President-elect Donald Trump nominated Sen. Jeff Sessions (R-Ala.) as attorney general, and hearings for his nomination are currently underway. Many are discussing the long, terrible record that Sessions has, but we thought it would be interesting to imagine what it would be like to actually work for Sessions. This is speculative fiction, of course, but based on the things he's said and done over the years (click on the link after each entry to read more about Sessions and that topic). But here's what we think it could be like to work for Sessions.

After Republican legislators in Kentucky passed several anti-worker laws, Kentucky State AFL-CIO President Bill Londrigan made the following statement.

Today, as Congress debates the future of the Affordable Care Act, the AFL-CIO sent a letter to Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell (R-Ky.), Speaker of the House Paul Ryan (R-Wis.) and all members of the U.S. Senate and House of Representatives.

Every week, we bring you a roundup of the top news and commentary about issues and events important to working families. Here’s this week’s Working People Weekly List.

The GOP in Kentucky has been chomping at the bit to destroy the basic protections that’ve held working families together across our state for decades. These newly emboldened GOP leaders need to answer to the people they are hurting with their greed. Kentucky has always run on the love we have for our families and that sense of community has been the bedrock of our labor unions. This is something I learned firsthand from my mom.

Staples and the U.S. Postal Service announced in late 2013 that they would launch a pilot program operating mini post offices in the company’s retail outlets. The initial test markets were the San Francisco Bay Area, Pittsburgh, Atlanta and the Boston suburbs.

Following the Connecticut's State of the State this week, which called for labor concessions to balance the budget, Connecticut AFL-CIO President Lori Pelletier said the governor's proposals are disappointing. Here are some excerpts from coverage of the response.

The U.S. economy added 156,000 jobs in December and unemployment was little changed at 4.7%, according to figures released this morning by the U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics. This continues the recovery of the labor market at a tempered rate, which means the Federal Reserve’s Open Market Committee should continue to let the economy grow at this rate and not raise interest rates.

Eds. note: "Right to work" legislation passes 58–39 in the Kentucky House.

Kentucky Republican leaders, led by Gov. Matt Bevin, gained control of the state House, giving them control of the executive and legislative branches. Their first order of business? Go after working families. Bevin and the Republicans are pushing forward with several anti-worker resolutions. In the process, they have given more say in the state's future to outsider billionaires and CEOs than the people of the state.

Oregon’s Bureau of Labor and Industries has changed how it interprets overtime laws—in a way that could fatten the paychecks of Oregon factory workers. The change follows a lawsuit filed in August by the non-profit Northwest Workers' Justice Project on behalf of a group of workers at Portland Specialty Baking, which earlier in 2016 quashed a union campaign.

Not surprisingly, House Speaker Paul Ryan (R-Wis.) is making going after Medicare one of his top priorities in the new Congress. But this scheme helps no one but Ryan and his buddies, and cuts to Medicare are not what the American people are asking for, nor need.

Let's be honest, 2016 was a heavy year for a lot of us. But as we start a new year, we've taken time to reflect on the pretty amazing things working people accomplished last year. 

Working people at Verizon who went on strike last year made huge gains, including a raise and 1,300 new call center jobs on the East Coast. 

Happy New Year from America's working people in unions, the AFL-CIO.

Working people in America's unions, the AFL-CIO, wish you a safe and happy holiday season with your friends, family and loved ones. 

The end of the year is a time to reflect and look forward to what comes next. Each year we bring you the top 10 most read blogs on the AFL-CIO blog. 

Here are the most read blogs from 2016.

For years we’ve talked about the shortcomings of the North American Free Trade Agreement (we even released this detailed report on its 20th anniversary) and how trade deals created behind closed doors with corporate CEOs harm working people. 

Today we released a blueprint for how to rewrite NAFTA to benefit working families. This past election there was much-needed discussion on the impact of corporate trade deals on our manufacturing sector and on working-class communities. The outline below puts forward real solutions that should garner bipartisan support if lawmakers are truly serious about realigning our trade policies to help workers.

As easy as it is to get caught up in gift giving and capitalism, the holiday season is also a time to look back at the achievements of organized labor in the continuing fight for workers’ rights. In 2016, Philadelphia witnessed massive gains for workers when the Southeastern Pennsylvania Transportation Authority and the union representing nearly 5,000 workers finalized a new contract providing members wage increases and pension improvements. RNs at four area hospitals voted this year to join the Pennsylvania Association of Staff Nurses and Allied Professionals—nurses at St. Christopher’s Hospital for Children and at Hahnemann University Hospital recently ratified their first union contracts, and RNs at Temple University Hospital ratified a strong new contract as well.

President-elect Donald Trump is famous for firing workers; it's part of his brand. He has taken this to the next level in a pattern of attacking ordinary people for doing their jobs. This behavior runs contrary to his promise to be a president for working people. His rhetoric has inspired real and serious threats and physical attacks from overzealous supporters, but he remains silent or encouraging towards this behavior.

President-elect Donald Trump selected D-List fast food CEO Andy Puzder to head up the Labor Department. AFL-CIO and other working family advocates condemned the appointment of Puzder, who runs Carl's Jr. and Hardee's.

Puzder's nomination shows Trump is backing away from his promise to represent all working people.

On Saturday, Dec. 10, we lost America’s premier labor negotiator, William Julian Usery Jr. He died in Eatonton, Georgia. He was 92.

Usery has forgotten more about collective bargaining than most people will ever know. He understood deep in his veins how essential collective bargaining is to the American economy. He was a good man, and a good and well-respected friend of mine, and a man who taught me immensely about how to unravel tension and bring two warring sides together to reach a workable relationship.