Sanders’ help comes amid rising tensions between staff on YouTube Music’s Content material Operations group and its dad or mum firm, Google. The almost 60 staff are formally employed by Cognizant, a third-party contractor to Google. Final October, they filed for a union election with the 1,300-member Alphabet Employees Union (AWU). However shortly after that request was filed with the Nationwide Labor and Relations Board, Cognizant issued a brand new return-to-office mandate that organizers — and Sanders — argue quantities to an unlawful union-busting technique.

“We fear that Cognizant out of the blue imposed these unimaginable necessities on these staff in response to them exercising their proper to arrange a union,” Sanders wrote to Pichai together with Austin Rep. Greg Casar (D) on Tuesday. “Our request to you is straightforward: Be sure that all Google staff, together with YouTube Music staff, are in a position to freely train their proper to affix a union as assured by federal legislation.”

Google didn’t instantly reply to a request for remark Tuesday.

The YouTube Music staff formally known as a strike on February third, three days earlier than the return-to-office mandate went into impact. In a Monday tweet, the AWU known as it the first-ever strike at Google. Whereas their employer, Cognizant, is a third-party contractor to Google, the AWU argues that the 2 corporations are joint employers for the YouTube Music Content material Operations Division. 

In January, Sanders turned the chair of the highly effective Senate Committee on Well being, Schooling, Labor, and Pensions. Along with his Tuesday letter to Google, Sanders has leveraged his newfound energy to go after different corporations allegedly obstructing unionization efforts and working afoul of federal labor legislation. Earlier this month, Sanders hinted at subpoenaing Starbucks CEO Howard Schultz to testify earlier than his committee concerning the firm’s “egregious union-busting marketing campaign.”