29 Oct 2024

Newark-Area Nurses Request Vote to Oust SEIU Union Officials as Federal Labor Board Seeks to Disenfranchise Workers

Posted in News Releases

Federal Labor Board, acting under new Biden-Harris Administration policy, moves swiftly to keep union officials in power despite nurses’ demand for removal vote

Newark, NJ (October 29, 2024) – Registered Nurses at the Clara Maass Medical Center in Belleville Township have filed a petition demanding a vote to remove United Healthcare Workers East (1199SEIU, an affiliate of the Service Employees International Union) officials from their workplace. Registered Nurse Nancy Bombaro filed the union decertification petition with Region 22 of the National Labor Relations Board (NLRB) with free legal aid from National Right to Work Legal Defense Foundation staff attorneys.

The NLRB is the federal agency responsible for enforcing federal labor law, which includes administering elections to install (or “certify”) and remove (or “decertify”) unions. Bombaro’s decertification petition contains well over the required threshold of employee signatures needed to trigger a decertification vote under the National Labor Relations Act (NLRA).

The requested vote would occur among Bombaro’s work unit of “[a]ll full-time, regular part-time, and per-diem Registered Nurses” employed by Clara Maass, but it appears the NLRB is taking action to block the vote at SEIU union officials’ behest.

Because New Jersey lacks Right to Work protections for its private sector workers, SEIU union officials have the legal power to enforce contracts that require Bombaro and her colleagues to pay union dues or fees as a condition of getting or keeping a job. In Right to Work states, in contrast, union membership and financial support are strictly voluntary. A successful decertification vote in a non-Right to Work state like New Jersey strips union officials of both their forced-dues privileges and the ability to impose one-size-fits-all contracts across an entire work unit of employees.

Biden-Harris NLRB Rule Change Lets SEIU Union Officials Trap Workers in Unwanted Union

Despite Bombaro’s petition containing more than enough signatures to prompt a union decertification vote, a recent shift in NLRB policy sparked by the union boss-allied Biden-Harris Administration could indefinitely block the nurses from exercising their right to vote out the SEIU. At the end of last month, the NLRB enacted a new policy reinstating so-called “blocking charges,” which are, in many cases, unproven allegations of employer misconduct used by union officials to stop workers from voting to decertify a union. SEIU union bosses are manipulating such charges to stymie the nurses’ effort.

“My fellow nurses and I are not pleased with the performance of 1199SEIU union officials and simply want to exercise our right to vote out this union,” commented Bombaro. “It was enough work to gather signatures and submit the petition asking for the vote. It’s outrageous that NLRB policy now lets union officials stop us from voting as if they know better than us.”

The Biden-Harris NLRB’s new rule overturns the Election Protection Rule, a set of Foundation-backed reforms the NLRB adopted in 2020 that prevented union boss allegations from stopping a worker-requested decertification election. The reforms also gave workers an opportunity to petition for secret ballot elections after union officials rose to power in a workplace by “card check,” an abuse-prone process which relies on union-solicited “cards” as votes and forbids workers from voting privately.

With the Election Protection Rule gone, union officials again have the power to block worker-requested union decertification votes for months or longer.

“Just weeks after the Biden-Harris NLRB enacted its cynical rule change, union officials are already manipulating it to maintain their own power while crushing the free choice rights of the workers they claim to ‘represent,’” commented National Right to Work Foundation President Mark Mix. “Ms. Bombaro and her fellow nurses are just a few of a growing number of workers around the country who want to declare their independence from unwanted union officials. Rather than side with these workers, the Biden-Harris Administration chose to arrange a blatant power giveaway for its Big Labor political cronies.”

11 Dec 2019

Newark Courthouse Security Guards Win Settlement Forcing Union Bosses to Refund Illegal Dues and Stop Retaliatory Lawsuit

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Union bosses filed collection suit illegally demanding dues payments from nonmember employee for period when there was no union contract in effect

Newark, NJ (December 11, 2019) – With free legal aid from the National Right to Work Legal Defense Foundation, Newark, New Jersey-based security guards Andrei Bobev and William Sona have won a settlement against United Government Security Officers of America (UGSOA) union bosses, whom they charged with illegally demanding union dues from them while there was no contract in effect between the employer and union. The settlement was approved by the National Labor Relations Board (NLRB) Region 22 in Newark.

As part of the settlement, UGSOA officials are required to refund to Sona and six coworkers more than $4,000 in dues and fees that were taken from them illegally, and notify Bobev that they will not continue a civil lawsuit they filed against him to force him to pay illegal union dues after he refused to do so. Bobev and Sona are not members of the UGSOA.

Bobev first sought the aid of Foundation staff attorneys after Paragon Systems took over the federal contract for security services at the U.S. Courthouse in Newark. USGOA bosses, who under the old contractor had monopoly bargaining power over the security guards at the courthouse, demanded that employees continue to pay them dues and fees even though a contract had not yet been finalized between the union and Paragon. Bobbev declined to pay the illegally-demanded dues, and filed federal charges with the NLRB against UGSOA officials with National Right to Work Foundation legal aid.

NLRB Region 22 officials dismissed Bobev’s charges, and UGSOA officials shortly after retaliated against him with a civil lawsuit in an attempt to force him into paying the illegal dues. However, the NLRB General Counsel in Washington reversed Region 22’s dismissal and instructed regional officials to prosecute Bobev’s charge.

Sona and other nonmembers were misled by union officials and started paying illegal dues and fees while there was no monopoly bargaining contract in effect between Paragon and the UGSOA union. With the current settlement, he and six of his fellow security guards will receive back all the money that they paid to UGSOA bosses during that period, plus interest.

UGSOA officials are also required by the settlement to post notices at union headquarters and at all of Paragon Systems’ Newark locations. The notices declare that union bosses “will not threaten to cause [the] employer to discharge [employees] for failure to pay dues and/or service fees” when there is no monopoly bargaining contract in effect, and “will not threaten to enforce [the union’s] by-laws and constitution against non-members by threatening to institute civil proceedings” to force them to pay dues or fees.

“Although this settlement finally provides Mr. Bobev, Mr. Sona, and their coworkers with remedies for illegal union boss actions, it is outrageous that UGSOA officials believed they could enforce their coercive bylaws on workers without having legal power over any one of them in the absence of a contract,” commented National Right to Work Foundation President Mark Mix. “A Right to Work law would stop coercive union boss activity in New Jersey by giving workers the right to voluntarily choose whether or not to join or financially support a union.”