Calling for “freedom from partisan interference in programming,” administrative staffers at the John F. Kennedy Center for Performing Arts have gone public with a push to unionize following an overhaul of the tony institution by Pres. Donald Trump’s administration.
The staffers announced their organizing drive on Thursday, revealing they are working with the United Automobile, Aerospace and Agricultural Implement Workers of America (UAW). Organizers say they filed a petition on Thursday afternoon for an election at the National Labor Relations Board in order to get the process underway.
Organizers are attempting to include between 130 to 170 employees in the bargaining unit, including staffers in programming, education, marketing and development departments in addition to administrative workers at the Washington National Opera and National Symphony Orchestra. According to the group, about 60 percent of these workers have signed union authorization cards.
“We demand transparent and consistent terms for hiring and firing, a return to ethical norms, freedom from partisan interference in programming, free speech protections, and the right to negotiate the terms of our employment,” an organizing spokesperson for the group, which is calling itself the “Kennedy Center United Arts Workers,” said in a statement.
The group believes union organizing will help accomplish these goals. “Union organizing is an unparalleled method of gaining power in the workplace and advancing our shared goals,” the spokesperson stated. “Forming as Kennedy Center United Arts Workers will position us firmly inside a powerful local — and national — network of unionized workers fighting for workplace rights and fair treatment.”
The Hollywood Reporter has reached out to the Kennedy Center for comment.
The White House began a fundamental reshaping of the 53-year-old institution in February, when Trump fired several members of the Center’s board and held a vote that installed himself as chair. From there, Hamilton and Issa Rae backed out of engagements and an LGBTQ+ event was quietly canceled.
According to Kennedy Center United Arts Workers, the new guard has cut the staff by 37 employees and hired leaders who are “industry outsiders” with “no formal job descriptions or professional background in the arts.”
The group also contends that, since February, the Center’s privately-funded Social Impact Division has been terminated while its national arts education programs have been threatened by cost-cutting.
“Kennedy Center’s new management has signaled its intent to dismantle mission-essential departments and reshape our arts programming without regard to the interests of program funders, philanthropists, national partners, and the audiences we serve,” the organizing spokesperson said.
Nineteen other unions currently represent different groups of workers at the Kennedy Center, a list including the crew union IATSE, the performers’ groups SAG-AFTRA and Actors’ Equity, the American Federation of Musicians and the hospitality union UNITE Here, among others.