Montana State AFL-CIO

Background

The federation traces its origins to the Montana State Trades and Labor Council, which for more than a decade declined to affiliate with the national AFL-CIO over the national body’s emphasis on organizing skilled craft workers rather than all workers. The organization was recognized as a tax-exempt labor organization in May 1956 and is headquartered in Helena, Montana. As of 2026, the group claimed to represent 38 affiliated unions, roughly 500 locals, and about 50,000 members. ^{1 2}

Activities

The Montana AFL-CIO lobbies the state legislature on labor and workplace policy and publishes legislative scorecards rating lawmakers on their votes on labor union priority issues. The federation has consistently opposed right-to-work legislation, which would bar mandatory union fee payments as a condition of employment. ⁴

During the 2025 legislative session, the federation mobilized members against Senate Bill 376, a right-to-work measure before the Senate Business, Labor, and Economic Affairs Committee, circulating a letter-writing campaign that urged lawmakers to reject it. ⁶

The federation’s published policy positions align with standard left-of-center union priorities. The group has called for “majority sign-up,” commonly known as card check, which would require an employer to recognize a union once a majority of employees sign public authorization cards rather than proceeding to a secret-ballot election. It has also supported the federal Davis-Bacon Act and Montana’s state-level prevailing wage law, both of which require government-financed construction projects to pay union-scale wages, and has urged the legislature to repeal its ban on project labor agreements. The federation has also opposed allowing employers to apply a “tip credit” toward tipped workers’ wages and has supported wage-transparency legislation. ⁷

On non-labor matters, the group has advocated increased public spending on infrastructure and public education and has opposed school choice, education savings accounts, and tax credits for private school expenses. It supported Montana’s Medicaid expansion under the 2015 HELP Act and its 2019 reauthorization and has opposed efforts to repeal the program. The federation has opposed Republican-backed changes to election administration, including measures restricting accepted forms of voter identification and eliminating same-day voter registration, and has backed non-discrimination ordinances extending employment and housing protections on the basis of sexual orientation and gender identity to LGBT individuals. It has also opposed converting government workers’ defined-benefit pensions into defined-contribution (401(k)-style) or hybrid plans. ⁷

The group operates a Committee on Political Education (COPE) that interviews candidates, distributes questionnaires, and issues endorsements ratified by union delegates at the federation’s annual June convention. ⁸

Leadership

As of 2026, Jason Small was executive secretary, the federation’s top staff post, a position he had held since his election at the union’s 2023 convention. Small, a member of the Northern Cheyenne Nation and a former president of Boilermakers Local 11, served as a Republican member of the Montana state senate. ⁴

Amanda Curtis, who as of 2026 was president of the Montana Federation of Public Employees, the state’s largest union, has sat on the board of the Montana AFL-CIO. Curtis is a former Democratic member of the Montana House of Representatives who was the Democratic nominee in Montana’s 2014 U.S. Senate election, losing to U.S. Sen. Steve Daines (R-MT). ^{9 10}