DELEGATE NADARIUS CLARK ANNOUNCES THE “RIGHT TO UNIONIZE” ACT.

Richmond, VA: Today, Delegate Nadarius Clark (HD-79), representing Portsmouth, Norfolk, and Chesapeake in the General Assembly, announced his chief patronage for HB1220, which will repeal Virginia’s “Right to Work” laws. 

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Virginia passed its right-to-work law in 1947 in response to a threatened strike by employees of Virginia Electric and Power Co., the predecessor of Dominion Energy. To suppress the potential strike, Gov. William Tuck, an avowed segregationist and union buster, threatened to draft the workers into the state militia. The conflict ended with no strike, but it motivated Tuck to propose the state's right-to-work legislation (Source: Barber 2020). 

Repealing the Right to Work laws in Virginia will allow workers to join unions and increase wages by ten to twenty percent compared to their non-union counterparts. In the long term, a repeal would strengthen unions, help make gains in union membership, and improve a union’s bargaining position as they continue to advocate for workers across the Commonwealth. 
 
“The right to organized labor, which provides power and agency for all  workers, is a moral issue facing our Commonwealth and for that reason I am proud to stand and support our sisters and brothers in labor.” Nadarius Clark said in a statement.

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“Workers in states with organized labor protections have a consistently higher quality of life than in other states—better wages, better benefits, safer working conditions, lower poverty and infant mortality rates, more access to the health care they need, and better education for their children.”

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“The Right to Unionize Act will strengthen our workforce, our communities, and secure a better future for the next generation.”

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