Gov. Jared Polis vetoes pro-union bill backed by Democratic lawmakers

Gov. Jared Polis made good Friday on his threat to veto a pro-union bill backed by every legislative Democrat and the state’s labor organizations, a move that’s likely to deepen the governor’s rift with key parts of the party’s coalition and set up a 2026 ballot fight.

Polis’ office announced his rejection of Senate Bill 5 on Friday afternoon, 10 days after it cleared the legislature. In his veto letter, the governor said he was open to changing the state’s Labor Peace Act, “if agreed to by both labor and business.”

SB-5 would’ve eliminated the second election in union formation, which is a unique provision of Colorado law that requires organized workers to pass another vote, with a 75% threshold, before they can negotiate the collection of union dues with their employer.

“Unfortunately, while both sides moved their positions, labor and business missed an opportunity this year to modernize this outdated law while providing lasting certainty to Colorado workers and businesses,” Polis wrote. His office previously defended the Labor Peace Act as a law that “serves the state and workers so well.”

Polis’ veto comes as no surprise: He’d privately told SB-5 supporters for months that he would reject the proposal unless the business community signed off on it, and he reiterated that position to reporters last week, after the bill passed.

In an interview with the Colorado Sun on Thursday, Polis said it would be “politically, suicide if I were to sign the bill,” given his earlier threats to veto it.

Talks to reconcile the differences between labor groups, business leaders and Polis’ office broke down in the final days of the session earlier this month. Business groups rejected Polis’ final compromise, and labor leaders — who’d accepted that deal — then rejected Polis’ attempt to inject his own priorities, like cuts to restaurant workers’ pay and expansion of charter schools, into the talks.

For months, Democratic lawmakers and labor unions mounted a public pressure campaign on Polis to sway him, which included a letter signed by five former U.S. Labor secretaries urging him to sign the bill.

On Tuesday, with the bill passed and a veto imminent, supporters held a rally behind the governor’s mansion in Denver. It included a Polis impersonator in enormous basketball shoes — a nod to the governor’s casual footwear — who introduced himself as “Jerry Polis, Jared Polis’ cooler cousin who cares about workers.”

Unions have long opposed the second election as unnecessary government interference that effectively makes Colorado a diet version of a “right-to-work” state, referring to states that prohibit requirements that workers join a union or pay dues. They have argued that workers should be able to more easily negotiate their contracts.

But in the second election, Colorado’s free market-friendly governor found a business regulation that he would defend. He and business groups argued that the state’s labor laws have worked effectively for decades and that workers should have maximum say in the collection of union dues from their paychecks.

Though Polis stressed in his letter that he support unions, his rejection of SB-5 puts him at odds with the Democratic lawmakers who control the legislature, and it will worsen his relationship with labor groups, who have accused Polis of going back on his promise to champion organized workers during his 2018 gubernatorial campaign. A year ago, Polis rejected other pro-union bills, sparking a rally outside his office attended by a number of elected Democratic leaders.