Both business and labor advocates are asking Gov. Jared Polis to act on the Colorado Labor Peace Act overhaul that passed the Legislature, though union leaders already are plotting an alternate course in the wake of his announcement that he anticipates vetoing the bill.
On Monday afternoon, a coalition of 10 business organizations sent a letter to the Democratic governor officially requesting him to veto Senate Bill 5, which would eliminate the second organizing election required for union security under Colorado law. Accompanying the letter were signatures of more than 1,000 workers who said they too want to preserve the state’s unique labor law that requires at least 75% of employees voting in the second election to approve efforts for a union to seek through a collective-bargaining contract to take negotiating fees directly from every employee’s paycheck.
Meanwhile, a group of some 80 unions, community organizations and small businesses are gathering this afternoon in Governors Park near the governor’s mansion in Denver to ask Polis to sign the bill despite his statements Thursday indicating he plans a veto. However, that coalition, calling itself Colorado Worker Rights United, also will begin collecting signatures for a 2026 ballot initiative that would require employers to give just cause for firing a worker — the group’s stated backup plan in the event of a veto.
Business groups make Labor Peace case
For business leaders, this first step calling for a veto is a long-anticipated move after Democrats passed SB 5 through both chambers on a party-line vote, giving it a final OK on the penultimate day of the legislative session that ended on Wednesday. The letter notes that employer groups offered several compromise proposals that could have eliminated the second election if roughly two-thirds of workers approved unionization at the initial vote but felt they were not met with the same conciliatory efforts by labor.
“Colorado’s Labor Peace Act has served our state well for more than 80 years, fostering a unique equilibrium that has helped us outcompete peer states while protecting the individual employee’s rights,” the letter reads. “Your veto will ensure we remain a state that encourages collaboration, not compulsion, in workplace representation.”
Colorado Chamber of Commerce President/CEO Loren Furman testifies in January with a panel of business leaders against the proposed overhaul of the Labor Peace Act.
Signatory organizations include:
- Associated General Contractors of Colorado
- Colorado Bankers Association
- The Colorado Chamber of Commerce
- Colorado Contractors Association
- Colorado Concern
- Colorado Springs Chamber & Economic Development Corp.
- Colorado Hospital Association
- Colorado Hotel & Lodging Association
- Colorado Lodging Association; and,
- Denver Metro Chamber of Commerce.
Sides claim different impacts on workers
In addition, the petition includes the signatures of about 1,050 workers, collected between March and May, who oppose the bill because they want to preserve their right to determine whether roughly 2% of each paycheck will go to union negotiating fees. Business leaders have argued that one of the primary reasons to stop SB 5, along with what they anticipate will be its detrimental effect on economic-development efforts, is to honor workers who don’t want to be forced to pay a union they don’t want to join.
Labor leaders have argued in turn that unionizing will raise the base wages of workers across Colorado and help state residents to afford the cost-of-living spike that elected officials from both parties are calling an affordability crisis. The second election, they say, is an unnecessary barrier to granting workers the organizing preference they choose in a first election where unionization requires a simple majority, and it gives anti-union employers time to try to intimidate workers into a “no” vote.
“Lawmakers have done their part. Now it’s up to Governor Polis to do his part,” said Stephanie Felix-Sowy, president of SEIU Local 105, in a news release. “He can stand with working families or with the billionaire class rigging the system. It’s time to sign this bill into law and prove that Colorado stands with working people, not the wealthy few.”
Why Labor Peace Act is targeted
No other state has a law like Colorado’s Labor Peace Act. Twenty-six right-to-work states bar mandatory payment of union fees as a condition to employment, even at unionized companies. And twenty-three right-to-organize states require just the single first vote to unionize and before union-security payments can be taken from all workers.
The next step for Colorado Worker Rights United, which will kick off at this afternoon’s event, will be to try to get onto the 2026 statewide ballot another law that would make Colorado unique in requiring employers to give cause before letting workers go. Montana is the only other state right now with a just-cause requirement, but there are far more exemptions in its law than in what unions are proposing for Colorado.
Initiative 43, which was filed on March 7 with the Colorado Secretary of State’s office, would make companies with at least eight employees justify any suspension or discharge of a private-sector worker in writing to that worker within seven days of their action. Workers employed at the company for at least six months who believe they were disciplined or let go without cause could file a civil lawsuit seeking reinstatement, back pay, front pay, attorneys’ fees and “any other equitable relief the court deems appropriate.”
The battle over just-cause initiative
Employers would have a narrow group of reasons that they could cite as just cause, including repeated violations of job-performance policies, gross insubordination, willful misconduct and documented economic hardships to the employer. Substandard performance of assigned job duties also could justify firing, but employees first must be given notice of that issue and given an opportunity to cure.
Colorado AFL-CIO Executive Director Dennis Dougherty told The Sum & Substance when he filed the initiative that it polled very well at a time when, spurred by federal layoffs, there is an appetite among Americans to protect workers’ rights and jobs.
Employment attorneys have said passage of the initiative would open Colorado employers to threats of lawsuits from any workers that they fire and would make the state far less attractive a place for companies to relocate or expand.