AT&T Workers Nationwide Win Challenges to Unionization Imposed Through Card Check
The following article is from the National Right to Work Legal Defense Foundation’s bi-monthly Foundation Action Newsletter, November/December 2024 edition. To view other editions of Foundation Action or to sign up for a free subscription, click here.
Victories by AT&T workers in five states preceded Biden-Harris NLRB rule change to block secret ballot votes
See You, CWA: Marquita Jones (left), Samantha Cain (middle), and Matthew Gonzalez rallied their fellow AT&T workers to escape unwanted CWA unions.
WASHINGTON, DC – While the Biden-Harris National Labor Relations Board (NLRB) sought to upend NLRB rules designed to protect workers’ ability to vote out unwanted unions, AT&T workers across the country won a series of victories highlighting the importance of allowing workers to challenge coercive union card check unionization with secret ballot votes. The decertification victories all relied on the National Right to Work Foundation-backed 2020 NLRB “Election Protection Rule” (EPR), which was formally eliminated by the Biden-Harris Labor Board in September.
In five separate cases covering well over 1,000 workers, AT&T Mobility employees have successfully overturned Communications Workers of America (CWA) unionization imposed through the notorious “card check” process.
Under card check, union organizers bypass the secret ballot election process and instead collect cards face-to-face from employees that are then counted as “votes” for the union. Without the privacy of a secret ballot vote, many workers report being pressured, bullied, or threatened into signing, which is among the reasons why card check has long been recognized as inherently unreliable and abuse-prone.
Foundation-Backed 2020 Rule Let Over 1,000 AT&T Workers Nix Union Card Checks
The 2020 Election Protection Rule reformed several rules that union officials manipulate to trap workers under monopoly “representation,” including by giving employees a way to challenge card check unionization with a secret ballot election. Foundation staff attorneys assisted AT&T employees in five states to do that in advance of the Biden-Harris Labor Board’s cynical repeal of the rule.
First, in Tennessee, AT&T employee Denis Hodzic filed a petition signed by two-thirds of his coworkers in the unit seeking a secret-ballot vote to remove the CWA union, after CWA agents installed themselves over 100 AT&T In-Home Experts by card check. Initially CWA union officials argued the election should be permanently blocked because the union had already merged the workers into a larger bargaining unit with thousands of other AT&T workers.
CWA Bosses Capitulated to AT&T Workers
However, citing the Election Protection Rule, which gives workers at least 45 days to challenge a card check with a decertification petition, Foundation staff attorneys were able to win a ruling with the NLRB allowing the vote to proceed. At that point CWA officials chose not to even contest the vote, instead filing paperwork with the NLRB freeing the employees from CWA ranks apparently to avoid an overwhelming final vote against the union.
“The Election Protection Rule was essential for us to rely on as we went through the process of seeking resolution to our tricky situation,” Hodzic said of his situation. “The 45-day petition window needs to remain regardless of which group holds the majority position in Washington.”
Since then, with legal aid, around 1,000 additional AT&T Mobility employees in California, Louisiana, Mississippi, and Texas have all also successfully removed the CWA union following installation through card check. In all four states, once the decertification vote became inevitable, CWA officials simply conceded defeat rather than wait for the results of a formal decertification vote.
NLRB Repeal of Election Protection Rule Traps Workers in Union Ranks
Despite these efforts from independent-minded employees, the Biden-Harris NLRB formally repealed the Election Protection Rule in September, dramatically expanding union bosses’ ability to block employee-requested decertification votes.
As a result, now, when workers in Hodzic’s situation attempt to challenge a card check with a secret ballot decertification, the NLRB will automatically block their vote for up to one year after a card check, which opens the door to countless other union delay tactics.
“If these AT&T employees had filed their five decertification petitions after September 30th, they would have been trapped in a union they oppose for years and likely forever,” commented National Right to Work Foundation Vice President Patrick Semmens.
“This is yet another example of the Biden-Harris NLRB steamrolling the rights of independent-minded employees, so union bosses can expand their forced dues ranks. “Despite this setback for employee freedom, Foundation staff attorneys remain committed to helping workers trapped in union ranks they oppose,” added Semmens. “That includes helping them navigate the increasingly rigged NLRB system.”
Puerto Rico Police Bureau Employees Foil Anti-Janus Scheme
The following article is from the National Right to Work Legal Defense Foundation’s bi-monthly Foundation Action Newsletter, November/December 2024 edition. To view other editions of Foundation Action or to sign up for a free subscription, click here.
Federal court strikes down discrimination against workers at the Puerto Rico Police Bureau who exercised First Amendment rights
Vanessa Carbonell (center) and other employees of the Puerto Rico Police Bureau won big at the Puerto Rico District Court in September 2024. Their Foundation-won decision forces their employer and the union to stop violating their Janus rights.
SAN JUAN, PR – The National Right to Work Foundation’s 2018 victory at the U.S. Supreme Court in Janus v. AFSCME opened new horizons for employee freedom across the country. For the first time, the Justices recognized that the First Amendment prohibits union bosses from forcing public sector employees to join a union or pay dues as a condition of employment, and that union bosses can only take dues from a worker’s paycheck with their affirmative consent.
Foundation attorneys’ efforts to enforce the landmark decision yielded a big victory this September for a wide swath of civilian employees at the Puerto Rico Police Bureau (PRPB). In a class action federal lawsuit, more than a dozen PRPB employees charged officials of the Union of Organized Civilian Employees with violating their Janus rights by stripping them of an employer-provided health benefit because they refused to join the union.
A recent decision from the District Court of Puerto Rico found in favor of the employees’ arguments, stating that their employer had indeed taken away the health benefit because the employees exercised their right to not join or pay dues to the union.
Scheme Forced Workers to Join Union or Lose Access to Better Healthcare
“This is either retaliation for exercise of non-union members’ post-Janus non-associational rights under the First Amendment under the Constitution or simply discrimination,” said the Court.
According to lead plaintiff Vanessa Carbonell and her colleagues’ original lawsuit, they all exercised their Janus right to opt out of the union at various points after the 2018 Janus decision. They each began noticing that as dues ceased coming out of their paychecks, they also stopped receiving a $25-a-month employer-paid benefit intended to help employees pay for better health insurance.
The lawsuit demonstrated that PRPB officials cut the benefit off to employees who refused union membership — a clear case of discrimination against employees who exercise their First Amendment right to abstain from union affiliation.
Union and Employer Must Stop Discrimination
The District Court’s decision, in addition to declaring that the ploy by PRPB and the Union of Organized Civilian Employees is unconstitutional, orders an injunction to stop PRPB officials from continuing to withhold the benefit from Carbonell and other employees.
“Janus enshrined a very simple First Amendment principle: That union officials need to convince public employees to support their organization and activities voluntarily,” commented National Right to Work Foundation Vice President Patrick Semmens.
Amicus Briefs Boost Professors’ First Amendment Challenge to Union Monopoly Bargaining Power
The following article is from the National Right to Work Legal Defense Foundation’s bi-monthly Foundation Action Newsletter, November/December 2024 edition. To view other editions of Foundation Action or to sign up for a free subscription, click here.
As reported in the previous issue of Foundation Action, City University of New York (CUNY) professor Avraham Goldstein and several of his colleagues have asked the U.S. Supreme Court to hear their First Amendment challenge to union monopoly power in the public sector.
The professors have had enough of Professional Staff Congress (PSC) union bosses’ attacks on Jewish culture and identity, and argue that New York State’s laws forcing them to associate with PSC and PSC officials’ so-called “representation” violate their constitutional rights.
Already, their petition before the Supreme Court is gaining traction: Since the Foundation-backed petition was filed in July, 11 briefs in support of the professors have rolled in from notable legal foundations, religious freedom advocacy groups, and legal scholars.
Additionally, in September, the Supreme Court took the step of ordering PSC and New York State officials to file a response brief. The Supreme Court will likely make a decision on whether to hear the case by early 2025.
Check out the Foundation’s website for breaking news in cases being litigated by Foundation staff attorneys.
MIT Graduate Students Defeat Discriminatory Dues Demands From Radical Campus Union
The following article is from the National Right to Work Legal Defense Foundation’s bi-monthly Foundation Action Newsletter, November/December 2024 edition. To view other editions of Foundation Action or to sign up for a free subscription, click here.
Union must cease forced dues, inform thousands of MIT graduate students of right to defund union politics
Foundation staff attorney Glenn Taubman, who aided the MIT graduate students in their legal victory, told NTD News his phone is “ringing off the hook” because university students and faculty nationwide are seeking ways to defund radical campus unions.
BOSTON, MA – “Jewish graduate students are a minority at MIT. We can’t remove the [Graduate Student Union (GSU)] or disabuse it of its antisemitism. But we also can’t support an organization that actively works toward the eradication of the Jewish homeland, where I have family living now.”
These were the words MIT Ph.D. student Will Sussman used to describe his, and other graduate students’, battle against radical union bosses at his campus, both in a Wall Street Journal op-ed and in June testimony before the U.S. House Committee on Education and the Workforce. GSU union officials gained the legal privilege to force MIT graduate students to pay dues or lose their academic work thanks to biased rulings by the National Labor Relations Board (NLRB) under both President Biden and President Obama. Since then, they’ve wasted no time in forcing even Jewish students with strong objections to the union’s anti-Israel agitating to fund their activities.
Students Battle Anti-Israel Sentiment Boosted by GSU Union Bosses
However, with free legal aid from National Right to Work Foundation staff attorneys, Sussman and his fellow Jewish graduate students Joshua Fried, Akiva Gordon, Adina Bechhofer, and Tamar Kadosh Zhitomirsky fought back against the GSU’s discriminatory dues demands. They each filed federal charges at the Equal Employment Opportunity Commission (EEOC), charging the GSU with denying them religious accommodations required by Title VII of the Civil Rights Act of 1964. Now they’ve won full accommodations that allow them to cut off all financial support for the union.
Separately, Foundation attorneys also filed federal unfair labor practice charges at the NLRB for Katerina Boukin, who objected on political grounds to the GSU’s ideological activity. Boukin sought to exercise her rights under the Foundation-won Communications Workers of America v. Beck Supreme Court decision, which lets workers who abstain from union membership opt-out of paying for the union’s political expenses.
In the wake of the October 7, 2023, attacks on Israel, Sussman and his fellow students experienced a massive wave of anti-Israel sentiment on MIT campus, including from GSU union chiefs.
“The blood had not yet dried when my colleagues at MIT declared, ‘Victory is Ours,’” related Sussman at a congressional hearing on anti- Semitism in unions. “The full-time GSU staff organizer told NBC10 Boston, ‘Those who rebel against oppression cannot be blamed for rebelling against that repression.’”
GSU Union Backed Off Unlawful Demands After Foundation Intervention
Sussman, Fried, Gordon, Bechhofer, and Zhitomirsky each requested in early 2024 that GSU union officials provide them with religious accommodations to paying union dues based on their objections to union officials’ extremist beliefs. Under federal law, such accommodations vary, but often take the form of letting the objector divert the dues from the offensive union to a 501(c)(3) charity instead. The GSU union’s brazen response was that “no principles, teachings or tenets of Judaism prohibit membership in or the payment of dues or fees to a labor union” and that no religious conflict existed because one of the founders of GSU’s parent union was himself Jewish.
The GSU union backed down after Foundation staff attorneys filed EEOC anti-discrimination charges in response to the lack of accommodation. The students have secured full religious accommodations and will pay money to charities of their choice, despite initial pushback from union bosses. The charities include American Friends of Magen David Adom and American Friends of Leket.
Katerina Boukin’s NLRB case was spurred by her disagreements with the union’s political stances on Israel. She stated that she was deeply offended by GSU’s “opposition to Israel and promotion of Leninist- Marxist global revolution” and that “[t]he GSU’s political agenda has nothing to do with my research as a graduate student at MIT, or the relationships I have with my professors and the university administration.”
“[Y]et outrageously they demand I fund their radical ideology,” Boukin said.
Foundation-Won Settlement Informs Students They Can Defund ‘Marxist’ Union
Foundation attorneys won a settlement for Boukin that not only returned illegally-seized dues to Boukin, but also required GSU bosses to inform the entire MIT graduate student body of their rights to invoke the Beck decision.
GSU bosses were forced to declare by email that they will not restrict the ability of those who resign their union memberships to cut off dues payments for political expenses and pay a reduced amount to the union. This email notice went out to approximately 3,000 MIT students.
Legal Protections Should Protect Employees’ Right to Object on Any Grounds
“The Foundation-backed MIT graduate students who fought these legal battles have earned well-deserved victories. But defending basic free association rights shouldn’t require such complicated litigation,” commented National Right to Work Foundation President Mark Mix.
“This ordeal at MIT should remind lawmakers that all Americans should have a right to protect their money from going to union bosses they don’t support, whether those objections are based on religion, politics, or any other reason.”
Full Foundation Action September/October 2024 Newsletter Now Online
All articles from the September/October 2024 issue of Foundation Action are now online.
In this issue:
- Professors Launch Landmark SCOTUS Bid to End Forced Union Association
- Chicago 911 Operator Successfully Defends Janus Rights Against IBEW
- Post-Right to Work Repeal, MI Workers Vote to Cancel Union Bosses’ Forced-Dues Power
- Mark Mix in The Center Square: Escaping the UAW “Roach Motel”
- Foundation Exposes Union Boss Coercion & Discrimination Before Congress
- Flight Attendant Defends Win Against Union, Southwest, for Illegal Firing
Flight Attendant Defends Win Against Union, Southwest, for Illegal Firing
The following article is from the National Right to Work Legal Defense Foundation’s bi-monthly Foundation Action Newsletter, September/October 2024 edition. To view other editions of Foundation Action or to sign up for a free subscription, click here.
Union and airline seek to overturn District Court ruling & verdict targeting discriminatory union firing
Despite going head-to-head with the well-funded legal teams of Southwest Airlines and the TWU union, Charlene Carter and her Foundation legal team led by staff attorney Matt Gilliam (right) have fought — and won — crucial victories in her case.
NEW ORLEANS, LA – In 2017, Southwest flight attendant Charlene Carter filed her lawsuit against the Transport Workers Union (TWU) and Southwest Airlines for their respective roles in her termination after she spoke out against the TWU’s political activities.
Now, seven years later, despite winning a multimillion dollar jury verdict and a ruling ordering that she get her job back after the company’s and union’s efforts to fire her, Carter’s battle remains ongoing. Recently, Foundation staff attorneys were at the Fifth Circuit Court of Appeals for oral arguments to defend her District Court victory against appeals by TWU and Southwest.
“Southwest and TWU union officials made Ms. Carter pay an unconscionable price just because she decided to speak out against the political activities of union officials in accordance with her deeply held religious beliefs,” stated National Right to Work Foundation Vice President and Legal Director William Messenger. “Yet rather than comply with the jury’s decision and a District Court order, Southwest and TWU union bosses have decided to attempt to defend their blatant retaliation against a vocal union critic.”
Foundation Attorney: Evidence Shows Carter Was Fired Over Religious Exercise
During oral arguments at the Fifth Circuit, which took place before a three-judge panel this June, Foundation staff attorney Matt Gilliam rebutted specious union claims that there was no direct evidence that Carter’s religious beliefs played any role in the decision to fire her.
Gilliam told the panel that a Southwest agent “specifically admitted that he considered Carter’s religious beliefs in his termination decision” and reminded the judges that, under Title VII, an employee’s religious beliefs “can’t be any factor” in making such a decision.
“Southwest just admitted to this court that they fired her because of conduct. Well, what was the conduct? It was religious conduct,” said Gilliam.
Carter’s Story Reveals Pro-Union Boss Bias of Federal Labor Law
Carter resigned from union membership in 2013 but was still forced to pay fees to TWU Local 556 as a condition of her employment. The Railway Labor Act (RLA), the federal law that governs labor relations in the airline and railroad industries, permits firing employees who refuse to pay union fees and preempts the protections that state Right to Work laws provide.
However, the RLA does protect employees’ rights to resign from union membership. It also has free speech protections that cover the right to speak out against a union and its leadership and to advocate for changing the union’s current leadership.
In January 2017, Carter learned that then-TWU Local 556 President Audrey Stone and other Local 556 officials used union dues to attend the Women’s March in Washington, DC, which was sponsored by Planned Parenthood, an activist group she deeply opposed.
Carter, a vocal critic of Stone and the union, sent private Facebook messages to Stone challenging the union’s support for ideological positions that were contrary to Carter’s beliefs and expressing support for a recall effort that would remove Stone from power. Carter also sent Stone a message emphasizing her commitment to a National Right to Work law after the union had sent an email to employees telling them to oppose Right to Work.
After a meeting at which Southwest officials confronted Carter about private Facebook messages protesting the union’s positions, the company fired Carter. In 2017, Carter filed her federal lawsuit challenging the firing as a clear violation of her rights under two federal laws. She maintained that she lost her job because of her religious beliefs and her criticism of union officials’ spending employees’ dues and fees on ideological causes.
Ultimately, after a six-day July 2022 trial, a jury in the U.S. District Court for the Northern District of Texas agreed with Carter and her Foundation staff attorneys. During the trial, Foundation attorneys unearthed and introduced bombshell email communications showing TWU union militants advocated for “targeted assassinations” of union dissidents.
“We are proud to defend Ms. Carter throughout this prolonged legal case to vindicate her rights,” stated Messenger. “However, her case should prompt policymakers to pare back union bosses’ coercive, government-granted powers over workers. Even if Charlene attains total victory in her case, the RLA will still force her and airline employees across the country to pay money to union officials as a condition of keeping their jobs, which is why policy change is needed.”
Foundation Exposes Union Boss Coercion & Discrimination Before Congress
The following article is from the National Right to Work Legal Defense Foundation’s bi-monthly Foundation Action Newsletter, September/October 2024 edition. To view other editions of Foundation Action or to sign up for a free subscription, click here.
U.S. House relies on Foundation for insight on ‘card check’ and forced-dues-for-politics
“The Law Has Failed Me”: This was MIT Ph.D. student Will Sussman’s response when asked by Rep. Tim Walberg (R-MI) whether current federal labor law protects union dissenters. Sussman recommended nationwide Right to Work protections.
WASHINGTON, DC – Within the past few months, National Right to Work Foundation attorneys and recipients of free Foundation legal aid have appeared multiple times before the U.S. House Committee on Education and the Workforce, revealing the anti-freedom tactics union bosses use to sweep workers under their power and prop up their radical political agenda.
In May, U.S. House members called Foundation Vice President and Legal Director William Messenger as an expert witness in a hearing named “Big Labor Lies: Exposing Union Tactics to undermine Free and Fair Elections.” The hearing was designed to probe how current federal labor policies are letting union bosses deprive American workers of even the basic protection of a secret ballot election when union organizers target their workplace for monopoly unionization.
In July, Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT) Ph.D. student Will Sussman, who received free Foundation legal aid in filing federal anti-discrimination charges against union bosses on his campus, appeared before the U.S. House to recount his battle against MIT Graduate Student Union (GSUUE) officials. GSU union bosses demanded Sussman, who is Jewish, fund union activities despite his repeated and forceful objections to the union’s anti-Israel pursuits.
The July hearing, called “Confronting Union Antisemitism: Protecting Workers from Big Labor Abuses,” also featured testimony from veteran Foundation staff attorney Glenn Taubman, who is providing free legal representation to Sussman and other MIT graduate students challenging forced-dues demands from GSU.
“Whether it’s union officials seizing power in a workplace without giving employees a chance to vote, or using graduate students’ money to fuel radical protests and other unrest on college campuses, these outrageous activities all have one thing in common — union boss privileges heavily ingrained in federal labor law,” commented National Right to Work Foundation Vice President Patrick Semmens. “No organization in the country has been more active than the Foundation in countering these coercive practices on behalf of rank-and-file workers.
“As the Biden Administration ramps up its attacks on worker freedom, we are honored and gratified that U.S. representatives look to Foundation attorneys and Foundation-backed workers for perspectives on how to defend worker freedom.”
Foundation Legal Director: ‘Card Check’ Permits Union Boss Tyranny
At its hearing in May, the U.S. House Committee on Education and the Workforce listened to William Messenger testify regarding union bosses’ two favorite tactics for gaining power: “card check” drives and censorship of speech critical of the union.
Card check is a process that lets union bosses gain power in a workplace without giving employees a chance to vote in secret on whether they want a union. Union officials can gang up on workers and even harass them to obtain signatures on union authorization cards, which are later counted as “votes” for the union. This process opens workers to intimidation and threats, something not found with secret balloting.
Union Censorship Exposed by Foundation
As if that weren’t bad enough, Messenger testified how the Biden-Harris NLRB “operates the most repressive regime of government censorship in the nation” by censoring employees’ ability to hear basic truthful information from employers that union officials don’t want workers to hear.
“Just imagine if the ruling party of a third-world nation decided to use such a process instead of having secret-ballot elections for political office,” Messenger testified. “Instead of having elections, the ruling party would go around to people’s homes and workplaces and collect ‘votes’ for the party. Instead of free speech, only the ruling party would be allowed to campaign.
“I submit this process is nothing like a democratic process,” Messenger declared. “Yet the Biden NLRB is . . . mandating card check with its Cemex decision, under which it’s now an unfair labor practice . . . for an employer to refuse to recognize a union based on cards.”
At the July hearing, Will Sussman detailed the harrowing story of how GSU union bosses continued demanding dues payments from him and other Jewish MIT graduate students even after they had informed the union of their religious objections and requested religious accommodations due to their beliefs. Title VII of the Civil Rights Act of 1964 requires union officials to accommodate those that have religious objections to subsidizing union activities; in practice this usually entails letting the employee pay an amount equivalent to dues to a charity.
MIT Grad Student Recounts Union Discrimination, Calls for Right to Work
But Sussman explained that the union blew off this legal duty, and legal action by the Foundation’s attorneys was needed: “The union denied my request, telling me in a letter that ‘no principles, teachings or tenets of Judaism prohibit membership in or the payment of dues or fees to a labor union’ . . . In other words, UE thinks it understands my faith better than I do.
“This Congress should pass the National Right to Work Act, so that unions have to earn their dues and think twice before discriminating against minorities,” Sussman added.
Mark Mix Op-ed: “When Alabama workers fought for years to escape the UAW ‘Roach Motel’”
The following article is from the National Right to Work Legal Defense Foundation’s bi-monthly Foundation Action Newsletter, September/October 2024 edition. To view other editions of Foundation Action or to sign up for a free subscription, click here.
To inform Alabama Mercedes-Benz workers of their rights and the availability of free legal aid as United Auto Workers (UAW) union bosses targeted them with an aggressive unionization campaign, Foundation staff got this opinion piece from Mark Mix published in The Center Square this May. The workers ended up voting against installing the UAW at their workplace.
May 16, 2024 | Mark Mix, president of the National Right to Work Foundation
Although the upcoming vote of Alabama Mercedes-Benz employees over whether or not to affiliate with officials from the Detroit-based United Autoworkers union has been billed as a historic first for the state, in fact it isn’t.
Based in Hamilton, Ala., workers at NTN-Bower, which manufactures roller bearings used in vehicle wheels, were subject to UAW representation from 1976 until the workers kicked the union out in 2015 after a protracted legal fight.
In Hamilton, UAW bosses ordered a divisive, prolonged strike at the plant. When some employees decided to defy union orders and exercise their right to return to work despite the strike, they faced aggressive harassment from UAW partisans, including tacks dropped to flatten tires and even racial slurs.
“Someone had to stand up for families like mine who simply couldn’t risk going on strike,” said Ginger Estes, who would go on to lead a petition to “decertify,” or remove, the UAW. “It didn’t take me long to see firsthand how the UAW was putting the plant at risk.
“The union’s leaders were willing to gamble with the livelihoods of hundreds of workers and were actively protecting lazy and incompetent employees who made the rest of us look bad.”
When workers began collecting decertification petitions at NTN-Bower, the harassment ramped up again.
Estes, whose husband and son also worked at the plant, took the threats personally. “During my signature-gathering process, I frequently had harassing phone calls made to my house and even had three of our family dogs die under mysterious circumstances.”
Eventually, Estes and her coworkers collected enough signatures to get the National Labor Relations Board to schedule a decertification election. However, workers soon found out that UAW officials weren’t willing to accept the results when a majority voted to reject the union.
UAW lawyers got the NLRB to overturn the first election’s result. When a rerun election occurred, a majority again voted against keeping the union, but UAW lawyers got that vote thrown out too. In a third election the UAW supposedly “won,” but that vote was disallowed due to obvious vote fraud, as more votes were cast than there were actual eligible voters.
In the fourth election, the UAW got the vote against them overturned. In the fifth and final vote, the largest majority yet voted to remove the UAW. This time, with free representation from National Right to Work Foundation attorneys, UAW lawyers were unable to overturn the result.
It took multiple years and five votes for the Alabamians at NTN-Bower to finally overcome UAW tactics designed to disenfranchise them. In the process, they saw how union officials had mistreated workers who questioned the union.
Unfortunately, their story is hardly unique.
Take the recent case of employees at a Nissan North America, Inc. parts distribution center in Somerset, New Jersey. After the previous contract expired, workers expressed frustration with how UAW officials openly ignored their voice and treated rank-and-file workers with contempt.
“UAW union officials were far more concerned with hoarding power in the workplace than communicating with or listening to workers,” observed Nissan employee Michael Oliver, who led the effort to remove the UAW. “They kept us completely in the dark about contract negotiations and treated anyone in the workplace who opposed their agenda or questioned their leadership with a huge amount of arrogance, contempt and even intimidation.”
At the election held last month, 70% of workers voted to remove the union, but the vote almost didn’t happen. UAW officials rushed to impose a contract, seemingly in an attempt to halt the decertification vote for years and/or influence its outcome.
Fortunately, the UAW’s tactics failed. The Nissan workers saw the UAW contract and voted overwhelmingly to send union officials packing.
When workers contact the National Right to Work Foundation for legal assistance with decertification, they frequently report that union organizers told workers that “if you don’t like the union, then you can always vote us out later.”
As experiences of workers at NTN-Bower and Nissan demonstrate, union officials often use underhanded legal tactics to disenfranchise the very workers they claim to “represent.”
That’s why, following her multi-year battle with UAW bosses, Alabama NTN-Bower employee Ginger Estes concluded: “The UAW will make lots of promises to workers during its campaign that it’s under no obligation to keep. But like a roach motel, once you check in to the UAW, it’s difficult if not impossible to check out.”
Post-Right to Work Repeal, MI Workers Vote to Cancel Union Bosses’ Forced-Dues Power
The following article is from the National Right to Work Legal Defense Foundation’s bi-monthly Foundation Action Newsletter, September/October 2024 edition. To view other editions of Foundation Action or to sign up for a free subscription, click here.
With Foundation aid, workers are fighting forced unionism through “deauthorization votes”
From Forced Dues to Freedom: Robert Gray and his coworkers at MV Transportation are part of a growing movement by Michigan workers to attack union boss privileges in the wake of the repeal of Right to Work.
MICHIGAN – MICHIGAN – As Big Labor’s pet politicians in the Michigan legislature prepared to repeal the state’s Right to Work law in 2023, Michiganders spoke out: Polling data revealed that a majority of Great Lakes State voters — including over 70% of those from union households — wanted to leave the law in place. Because Michigan’s Right to Work law protected workers’ right to freely choose whether union bosses had earned their dues money and served as a boon to Michigan’s economy, such broad support was unsurprising.
Since the party-line vote repealing the popular law took effect this February, Michigan workers are speaking out again.
So far in 2024, National Right to Work Foundation staff attorneys have already filed double the amount of cases than the prior year for Michigan workers, many of whom are pushing back against union officials’ new powers to force workers to pay dues as a condition of keeping a job. And this July, two sets of workers from across the state successfully voted to strip union bosses of their forced-dues powers in a process known as a “deauthorization election.”
Workers Across Industries Band Together Against Pay-Up-or-Be-Fired Demands
Mechanics from Brown Motors (a Ford, Chrysler, Dodge, and Jeep dealer) in Petoskey and drivers from MV Transportation (a transportation contractor) in Ypsilanti voted by well over 70% to strip forced-dues powers from Teamsters and Amalgamated Transit Union (ATU) bosses respectively after successfully petitioning for such votes with Foundation aid.
National Labor Relations Board (NLRB) rules require that at least 30% of a work unit sign onto an employee petition to trigger a deauthorization election. The only ways that workers in non-Right to Work states can end union bosses’ forced-dues powers are by either voting as a majority against forced dues in such an election (as the Brown Motors and MV Transportation employees have done), or by voting to remove the union entirely in a “decertification election.”
MI Workers Catch Union Bosses Red-Handed Violating Federal Law
Despite these encouraging efforts, it’s clear that the Right to Work repeal has emboldened Michigan union officials to play fast and loose with workers’ rights. But workers across the Great Lakes State are stepping up to defend their freedom with the benefit of Foundation legal expertise.
Other ongoing Foundation cases for Michigan workers include an NLRB case for Detroit-area Kroger employee Roger Cornett. Cornett faced post-repeal threats from his employer that he would be terminated if he did not sign a United Food and Commercial Workers (UFCW) membership form that included a page authorizing payments to the union’s Political Action Committee (PAC). Similarly, Foundation attorneys filed multiple federal charges for Grand Rapids-area General Electric (GE) worker Richard Howard, whom United Auto Workers (UAW) bosses had fired after he refused to join and pay full union dues, including dues for political expenses.
Both forced union membership and forced contributions to a union’s political activities are illegal even in a non-Right to Work environment under longstanding federal law and the Foundation-won Communications Workers of America v. Beck Supreme Court decision.
Foundation attorneys also recently filed federal charges for Madrina Wells and Lynette Doyle, two nurses at Ascension Genesys Hospital near Flint, MI. The charges maintain that Teamsters union officials threatened to fire them and other nurses if they didn’t sign forms authorizing union officials to deduct dues straight out of their paychecks. Requiring workers to give union bosses direct access to their paychecks is another common union boss scheme forbidden by federal law.
“Despite the fact that an overwhelming majority of Michiganders wanted Right to Work to remain in place, Michigan politicians repealed it on a party-line vote to appease the union boss puppeteers that fund their campaigns,” commented National Right to Work Foundation Vice President and Legal Director William Messenger. “Within just months of the repeal becoming effective, workers from all corners of the state are fighting — and winning — battles to limit union bosses’ power, showing that Michigan workers are not going to take this attack on their individual rights sitting down.”
Chicago 911 Operator Successfully Defends Janus Rights Against IBEW Forced Dues
The following article is from the National Right to Work Legal Defense Foundation’s bi-monthly Foundation Action Newsletter, September/October 2024 edition. To view other editions of Foundation Action or to sign up for a free subscription, click here.
Six years after Janus, union bosses still violating workers’ First Amendment rights, but workers fight back
Hundreds of thousands of American public sector workers felt the impact of the Foundation-won Janus decision almost immediately after the Supreme Court decided it in June 2018, and its legacy has only continued to grow.
CHICAGO, IL – “I decided to leave [International Brotherhood of Electrical Workers (IBEW)] 21 because for some time now I believed that IBEW 21 was not acting in the best interest of its members. Be it a new job title that senior employees were deliberately misinformed about, to breach of contract on my employer’s part, to having to navigate the police and court alone after being threatened at work, IBEW 21 was either ineffective or absent.”
This is how Rhonda Younkins, a City of Chicago 911 operator, described the so-called “representation” she and her colleagues were getting from IBEW 21 union bosses. With free legal aid from the National Right to Work Foundation, Younkins in June was able to force IBEW Local 21 officials to return unlawfully deducted dues and cease future payroll deductions.
IBEW Bosses Backed Off Anti-Janus Demands After Foundation Involvement
Younkins was defending her rights under the landmark Foundation-won Janus v. AFSCME Supreme Court decision. In Janus, the justices ruled that the First Amendment forbids union bosses from forcing public sector workers to join or pay dues to a union as a condition of employment. The Justices further clarified that union officials could only take dues from a worker’s paycheck after receiving their clear and affirmative consent.
Younkins repeatedly tried to end dues payments to the IBEW 21 union, but union officials either ignored her requests or tried to foist other demands on her. After many unsuccessful attempts, Younkins sought free legal aid from Foundation staff attorneys, who filed charges against the IBEW union at the Illinois Labor Relations Board (ILRB).
IBEW 21 union officials eventually backed down, ceased dues collections, and issued refunds of past illegally seized dues.
Janus Impact Still Growing
While Younkins’ reasons for defunding IBEW union bosses are unique to her job and experience, she’s certainly not alone in using Janus to break free from union bosses’ influence. After Janus was issued in 2018, an estimated 450,000 public employees immediately stopped payment to unions, and in the six years since then, Foundation-backed litigation has helped defend the rights of tens of thousands of other government employees.
“We at the Foundation are encouraged at the strides workers have made since our Janus victory at the Supreme Court,” commented National Right to Work Foundation Vice President Patrick Semmens. “But the fight is far from over. As cases like Ms. Younkins’ show, union bosses still stonewall public workers when they try to exercise their First Amendment Janus freedoms, and private sector workers don’t yet enjoy similar protections.
“Foundation staff attorneys will keep fighting for a future where all American workers’ right to freely associate or dissociate with a union is fully protected,” Semmens added.
