Two days earlier, Condé announced the near-shuttering of Teen Vogue, which entailed letting go of eight people. My termination and that of three of my coworkers were clearly retaliatory, and if Condé can get away with this-and with President Donald Trump sabotaging the National Labor Relations Board, the company appears to be betting that it can-it will send a message to unions and employers across our industry that the foundations of labor law are collapsing.
The Trump administration issued an executive order late last month, quietly declaring that NASA will operate as a national intelligence and security agency going forward. The order stipulates that the agency will now "have as a primary function intelligence, counterintelligence, investigative, or national security work." It's a major departure for the agency, which has historically focused on space exploration, as well as space and Earth sciences over its 67-year lifespan.
Many have left rather than go back to an office they'd never visited or that was too many miles away. The RTO order was also an early sign that the administration would not respect the contracts the government had signed with federal unions - many had guaranteed hybrid and remote work arrangements. Since then, the White House has stripped nearly half a million federal employees of their union rights.