Newsom Signs Bill Eliminating Union Vote-by-Mail for Farm Workers

Farm workers tend a strawberry field near Ventura, Calif., on Aug. 5, 2022. Mario Tama/Getty Images

Farm labor unions could get a boost in membership with new union election rules they say will make it easier for farm workers to organize—approved by California Gov. Gavin Newsom last month—despite objections from the state’s agricultural industry.

Newsom signed Assembly Bill (AB) 113 into law May 15, making changes to the state’s Agricultural Labor Relations Voting Choice Act (AB 2183) passed last year, eliminating mail-in ballots in union elections.

“California’s farmworkers are the lifeblood of our state, and they have the fundamental right to unionize and advocate for themselves in the workplace,” Newsom said in a statement announcing the signing of AB 2183 in September.

The new revisions in AB 113 keep in place a card-check system, favored by unions. The card-checks—also known as a Majority Support Petition—allow workers who want to join a union to sign a card, authorizing a union to represent them in collective bargaining, according to the California Labor Federation.

The card system allows unions to submit proof of majority support through cards or petitions, which would be verified by the Agricultural Labor Relations Board.

Farm workers move piping used to irrigate a field near Palm Desert, Calif., on July 13, 2022. Mario Tama/Getty Images

The mail-in system, outlined in the Agricultural Labor Relations Voting Choice Act, would have required employees to contact unions and request voting kits to participate in the election. The state’s agricultural labor board would have verified the validity of the petition for representation and the names on the ballots.

According to the law, AB 2183 allows the state to fine companies for unfair labor practices up to $10,000 for each violation and $25,000 for instances when the employee suffers “serious economic harm.”

AB 113 also limits the number of card-check elections in the state to 75 in the next five years and creates a bond process for employers, which requires employers who want to challenge, overturn, or appeal a labor board’s order to submit a bond—or sum of money—that equals the value of the order to proceed.

The regulations in AB 113 sunset on Jan. 1, 2028, when card-check elections will no longer be an option.

Supporters hope AB 113’s new provisions will boost union membership among the state’s farm workers.

Matt Broad, a legislative analyst with Broad and Gunsman Governmental Advocacy, said the changes will make it much easier for laborers to organize.

Farm workers tend to strawberries in a field in Fountain Valley, Calif., on Jan. 27, 2022. John Fredricks/The Epoch Times

“Unions like to organize under card-check because they can go out and have conversations with workers and sell them on the benefits of joining a union,” Broad told The Epoch Times.

The card-check system allows workers to avoid employer harassment, which is a “big deal” in the agricultural sector, he said.

Also, when farm workers—who are mostly Hispanic or Filipino in California—join a union, they gain the benefit of having an extra set of eyes looking out for them, Broad added.

“It helps mitigate some of the bad stuff that can happen in a workplace where workers feel they have no other choice. They can channel through the union, and the union is looking out for them, making sure [employers] are not in violation of the labor law.”

Critics of the card-check system claim it violates farm workers’ right to a secret vote and could make it easier for unions to coerce and intimidate workers during union elections.

This year’s measure faced strong opposition from the Western Growers Family of Companies, an industry group representing the state’s agricultural community since 1926.

Farmworker Florentino Reyes picks tomatoes in a field near Mendota, Calif., on Aug. 30, 2016. Scott Smith/AP Photo

“[Western Growers] voiced strenuous opposition to this unusual agreement during the Senate hearing on AB 113 and specifically called out that this agreement was made behind closed doors without public input, removes the mail-in voting option which legislators touted last year, and places an inherently unfair appellate bond process in front of employers as a way to block their appeal rights,” said Matthew Allen, the organization’s vice president of state government affairs, in a statement.

Agricultural employers were excluded from discussions that Newsom had with unions about such changes in 2022, Allen added.

United Farm Workers and the California Labor Federation struck an agreement with Newsom Sept. 28 before he signed last year’s Agricultural Labor Relations Voting Choice Act, which resulted in this year’s AB 113.

California has about 81,500 farms and ranches, which is less than 4 percent of the nation’s total. But the state’s agricultural production makes up about 11.2 percent of the nation’s agricultural crops and commodities, according to Cal Poly–San Luis Obispo.

An estimated 162,500 farm workers worked in California in 2019, the Public Policy Institute of California reported.

AB 113 took effect immediately after the governor signed the bill.