CWA Delegates Vote for Unbreakable Resolution: Strengthening the Union's Future

Ladies and Gentlemen, the 80th CWA Convention was a game-changer! Delegates voted overwhelmingly in favor of the CWA Unbreakable Resolution, a bold move to strengthen our members’ ability to strike while ensuring sustainable funding for crucial projects. This resolution is a game-changer, folks! It adjusts the guidelines for our Strategic Industry and Growth Funds to provide more consistent funding and increases weekly payments to striking members. This is a no-brainer move to build a better future for our members, retirees, and their families.

The resolution addresses the variability in investment income from the Members' Relief Fund (MRF) by lowering the floor levels and adding predictability to the investment allocation. Specifically, the resolution lowers the MRF soft floor to $350 million and the hard floor to $325 million. These adjustments ensure that the union maintains its strike readiness and provides ample financial support to members during strikes. Additionally, the resolution sets investment income for the Strategic Industry and Growth Funds at a consistent $14 million annually. In years when investment income exceeds $14 million, any additional funds will remain in the MRF. This approach guarantees predictable returns while maintaining the liquidity needed to fund massive strike actions at a moment's notice. The resolution also enhances strike benefits, raising them to $400 a week beginning on the fifteenth day of a strike and $500 per week beginning on the twenty-ninth day. These changes ensure a more consistent flow of resources to the Strategic Industry Fund and Growth Fund programs, allowing the union to grow and strengthen its position to face future challenges.

Delegates also considered several proposed amendments to the CWA Constitution. They rejected an amendment that would have consolidated the Telecommunications and Technologies sector into the CWA Districts' administration structures. Instead, they approved amendments to:

- Require that the Finance Committee present a report during the Presidents' Meetings in non-convention years;

- Add a Passenger Service Representative to the Defense Fund Oversight Committee;

- Empower members by allowing them to file charges with the National Union for violations of the Policy on Mutual Respect—specifically in cases of harassment, discrimination, or retaliation;

- Update the process for handling charges against members and conducting trials.

Additionally, delegates approved several resolutions, including:

- Ten-year Project to Unionize Our Fellow Telecommunications Workers: Reaffirms our commitment to organizing in our industry of origin.

- Fighting the Trump Administration’s Anti-Union Project 2025 Playbook: Outlines the Trump Administration's attacks on working people and resolves to oppose any policies that undermine our ability to form unions and bargain contracts, resist any and all attempts by politicians to hand more power to corporations by taking away our freedom to vote, and mobilize to elect candidates who share our vision for a better future for ourselves, our families, and our communities.

- Protecting Our Public Services: Resolves to organize and mobilize to protect high-quality public services and good union jobs, fight to defeat anti-worker, pro-corporate policies, and proactively seek to put in place protections for public services as well as to educate, advocate, and build coalitions to help a wide audience of policymakers and working people understand the valuable role of public services.

- Trans Rights are Workers’ Rights: Reaffirms CWA’s organizational support for our trans siblings and resolves that CWA will continue to bargain for trans-inclusive contract language and protections to respect the expressed gender identities of our members. It is also resolved that we will continue to stand up for the civil rights of our trans siblings both in principle and by utilizing the power of our members to enshrine those principles into strong, enforceable contract language.

- A Generational Fight for Our Freedoms: Resolves to educate our members, increase our union membership, grow our independent political strength, and take an active part in building the broad multiracial working-class resistance to authoritarianism.

- Restoring Federal Funding for the Corporation for Public Broadcasting and Local Public Media: Condemns the Trump administration’s decision to request, and Congress’s decision to approve, the rescission of federal funding for the Corporation for Public Broadcasting, which jeopardizes the jobs of CWA members. It also reaffirms our commitment to defending public broadcasting as an essential institution that informs, educates, and connects communities across the nation.

- International Solidarity: Reaffirms our union’s commitment to global labor solidarity and support for the work of our international labor federations; states that we will work to ensure the full restoration of USAID and all international labor rights programs, institutions, and independent agencies that defend workers’ rights, investigate labor and human rights abuses, and lift up international labor standards; and urges locals to support CWA’s Eduardo Diaz Union-to-Union International Solidarity Fund through voluntary funding.

The resolution also demands an immediate and permanent ceasefire in Gaza, the return of all hostages, and that all steps are taken for the immediate and unhindered delivery of critical humanitarian aid to Gaza. In addition, CWA joins the calls for a permanent two-state solution for the region and, as such, demands that the U.S. government join the list of countries that have formally recognized a Palestinian state.

Delegates to the 80th CWA Convention voted on numerous resolutions, motions, and actions during the two-day convention. This was a historic moment, folks! The CWA Unbreakable Resolution is a game-changer, and the delegates' overwhelming support shows their commitment to building a better future for our members, retirees, and their families. This is a no-brainer move to strengthen our union and ensure a brighter future for all.