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Obama Aids Labor With Policy Shifts, Key Appointments
After decades of decline, Big Labor now has reason to be optimistic about the future: It has fast friends in the White House.

California officials recently learned just what that meant when they tried to trim the pay of state health workers. A top union got the administration to tell California to back down.

The debt-ridden state had sought to trim $74 million from its budget by reducing its contribution to home health workers' pay from $12.10 an hour to $10.10.

The Obama administration subsequently told them in an April 15 conference call that if the wages were cut it could endanger $6.8 billion in federal stimulus funds.
President Barack Obama speaks Thursday during a town hall meeting in Rio Rancho, New Mexico.

Also on the call were the Service Employees International Union's associate general counsel and two California union officials, one a lobbyist.

The SEIU had lobbied the administration to step in. Many of the workers are SEIU members....