Mar 20, 2025 - CWA Levels Up with Industry-Wide Video Game Union Launch

Yesterday, workers across the U.S. and Canada launched United Videogame Workers-CWA Local 9433 (UVW-CWA), a direct-join, industry-wide video game union in partnership with the American Federation of Musicians (AFM). The union announced its launch at the 2025 Game Developer Conference in San Francisco, Calif., the world’s largest industry event for video game professionals, which draws tens of thousands of attendees. CWA members attended the launch, helped hand out an introductory zine with information about the union, and spoke on panels during the conference.

“Our mission is to take back our lives, our labor, and our passion from those who treat us like replaceable cogs,” reads UVW-CWA’s mission statement. “We are going to create a game industry that works for us, one that nourishes its talent and invests in its future, rather than constantly seeking short-term profits. We are the ones that make the games, so we must be the ones that set the terms of how we work.”

“The formation of United Video Game Workers-CWA is an exciting next step in our union’s work to help video game workers build power in their industry,” said CWA President Claude Cummings Jr. “As video game studios have consolidated, the workers whose creativity, dedication, and skill bring the games to life have become more of an afterthought. They are subject to endless cycles of layoffs and rehiring as corporate executives pursue short-term profits at the expense of a sustainable future.”

Video game workers and musicians in the United States and Canada who are interested in becoming members can apply here.

Follow UVW-CWA on Bluesky, X, and Instagram. Visit uvw-cwa.org for more information on campaign updates and membership opportunities.

Last week, striking production and advertising workers at the Pittsburgh Post-Gazette (PPG) accepted a buyout offer after the newspaper outsourced production of its print edition, eliminating 31 union jobs. Journalists and newsroom staff represented by the Newspaper Guild of Pittsburgh (TNG-CWA Local 38061) remain on strike.

“The Post-Gazette chose to outsource jobs rather than do the right thing and bargain,” said CWA District 2-13 Vice President Mike Davis. “They have not bargained in good faith, but we have stood together to negotiate the best possible severance package for the production and advertising workers. As always, we have their backs, and we know that they will continue to stand in solidarity with our striking journalists for justice at the Post-Gazette.”

With some workers having been on strike for 29 months, CWA’s Pittsburgh Post-Gazette strike is the longest-running current strike in America. Journalists, editors, artists, and other workers went on an unfair labor practice strike demanding the company bargain in good faith and restore the terms of the contract it illegally, unilaterally tore up, including slashes to health care, time off, and other core tenets of any union contract.

“They leave this strike with best wishes and admiration from the members of the Newspaper Guild of Pittsburgh,” wrote striking PPG journalist and member of the Newspaper Guild of Pittsburgh-CWA Ed Blazina. “We are proud to have stood alongside these folks during this bitter strike. And we will carry on striking with their fight and sacrifice very much in our minds and hearts. For two and a half years, they have fought against an employer set on destroying them. Our union siblings have simply made the best deal they can so they can move on with their lives. For us Guild members, the strike goes on as we are in a different position.”

On February 27, a 3rd Circuit Court panel of judges heard oral arguments from the company and the National Labor Relations Board over a request by the board to enjoin the company to restore the terms of the contract it unlawfully discarded in 2020. Strikers are awaiting a decision any day now.

Visit Pittsburgh Union Progress to read more.

To support striking workers and families, you can do any of these three things today:

1. Donate to the strike fund that's used to pay for rent, utility bills, car repairs, groceries, and to keep their pets alive and well.
    
2. Order a T-shirt repping their strike publication, the Pittsburgh Union Progress. All proceeds go to the same strike fund.
    
3. Subscribe to the Pittsburgh Union Progress for free news on the strike, the lives of working people in Western PA and beyond, and more.

Flight Attendants at Hawaiian Airlines, represented by the Association of Flight Attendants-CWA, reached a tentative agreement with the company last week on a contract extension through February 2028. The extension provides a foundation for negotiations on a joint collective bargaining agreement with the recently merged Alaska and Hawaiian Airlines.

The contract extension includes pay increases, improvements to retirement benefits, and inclusion in the Alaska Air Group profit-sharing program. Voting on the tentative agreement will end on April 17.

“Hawaiian Flight Attendants deserve certainty and guaranteed improvements as we work towards our joint contract,” said Joni Kashiwai, AFA-CWA Hawaiian Negotiations Chair. “This extension provides these certain economic improvements while joint contract negotiations begin this month.”

Workers at two Gannett-owned newsrooms represented by the NewsGuild of New York (TNG-CWA Local 31003) have been fighting for fair wages. Gannett operates the USA Today network and controls hundreds of local newsrooms across the United States.

Editorial staff at The Bergen Record in Bergen, N.J., voted overwhelmingly last week to authorize a walk-out, citing Gannett’s chronic union-busting and unwillingness to reach a fair first contract after three years of bargaining. “Gannett continues to bargain in bad faith and insult us at the bargaining table. Our members’ walkout vote shows we won’t let Gannett bully us into submission,” said Kaitlyn Kanzler, Unit Chair of The Record Guild and courthouse reporter for The Record.

Currently, over half of the staff at The Bergen Record are paid salaries below the average living wage for the area, and nearly a quarter of the staff are paid poverty wages. The NewsGuild of New York has filed numerous unfair labor practice complaints against the company.

At the same time, journalists at six Gannett papers in New York and New Jersey, also represented by the NewsGuild of New York, recently ratified first contracts after threatening to walk out.

The APP-MCJ Guild represents editorial staff at the Asbury Park Press, Courier News, and the Home News Tribune, and the Hudson Valley NewsGuild represents editorial staff at The Journal News, Poughkeepsie Journal, and Times Herald-Record.

“We fought for Gannett to invest in our communities and in us,” said Journal News reporter Nancy Cutler, acting Unit Chair of the Hudson Valley News Guild. “And we won.”

Gains include strong salary floors for new and current employees, many of whom will see life-changing raises; annual guaranteed wage increases to combat inflation; and policy updates to include ethical guidelines for the use of artificial intelligence with a stipulation that new technology must be bargained over in future contracts.

 
Members of the APP-MCJ Guild (TNG-CWA Local 31003) celebrated their contract win earlier this month.

Workers organizing with NABET-CWA Local 52031 reached a first contract earlier this month with Deep South Today, a nonprofit network of newsrooms in Mississippi and Louisiana. The company voluntarily recognized the union in July 2023, following a successful card check campaign. This effort represents the first Mississippi-based newsroom ever to successfully form a union.

NABET-CWA Local 52031 President Bantu Opiotennione provided critical support for the unit's negotiating team and helped to deliver this initial contract which establishes a minimum annual salary of $60,000 for certain job categories, including reporters and photojournalists, and $69,000 minimums for the Senior Reporter/Investigative Reporter categories.

"As President of NABET-CWA Local 52031, it fills me with pride that we now have a union contract that covers these newsrooms in Mississippi and Louisiana, and it is my hope that this represents the first of many new NABET-CWA shops in the deep South," said Opiotennione.

Last night, CWA hosted a town hall for members and retirees about recent actions that the Trump Administration has taken that could make it more difficult to enforce our contracts and what we can do to protect our rights. The call featured remarks from CWA President Claude Cummings Jr., CWA Local 3204 President Ed Barlow, and Economic Policy Institute Senior Fellow Lynn Rhinehart.

If you missed the town hall, you can watch the recording here.