Pittsburgh Post-Gazette Union Votes To End Long Strike

The longest newspaper strike in decades has ended: Union members at the Pittsburgh Post-Gazette have voted 21-4 to ratify a new contract and return to work, officially concluding the bitter three-year walkout that began in October 2022.

The decisive 84% vote came days after a federal court upheld a National Labor Relations Board ruling ordering the Post-Gazette to pay millions in back wages and benefits for labor-law violations spanning five years, including the unilateral cancellation of the union’s healthcare plan in July 2020 and its replacement with a more costly, less comprehensive corporate alternative.

U.S. District Judge Cathy Bissoon’s order also requires the newspaper to immediately cease the illegal practices cited by the NLRB in its September 2024 decision.

The Newspaper Guild of Pittsburgh-CWA, representing newsroom, advertising, and circulation employees, celebrated the twin victories on the picket line with the arrival of half-a-dozen pizzas—a nod to the union’s long-running joke that “strikes run on pizza.”However, one major cloud remains: Block Communications, owner of the Post-Gazette, has vowed to appeal the federal ruling “all the way to the Supreme Court if necessary” and has repeatedly stated it will shutter the 238-year-old newspaper rather than comply with an adverse final judgment.

Despite that threat, striking workers—many of whom have gone without company health insurance since 2020—voted overwhelmingly to accept the new five-year contract and end the walkout. Details of the agreement, including healthcare restoration and wage increases, have not been publicly released pending formal signing.

Employees are expected to return to the newsroom as early as this week, marking the first time in more than three years that the Pittsburgh Post-Gazette will publish with its full union staff.