Dive Brief:
- A U.S. District Court judge in Washington, D.C., has granted a preliminary injunction against the Department of Defense and Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth for not following a Biden-era executive order mandating the use of project labor agreements on some federal jobs.
- Judge Rudolph Contreras ruled in favor of North America’s Building Trades Unions and the Baltimore-D.C. Metro Building and Construction Trades Council on May 16, ordering the DOD to set aside PLA-avoidant guidance, even for projects not related to the plaintiffs.
- Contreras’ order sides with the plaintiffs and says that the DOD must resume the practice of using PLAs. The agency did not respond to requests for comment.
Dive Insight:
The case is the latest news in a legal back and forth wherein an executive order from former President Joe Biden remains in place, despite opposition from the current administration and numerous contractor groups.
On Feb. 7, the DOD ordered its contracting officers to halt the use of PLAs on “large-scale construction projects,” according to a memo obtained by Construction Dive. That contrasted with a still-on-the-books executive order from Biden’s time in the White House, which mandated use of PLAs on projects receiving $35 million or more in federal funds.
Then, on April 9, NABTU and the Baltimore-D.C. Metro Building and Construction Trades Council filed suit in the U.S. District Court for the District of Columbia., claiming the exclusion “interferes with Plaintiffs’ ongoing practice of negotiating such agreements with contractors bidding on federal large-scale construction projects.”
NABTU President Sean McGarvey praised the ruling.
“PLAs aren’t political gimmicks or special-interest carveouts,” McGarvey said in a statement. “They are proven workforce development tools that undergird strong economic growth in communities across the country.”
Despite the injunction, the landscape around federal PLAs remains unclear.
For one, U.S. Court of Federal Claims Judge Ryan Holte ruled in January in favor of employers on seven contracts that Biden-era order would be anti-competitive and relied on “arbitrary and capricious” presidential policy. Nonetheless, the ruling applied to only those specific bid protests, which would mean any other contractors wishing to receive an exception to a federal contract requiring a PLA would need to file their own protest.
On top of that, President Donald Trump has yet to remove Biden’s executive order, despite signing one of his own guiding rulemaking at agencies away from using PLAs and other collective bargaining agreements.
Brian Turmail, vice president of public affairs and workforce for Associated General Contractors of America, said that the May 16 ruling demonstrates the need for the Trump administration to revoke what he called President Biden’s "unlawful" executive order.
Kristen Swearingen, vice president of government affairs for Associated Builders and Contractors, also called for the revoking of the Biden-era order.
“ABC respectfully disagrees with the court’s reinstatement of illegal and costly project labor agreement mandates on a wide range of federal construction projects critical to America’s national security,” said Swearingen in the statement.
She also said the executive order discriminates against non-union workers and discourages competition. Swearingen alleged that PLAs force non-union contractors to sign collective bargaining agreements and coerce workers who don’t wish to be in unions to join.
McGarvey pushed back on that remark.
“The Associated Builders and Contractors’ statement on this matter reflects a fundamental misunderstanding of how the construction industry actually works,” McGarvey wrote in his statement. “PLAs aren’t exclusive to union contractors. In fact, countless traditionally non-union contractors work on PLA projects across the country.”
