Labor & Employment Law Daily Wrap Up, LITIGATION NEWS, TRENDS—With FMCS down to 10 to 15 employees, states worried about strike risks and rising costs, (Apr 8, 2025)

By Brandi O. Brown, J.D.

“Without FCMS assistance in ongoing negotiations,” the states allege, “parties will need to use much more costly private arbitrators, or risk strikes or other work stoppages.”

In a lawsuit filed by over 20 states against President Trump and multiple federal agencies, the states accuse the President of “leading a campaign to dismantle vast swaths of the federal government.” They allege that the administration “cannot dismantle federal agencies in this way” and that the actions taken, including the Executive Order issued on March 14 (the Closure Order), “are illegal several times over.” They allege that “whatever the President’s policy preferences, he cannot override the congressional enactments that authorize federal agencies, appropriate funds for them to administer, and define how they must operate.”

FMCS included. One of the agencies that the administration is “stripping... well past the studs,” the complaint alleges, is the Federal Mediation and Conciliation Service. Its staff, they allege, has been “slashed” from “roughly 200 to fewer than 15 individuals” and FMCS has also “announced the termination of several of its core programs, including its mediation program for public sector entities.”

Harms already inflicted. This “gutting of FMCS,” the states allege, “is already inflicting immediate and irreparable harms on” them. They note that several of the plaintiff states have laws requiring or strongly encouraging that a mediator or arbitrator in public labor disputes come from FMCS and some of the plaintiffs have collective bargaining agreements that specifically call for a mediator or arbitrator from FMCS to be used. Other states have MOUs and other agreements providing for the use of FMCS arbitrators or fact finders and others benefit from and rely on the agency’s services in other ways.

Along with higher costs and longer resolution times, they also cite concerns that a potentially large number of contract disputes could overwhelm state agencies and allege concerns that labor disputes are more likely to result in work disruptions. In a couple of states, they note that “ongoing labor negotiations have been abruptly canceled due to FMCS’s closure.” They assert that, without FCMS, “parties will need to use much more costly private arbitrators, or risk strikes or other work stoppages.”

The case is No. 1:25-cv-00128-JJM-LDA.

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