Research by a new grassroots citizens’ watchdog group in New York’s 21st Congressional District indicates Stefanik favors business owners over workers
For Immediate Release
October 28, 2025
Contact:
NY21CongressWatchdogs@gmail.com
Fred Balzac, 518-588-7275 (cell); Peter LaVenia, 518-495-8001
SARANAC LAKE, NY — Now in her fifth term in Congress, U.S. Representative Elise Stefanik clearly has the support of many members of the working class in New York’s 21st Congressional District. But, in terms of her voting record, is Stefanik actually supportive of working people? Research by a new grassroots citizens’ watchdog group based in the district examining recent legislation that the Congressperson has sponsored clearly demonstrates that Stefanik is not.
Among several committee assignments, Stefanik sits on the House Committee on Education and the Workforce, the Subcommittee on Higher Education and Workforce Development and the Subcommittee on Workforce Protections [1]. Since 2023, she has sponsored at least three bills in the area of labor [2].
One of Stefanik’s bills, H.R. 5513, would amend the Fair Labor Standards Act of 1938 and the National Labor Relations Act to make it easier for businesses to designate individuals who work for them as independent contractors—in other words, gig workers—rather than employees.
Another bill, the Wage Equity Act of 2023 (H.R. 5053), also would amend the Fair Labor Standards Act of 1938 while watering down the Equal Pay Act of 1963, resulting in changes that weaken worker protections against wage discrimination by their employers. A third piece of legislation, the Ensuring Workers Get PAID Act 2023 (H.R. 572), actually does the opposite of what its name claims by reducing penalties for businesses that engage in wage theft.
While, taken together, all this legislation may appear to benefit workers, on closer inspection it becomes clear that these bills are, in reality, pro-employer, says Fred Balzac of NY-21 Congress Watchdogs.
“At first glance, each of these bills might look like they offer protections to workers, in keeping with the name of one of the subcommittees Stefanik sits on,” he said. “But working people, pay heed: the ‘workforce protections’ these bills offer are for employers, including those at big corporations. Despite her claims otherwise, Rep. Stefanik is not your friend.”
The aim of NY-21 Congress Watchdogs is to work across party and even ideological lines to monitor the voting record, statements, and actions of New York’s 21st Congressional District’s current U.S. Representative and her eventual successors—regardless of party affiliation—while, at the same time, inform the people of the district of their representative’s activities to encourage widespread citizen action that is in the public interest and serves the common good.
The project is modeled along the lines of what long-time consumer and public-interest advocate Ralph Nader has encouraged nationally, including in his 2012 book “The Seventeen Solutions: Bold Ideas for Our American Future.” The NY-21 Congress Watchdog group is strictly nonpartisan in that it is not affiliated with any political party, and it welcomes all members of the public who share its mission of acting in the public interest and serving the common good. To learn more about the group’s efforts, interested individuals should email NY21CongressWatchdogs@gmail.com.
Legislation Specifics
Here is a breakdown of the three bills that Stefanik has advocated for:
- H.R. 5513: To amend the Fair Labor Standards Act of 1938 and the National Labor Relations Act to clarify the standard for determining whether an individual is an employee, and for other purposes.
Introduced by Stefanik in September of 2023, the bill remains in the committee stage of consideration. In changing the Fair Labor Standards Act’s definition of an independent contractor, the bill would redefine workers as independent contractors if:
1) Another individual or entity does not exercise control over the details of how the individual’s work is performed, regardless of any control the other entity may have over the end-product of the work performed; and
2) While performing such work, the individual has opportunities and risks inherent with entrepreneurship (e.g., the option of using their own professional judgment).
Although this bill would allow more people to be classified as independent contracts, it also means the fewer workers would be protected by the Fair Labor Standards Act, said NY-21 Congress Watchdog David Lynch.
“Clearly, this legislation is not good for gig workers,” he said. “As a group, we spoke recently with a gig worker in the area. This person made it clear that this idea, as expressed in the bill, that companies don’t control what gig workers do is completely false. They tell these workers exactly what to do, while also encouraging competition among them.”
As independent contractors, gig workers—say, those who work for the ride-hailing companies Uber or Lyft—are not paid a salary, have to cover the expenses they incur on the job such as gas and mileage, and, of course, receive no benefits such as overtime pay, health insurance, workman’s comp protection, or a pension.
- Wage Equity Act of 2023 (H.R. 5053): To amend the Fair Labor Standards Act of 1938 to enhance provisions related to wage discrimination, and for other purposes.
This bill waters down the Equal Pay Act of 1963 by adding both a provision that discrimination may only be judged by “bona fide” business-related activity and an entire section at the end of act that would limit an employer’s liability if it undergoes a job-and-wage “analysis” within three years of legal action taken against the employer, observed Steve McAuley of NY-21 Congress Watchdogs.
“On top of that, if a prospective employee ‘voluntarily’ discloses a prior salary or wage rate,” he said, “the bill would allow the employer to look at the person’s wage history to decide whether it wants to hire that person—a clear violation of the Fair Labor Standards Act, thank you, Elise Stefanik!”
- Ensuring Workers Get PAID Act 2023 (H.R. 572): In re-establishing the Payroll Audit Independent Determination program, which was administered by the U.S. Department of Labor from 2018 to 2021, this bill would allow employers to self-report up to two years’-worth of federal minimum-wage and overtime-compensation violations and repay the workers the money owed to them while being absolved of potential legal action from the employees affected.
The Devastating Impact of Wage Theft
In taking a closer look at this third bill, consider the issue of wage theft. Analyzing the extent of one form of wage theft—minimum-wage violations, when workers are paid at an hourly rate below the required minimum wage—in the 10 most-populous states in America, a report by the Economic Policy Institute found that 2.4 million workers lose $8 billion annually, an average of $3,300 per year for year-round workers and nearly a quarter of their earned wages [3]. This form of wage theft affects 17 percent of low-wage workers, with those in all demographic categories being cheated out of pay.
The same report showed that wage theft in New York State alone amounted to nearly $1 billion annually. The NYS Department of Labor (DOL) recovers something to the tune of only $25 million from wage theft, and during the administration of Andrew Cuomo it was taking up to six years to process wage-theft claims. The proposed Securing Wages Against Theft (SWEAT) Act focused on the fact that, even when workers obtained a DOL order on wage theft, they seldom collected any back pay. After years of organizing by its advocates, the act passed both houses of the state legislature in 2019 only to be vetoed by Governor Cuomo on New Year’s Day, 2020 [4].
Wage theft includes stolen tips, illegal paycheck deductions, and forced overtime, as well as minimum-wage violations. Many minimum-wage have money stolen out of every paycheck, with overtime violations being very common. While some of these violations may seem small on a day-by-day basis, when added up the impacts are massive. Stolen wages mean workers have less to provide for themselves and their families, businesses see less foot traffic and less income, and local, state and federal governments collect less revenue.
In fact, wage theft is the most profitable form of theft in the United States. Based on the finding by the Economic Policy Institute that workers in the 10 most populous states, home to about half of the country’s total workforce, are being cheated out of $8 billion annually, the report estimated that bad employers across the country are stealing around $15 billion per year from their employees just from minimum-wage violations alone. That figure exceeds the total value of property crimes—robberies, burglaries, larceny and motor-vehicle theft—committed in the United States in 2015, according to the FBI, of $12.7 billion [5, 6].
Understanding the devastating impact of wage theft in New York State and across America makes Elise Stefanik’s sponsorship of the Ensuring Workers Get PAID Act all the more disturbing, said NY-21 Congress Watchdog Peter LaVenia.
“This anti-worker legislation limits the ability of working people to sue employers who don’t pay the minimum wage or overtime compensation as required by federal law, while limiting the amount of back pay to merely two years,” he said. “The bill would also allow the Department of Labor to enable these law-violating employers to remain anonymous, subject to Freedom of Information Act requests.
“Taken all together, these three bills indicate that Representative Stefanik is not acting in the best interest of working people across America. Our watchdog group encourages workers who live in the 21st Congressional District here in New York’s North Country to contact Stefanik’s office in Washington or one of her district offices in the region and ask why.”
Sources
- https://www.govtrack.us/congress/members/elise_stefanik/412648
- https://www.govtrack.us/congress/bills/browse?sponsor=412648&subject=6235
- Cooper, David, and Teresa Kroeger. “Employers Steal Billions from Workers’ Paychecks Each Year.” Economic Policy Institute Report, May 10, 2017.
- https://www.laborpress.org/cuomo-vetoes-wage-theft-protections
- Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI). “Table 23: Offense Analysis.” 2015 Crime in the United States. Criminal Justice Information Services Division, 2016.
- Meixell, Brady, and Ross Eisenbrey. “An Epidemic of Wage Theft Is Costing Workers Hundreds of Millions of Dollars a Year.” Economic Policy Institute Issue Brief no. 385, 2014.