African Americans and Native Americans by ancestors generations removed doesn’t factor into my educational equation. The premise is patently stupid.

Just as dumb are efforts to legislate sexuality in all its forms. Because the ignorant endeavors of repressed lawmakers will never supplant the fundamental, unavoidable certainties of human nature.

In Ray Bradbury’s prescient novel “Fahrenheit 451,” books are illegal and burned because the populace has lost interest in reading them in favor of mindless interactive videos and other forms of vacuous entertainment. People willfully swallow alternative facts from their government because they can’t be bothered to work their way to discerning objective realities.

With that in mind, and in view of my imminent arrest by the (lack of intelligent) Thought Police, I’d like to preemptively assert my right to place one phone call:

“Hello? May I please speak with the Founding Fathers?”

Chris Fulton teaches Cambridge Literature/General Paper classes at Tarpon Springs High School. He has been in the classroom for more than 25 years.

U

Employers spend more than $400 million per year on ‘union-avoidance’ consultants to bolster their union-busting efforts. (Economic Policy Institute)

From the Economic Policy Institute, evidence of employers' extravagant union-busting consultant spending:

Employers spend more than $400 million per year on ‘union-avoidance’ consultants to bolster their union-busting efforts

Fact Sheet • By Celine McNicholas, Margaret Poydock, Samantha Sanders, and Ben Zipperer • March 29, 2023

Fact Sheet

Download PDF

High-profile union organizing campaigns and attacks on those campaigns at companies such as Amazon, Starbucks, and Google have shined a spotlight on workers seeking better pay and working conditions. However, attempts to derail those efforts by corporations are on the rise, costing more than $400 million a year.

But that number is only the tip of the union-busting iceberg. 

Here’s what we know about ‘union avoidance’ today:

• When workers seek to form unions, employers often hire “union-avoidance” consultants to dissuade and weaken workers’ unionization efforts. These consultants work to prevent a union election from taking place—and if that fails, to ensure that workers vote against the union.
• Employers spend a lot of money trying to derail union organizing campaigns. EPI estimates employers spend $433 million per year on union-avoidance consultants. This work is well compensated—consultants report being paid $350-plus hourly rates or $2,500-plus daily rates for their work to defeat union organizing efforts. This estimate is just a drop in the bucket because there is not enough data to reveal the true scope of what employers spend.1
• Employers are required to report certain union-avoidance expenditures. However, statutory exemptions and enforcement limitations severely limit the scope of reportable employer union-avoidance activities. As a result, relatively little data exist on employer expenditures on union avoidance.
• This reality makes it harder for workers to fight for their collective bargaining rights because they do not know the extent of their companies’ investments in union-busting, a figure that could empower them at the negotiating table when employers claim they can’t afford to increase pay and benefits.

TABLE 1

Employers spend millions on union-avoidance consultantsAmounts union-avoidance consultants reported receiving from selected employers for work performed in 2021

Employer	Amount reported
Amazon	$4,260,000
United Natural Foods	$2,650,000
American Auto Assoc., N. California, Nevada, Utah	$1,923,000
Grocery Delivery E-Services (Hello Fresh)	$1,638,000
Maine Health	$958,000
El Milagro Tortillas	$863,000
Curation Foods	$689,000
Intralot	$251,000
Garden Fresh Gourmet	$211,000

Source: Bob Funk and LaborLab's analysis of LM-10 forms filed by consultants with the U.S. Department of Labor (DOL) Office of Labor-Management Standards (OLMS), 2021, rounded to the nearest thousand dollars.

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• While the law requires employers and consultants to disclose their union-avoidance agreements, it provides an important exception when the consultant is merely providing the employer with “advice”—a term that is not defined in the statute and is exploited by many union-busting consulting firms.
• The Obama administration tried to rectify the problem by attempting to close this loophole through a regulatory action known as the “persuader” rule. In its proposal, the administration emphasized the significance of this loophole, stating: “Although 71 to 87 percent of employers hire consultants to manage counter-organizing campaigns, the Department has received very few reports on these activities because employers deemed them to fall under the ‘advice’ exemption.”2
• Unfortunately, business groups sued to prevent the rule from being enforced, and the Trump administration rescinded the rule. Without reform to the reporting system, we have little to no idea how much companies spend on union busting. 

Table 1 lists just a few of the employers who filed mandatory reports with the Department of Labor during 2021.

Policy recommendations

To expose the extent of corporations’ union-avoidance activities, policymakers should: 

• Pass the Protecting the Right to Organize (PRO) Act, which would require disclosure of indirect persuader activities by union-avoidance consultants;
• Pass the No Tax Breaks for Union Busting Act, which would prevent employers from deducting union-avoidance expenditures from their taxes;
• Finalize Form LM-10 rulemaking requiring employers to attest if they are federal (sub)contractors, which would help fill an information gap on whether federal contractors are participating in union-avoidance activities; and
• Rescind the 2016 Special Enforcement Policy for Form LM-21, which states that the Office of Labor-Management Standards (OLMS) will not enforce the completion of Parts B and C of Form LM-21. Rescinding the policy would require union-avoidance consultants to itemize payments from employers they engage with each fiscal year. 

Our blog post on the issue highlights recent case studies of union busting.

Notes

1.  See Celine McNicholas, Margaret Poydock, Julia Wolfe, Ben Zipperer, Gordon Lafer, and Lola Loustaunau, Unlawful: U.S. Employers Are Charged with Violating Federal Law in 41.5% of All Union Election Campaigns, Economic Policy Institute, December 2019: To arrive at the $433 million figure, we take the $338 million dollar estimate from McNicholas et al. 2019, which covered the four-year period 2014–2017, and adjust it for inflation to 2023 dollars according to Consumer Price Index (CPI-U) estimates using the annual average of the BLS CPI-U for 2014–2017 and the Congressional Budget Office (February 2023) projection for the full-year 2023 CPI-U. The estimated rates for consultants are from McNicholas et al. 2019. 

2. U.S. Department of Labor, “Overview/Summary: Persuader Agreements: Ensuring Transparency in Reporting For Employer and Labor Relations” (fact sheet), October 2016. 

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See related work on Collective bargaining and right to organize | Unions and Labor Standards

See more work by Celine McNicholas, Margaret Poydock, Samantha Sanders, and Ben Zipperer

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