Case Closed: Nurse Prevails in 11-Year Legal Fight Over Forced Dues
The following article is from the National Right to Work Legal Defense Foundation’s bi-monthly Foundation Action Newsletter, January/February 2022 edition. To view other editions of Foundation Action or to sign up for a free subscription, click here.
100 Rhode Island hospital employees win refund of dues illegally seized for union lobbying
After over a decade of battling power-hungry UNAP union bosses in court, Jeanette Geary has secured not only refunds of dues seized for union politics, but a First Circuit decision clarifying non-members can never be charged for union lobbying.
WARWICK, RI – Jeanette Geary finally achieved a total victory in her 11-year legal battle against union bosses. She and 99 other current and former nurses at Kent Hospital in Rhode Island received refunds of forced dues that were illegally used to support union lobbying in state legislatures. Foundation attorneys represented Geary throughout her fight.
Geary’s journey began when she grew frustrated with United Nurses and Allied Professionals (UNAP) union bosses in her workplace. “I realized what the union was doing,” Geary explained. “The union leadership had no interest in nurses or our professional work. Their only interest was collection of dues and fees.”
Geary resigned her union membership, but union dues were still extracted from her paycheck because Rhode Island is a forced unionism state that lacks Right to Work protections. However, thanks to the Foundation-won CWA v. Beck Supreme Court decision, nonmember workers can only be forced to pay fees for union activities “germane” to union monopoly bargaining. They cannot be forced to pay the portion of dues that funds activities like union lobbying.
Nurse Harassed for Standing Up to Union Bosses
Geary demanded a breakdown of the union’s expenditures, but union bosses refused to give her a legally required independent auditor’s verification of how they calculated non-members’ reduced forced fees. Like many who speak up against union bosses, Geary became a target for union harassment. “They laughed at me. They had their workplace reps ridicule me on the job and tell me I could file grievances that would be thrown away and said so with a big smile,” Geary recalled.
In 2009, Geary filed federal charges against union officials. The trial revealed UNAP officials were charging non-member nurses for lobbying in state legislatures. Despite the Supreme Court’s clear mandate in Beck that non-members’ money could not be used to fund political causes, union lawyers argued the lobbying was “germane” to the union’s monopoly bargaining.
Thanks to delays caused by President Obama’s illegal recess appointments to the National Labor Relations Board (NLRB), Geary had to file two petitions with the U.S.
Court of Appeals in Washington, D.C., and didn’t get a final NLRB ruling for nearly a decade. Finally, in March 2019, the NLRB ruled 3-1 that union officials cannot charge non-members for lobbying of any kind. It also ruled that union officials must provide independent verification that the union expenses they force non-members to pay have been audited.
Union Bosses Ridiculously Claimed Some Union Lobbying Wasn’t Political
Union officials still wouldn’t abandon their argument that nonmembers could be forced to pay for some union lobbying as a condition of employment. Union lawyers appealed the NLRB’s decision to the U.S. Court of Appeals for the First Circuit. A three-judge panel that included retired Supreme Court Justice David Souter ruled unanimously in Geary’s favor, saying “we see no convincing argument that legislative lobbying is not a ‘political’ activity.”
Union officials made a last-ditch attempt to overturn the decision, requesting an en banc hearing by the entire Court of Appeals, but that request was denied. In September 2021, union bosses finally paid back, with interest, thousands of dollars taken from Geary and 99 other current and former Kent Hospital nurses who were not union members but were charged for the union’s lobbying, bringing the decade-long case to a close.
“Jeanette Geary faced workplace ridicule for her decision to stand up to union bosses, yet she persevered for eleven years,” said National Right to Work Foundation Vice President and Legal Director Raymond LaJeunesse. “In the process, she won important legal precedents that will protect thousands of other workers from having their money illegally used to fund union politics.”
Teamsters Officials Misled Pepsi Employee About His Rights, Attempted to Have Him Fired for Asking About Leaving Union
Albany-area worker filed unfair labor practice charge against Teamsters at National Labor Relations Board with free legal aid from the National Right to Work Foundation
Latham, NY (October 30, 2019) — National Right to Work Legal Defense Foundation staff attorneys filed an unfair labor practice charge on behalf of an employee of a Pepsi plant, against a local Teamsters union after union officials wrongly told him he would have to join the union as a condition of employment, tried to get him fired and would not allow him to exercise his legal right to resign from the union.
Vince Zasonski works for a Pepsi-Cola production plant in Lathan, New York where Teamsters Local 294 have a bargaining agreement which includes a union security clause, making union payments mandatory. In the summer of 2018, Zasonski, who did not voluntarily join the union, wanted to leave union membership, but a union official told him that because New York is not a Right to Work state, he would have to stay in the union.
In that statement, which came after Zasonski inquired about resigning from the union, the union fundamentally misstated workers’ rights under the National Labor Relations Act and longstanding legal precedents. While New York workers lack Right to Work protections that make all union payments strictly voluntary, Empire State workers still have the right to resign their formal membership and pay only the portion of union dues allowed under the Supreme Court’s Communications Workers of America v. Beck decision, which said unions cannot force workers to pay for activities unrelated to bargaining such as union political and lobbying activities.
The official then tried to get Zasonski fired for seeking to resign his union membership. In August of 2019, Zasonski wrote to union officials to resign his union membership and assert his Beck rights.
Union officials, however, still have not responded to his letter or recognized his legal rights. The unfair labor practice charge Zasonski filed with the free legal aid from National Right to Work Foundation staff attorneys states that union officials never explained that he could resign from the union or that he could assert his Beck rights, nor did they provide him with a breakdown of fees according to the Beck standard or reduce Zasonski’s dues as he asked.
The union continues to unlawfully take a cut of Zasonski’s paycheck as if he were a full member of the union despite his attempts to resign membership and exercise his rights not to pay dues that support union political activities in violation of his rights.
“Lying to employees about their right to resign from union membership and their ability to stop paying full dues shows what lengths greedy union bosses will go to pad union coffers, even if it means violating the rights of the very workers they claim to represent,” said National Right to Work Foundation President Mark Mix. “This case shows why every worker in America needs the protection of a Right to Work law that makes union membership and financial support strictly voluntary.”
