National Defense Authorization Act For Fiscal Year 2017

Floor Speech

First of all, this doesn't belong in NDAA. This is not a defense issue, but I would like to talk more substantively about it and then make another statement.

I strongly support tribal sovereignty. I know my colleagues appreciate Senator Moran's genuine interest in this. He is my friend. We have worked on a number of issues in banking together. We don't agree on this, but that is the way things are. I do believe both sides of the aisle do support tribal sovereignty.

This amendment, though, is not about tribal sovereignty. It is about undermining labor laws--laws that protect the rights of workers to organize and collectively bargain--one of America's great values that more than almost anything--other than democratic government--created and maintained a middle class, organizing and bargaining collectively. Specifically, the amendment attempts to overturn NLRB decisions that have asserted the Board's jurisdiction over labor disputes on tribal lands.

The Board has methodically evaluated when they do and don't have jurisdiction on tribal lands by using a very carefully crafted test to ensure that the Board's jurisdiction would not violate tribal rights and does not interfere in exclusive right to self-governance.

In a June 2015 decision, the NLRB employed the test and did not assert jurisdiction in a tribal land-labor dispute. Instead, the amendment is part of an agenda to undermine the rights of American workers. We have seen it regularly. We see it in State capitols. We saw it in my State capitol 5 years ago when the Governor went after collective bargaining rights for public employees.

For the first and only time in American history, voters in a statewide election said no to rolling back collective bargaining rights. It was the only time it ever happened, and it was by 22 percentage points.

The amendment is part of an agenda to undermine the rights of American workers, including 600,000 employees of tribal casinos--75 percent of them are not nonnative Indians, non-Indians. Courts have upheld the application to the tribes of Federal employment laws, including Fair Labor Standards Act, the Operational Safety and Health Act, the Employment Retirement Income Security Act, and title III of the Americans with Disabilities Act.

In addition to harming the thousands of already organized workers at commercial tribal enterprises, this amendment would establish a dangerous precedent to weaken longstanding worker protections on tribal lands.

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