Majority of workers backed petitions calling for Teamsters removal as second workplace ejects Teamsters Local 89 bosses in recent weeks

Louisville, KY (October 2, 2025) – Kenneth Moore, an employee of Builders FirstSource, and his coworkers have been freed from the hold of Teamsters Local 89 union bosses after Builders FirstSource ended its recognition of the Teamsters as the workers’ “representative.” The employer took this decision following a petition signed by a majority of the workers demanding that Builders FirstSource end the recognition of the Teamsters.

This development comes after Moore filed a petition last month at the National Labor Relations Board (NLRB) seeking a decertification election to remove the union from his workplace. Moore filed his petition at the NLRB with free legal aid from National Right to Work Foundation staff attorneys. Moore and his colleagues now join Chris Smith and other IMI – Irving Materials drivers who were successful in removing the Teamsters Local 89 in Scottsville, KY last month.

The NLRB is the federal agency responsible for enforcing the National Labor Relations Act and adjudicating disputes between employers, unions, and individual employees.

Thanks to the 2019 Right to Work Foundation-won Johnson Controls NLRB decision, workers seeking to remove unwanted union bosses can also do so by submitting a majority-backed petition asking their employer to stop recognizing the union. If there is a dispute about the petition, the NLRB can administer a secret-ballot vote to assess the employees’ opposition to the union.

The workers’ petition to Builders FirstSource managers provided the company with proof that the majority of their employees do not support the Teamsters presence at their facility. In compliance with the Johnson Controls decision, the employer withdrew the Teamsters’ recognition.

Moore and his Builders FirstSource colleagues are amongst the most recent workers who have made strides to remove the Teamsters from their workplaces. According to the NLRB’s owns statistics, over the past 12 months over 20% of all decertification cases involved the Teamsters union.

Kentucky is one of the 26 states with a Right to Work law that protects workers by making union affiliation and dues payment strictly voluntary. However, even in Right to Work states, union officials can still impose monopoly bargaining control upon all workers within a workplace, even those who oppose the union.

“These two groups of Kentucky workers are the latest to come to the conclusion that the interests that Teamsters bosses are pursuing are at odds with the wishes of the rank and file,” commented National Right to Work Foundation President Mark Mix. “The Foundation will continue to assist workers in their efforts to free themselves from the Teamsters or any other unwanted so-called ‘representation.’”

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.

Posted on Oct 2, 2025 in News Releases