Grave Threat to American Workers

Floor Speech

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Mr. KILEY. Mr. Speaker, as chair of the House Subcommittee on Workforce Protections, I will take a moment today to address a grave threat to American workers that is coming from Washington, D.C., right now. Hundreds of thousands of Americans are at imminent risk of losing their livelihoods because of an anti-worker agenda that certain politicians and special interests are pushing by any means necessary.

The Department of Labor is currently considering a proposed nationwide rule that would severely limit the gig economy, freelancing, independent contracting, self-employment, and other alternate work arrangements that entire careers are based on and entire industries have been built around.

The rule has a similar objective to the PRO Act, which is supported by President Biden, and even passed the House in the last Congress.

The devastating consequences of these policies are not a matter of speculation. In California, we know all too well what is in store for the rest of the country if this rule is adopted and if the PRO Act passes because the model for these policies comes from our State, a law called AB 5 that passed the supermajority legislature in 2019 and has been ruthlessly enforced by Governor Gavin Newsom ever since.

AB 5 has been absolutely devastating for countless independent professionals in California. You don't need to take my word for it. Governor Newsom's own former deputy chief of staff, Yoshar Ali, called it ``one of the most destructive pieces of legislation in the past 20 years,'' adding, ``It's truly horrific how many people are negatively impacted by it.''

Newsom's political mentor, the former mayor of San Francisco and former speaker of the State Assembly, Willie Brown, said that the law made him want to ``picket'' against the ``bastards'' at the Capitol and the special interests that ``took advantage'' of them.

Andrew Cuomo rejected a similar law in New York, saying he didn't want to ``make the same mistake'' as California.

The liberal Daily Kos likewise warned other States: Don't make the same mistake California's Gavin Newsom did--with the site's founder calling the law disastrous and asinine and its supporters shameful.

The NAACP assailed it as a ``terrible law'' and a ``gut punch to our community.''

The CEO of the Black Chamber of Commerce called it a catastrophe responsible for enabling, defending, and propagating systemic racism.

Mr. Speaker, 200 Ph.D. economists, including a Nobel Laureate, reported that the law is doing substantial and avoidable harm to the very people who now have the fewest resources and the worst alternatives available to them. One commentator called it ``the most malicious and harmful law ever passed in California.''

AB5 effectively bans independent work of any kind, being your own boss. With a single stroke of his pen, Governor Gavin Newsom rendered countless Californians, spanning hundreds of professions, unable to earn a living in our State--videographers and caricaturists, transcriptionists and interpreters, technicians and engineers, analysts and consultants, musicians and conductors, artists and dancers, writers and editors, coaches and trainers, teachers and tutors, nurses and doulas, the list goes on.

Many national companies now explicitly disclaim on their applications that they can no longer work with California freelancers. Hardly an industry or trade is unscathed.

Most devastated by AB5 have been our most vulnerable: seniors, caregivers, students, reformed convicts, single mothers, people with disabilities or health issues or mental health needs, all of whom rely on independent contracting.

Many of my own constituents have been ensnared by the law. Right here, you see a photo of Ildiko Santana, an immigrant, a naturalized citizen, who worked as a freelance translator for over 20 years in Loomis. It took decades for her to build up her clientele, and then she had a single law cause her to lose it all. After AB5 went into effect, not a single one of the over 50 agencies she did business with will hire her unless she incorporates or leaves California.

Across the State, thousands of hardworking people are in exactly the same position. Take, for example, Heather Mason, who said: ``I am a conference producer. I had to move; went to Utah. I can't hire many of our freelance folks back in California either.'' She said: ``I am heartbroken to leave LA.''

Elizabeth Adger said: ``AB5 is why I had to pack up my very ill husband with stage IV cancer and autistic son and leave the State. There is no way I can take care of our family and work a `traditional'- type job. I have always worked for myself and paid my taxes. I was terrified of becoming homeless. Now I am moving to Florida, where my business is welcome.''

Here is the thing. That just isn't going to be an option if the PRO Act or this proposed rule from the Department of Labor goes into effect because this suffering will be taken nationwide.

It is estimated that the PRO Act would cost over 350,000 freelance workers their ability to earn a living, and even just the Department of Labor rule in and of itself would cause significant losses.

Unlike State laws, independent businesspeople will have nowhere to turn if these policies go into effect. What is going to happen to folks like Ildiko and Heather and Elizabeth? In fact, Ildiko will be forced to leave the United States and return to her home country in order to make a living.

Mr. Speaker, I am calling on President Biden to see the reality, to see the harm that these policies are causing. I am calling on President Biden to rescind his proposed rule and to stop supporting the PRO Act, to listen to independent contractors and freelancers whose lives have been upended in California, to have compassion and to stop advocating for policy changes that would inflict this suffering nationwide.

As chair of the House Subcommittee on Workforce Protections, I will promise you this. I am going to work in every way possible to defeat the PRO Act. Our committee will fight for workers. There is an agenda out there that is working against workers. We are going to fight for workers, for small businesses, and for economic freedom.

If the proposed Department of Labor rule does take effect, I will immediately act to pass legislation to repeal it. More than that, I will use the gavel of this subcommittee to shine light on the unparalleled damage that has been wrought by AB5, and I certainly will make sure that the freelancers who have lost everything in California are not forgotten.

In a broader sense, AB5 is truly a case study in the decline of the State of California. We used to be the State where anyone could get ahead. Now, we are the State that so many can't wait to leave behind.

We are the Golden State and have always served as a beacon of opportunity for well over a century. We have attracted innovators and adventurers.

We are a State that has so many blessings, endowed with unbelievable natural beauty. Yet, somehow, we have gotten to the point where California just achieved a historic three-peat, where for the third straight year, we led the Nation in one-way U-Haul rentals.

In fact, with the recent redistricting, we lost a seat in Congress, and if the lines were redrawn today, we would lose another seat. It is precisely because of policies like AB5.

California's Governor is saying again and again that our State is a model for the Nation. President Biden has been all too quick to believe him by supporting policies like AB5 and the PRO Act.

The sad reality is that, in many ways, our State is not a model for the Nation but a warning to the Nation about what happens when humanist values give way to brute political force.

Today, I am urging the President and my colleagues in Congress to heed that warning.

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