Notice reminds nurses wishing to return to work that they must resign their union memberships to avoid potentially ruinous strike fines

Detroit, MI (March 6, 2026) – Today, the National Right to Work Legal Defense Foundation issued a special legal notice for Detroit-area nurses subject to Teamsters Local 2024 union bosses’ potential strike order. The strike order is projected to cover roughly 10,000 nurses across nine different Corewell medical facilities.

The legal notice informs these workers of rights that union officials often do not want them to know. First and foremost, nurses have the right to resign their union memberships and keep working to support their families, thereby avoiding union fines and internal discipline.

“The situation presents serious concerns for nurses who believe there is much to lose from a union-ordered strike and may not want to abandon their patients,” the legal notice reads. “That is why employees confronted with strike demands frequently contact staff attorneys at the National Right to Work Legal Defense Foundation to learn how they can avoid fines for continuing to work during a strike to support themselves and their families.”

According to reports, one major sticking point during contract talks has been Teamsters officials’ demands that Corewell management impose a forced-dues clause (often misleadingly referred to as a “union security” clause) over the roughly 10,000 nurses in the work unit, and collect dues for the union. Such a clause would require Corewell to fire nurses who refuse to financially support the union. The Foundation’s notice also contains information about what rights nurses have to rebuff union officials’ forced-dues demands, if the contract ends up allowing them to make such demands.

The notice is available at: https://www.nrtw.org/corewell/.

Foundation: Resign Union Membership Before Returning to Work to Avoid Fines and Discipline

Most importantly, the notice informs nurses who want to keep working that the safest way to avoid strike fines and other punishment by union bosses is to resign their union memberships before returning to work. “If an employee is not a union member, union officials have no power to fine or otherwise discipline him or her,” the notice says. “Employees who are union members, or are unsure as to what they might have signed, have a legal right to resign their membership at any time.”

The Foundation’s special legal notice provides nurses sample union resignation letters, as well as information on how to exercise their right under the CWA v. Beck Supreme Court decision to opt out of paying dues for union politics, if union officials succeed in their push to impose a forced-dues contract. “Due to the recent repeal of Right to Work [in Michigan], Teamsters union officials may try to threaten that they can get workers fired for refusal to pay full union dues,” the notice reads. “This is false…workers even in non-Right to Work states can’t be forced to pay dues for anything unrelated to the union’s bargaining functions.”

The notice also gives workers information on the process to submit a “decertification petition,” in which employees request a workplace election to remove the union.

“Since Michigan legislators foolishly repealed the state’s Right to Work law, union officials across the state have engaged in increasingly aggressive tactics to control workers,” commented National Right to Work Foundation President Mark Mix. “Teamsters union officials’ potential strike order against Corewell medical facilities is no exception, and many nurses may rightly think that an order taking thousands of nurses away from their jobs is a bad move for themselves, their families, their patients, and the Detroit community as a whole.

“Corewell nurses should know – regardless of what Teamsters officials may tell them – that they have the right to resign their union memberships and rebuff the union strike order, as well as the right to refrain from paying any dues to support the union’s political activities,” Mix added.

The National Right to Work Legal Defense Foundation is a nonprofit, charitable organization providing free legal aid to employees whose human or civil rights have been violated by compulsory unionism abuses. The Foundation, which can be contacted toll-free at 1-800-336-3600, assists thousands of employees in about 200 cases nationwide per year.