Forced Dues For Politics: CWA Union Hit with Federal Charge by Pennsylvania Metal Worker
The following article is from the National Right to Work Legal Defense Foundation’s bi-monthly Foundation Action Newsletter, July/August 2022 edition. To view other editions of Foundation Action or to sign up for a free subscription, click here.
CWA officials defied decades of law by rejecting worker’s resignation
Coates’ case challenging illegal seizure of forced dues for politics comes after one analysis found that union officials likely spent over $12 billion on political activities during the 2019-2020 election cycle, far more than union officials publicly admit.
GALETON, PA – An employee of metal corporation Catalus hit a Communications Workers of America (CWA) union local this May with federal charges for illegally seizing full union dues from his paycheck, including dues for politics. Curtis Coates, a metal worker for Catalus, is receiving free legal aid from the National Right to Work Legal Defense Foundation.
Foundation attorneys filed Mr. Coates’ charges with National Labor Relations Board (NLRB) Region 6 in Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania. The Region is now investigating the charges.
CWA Union Officials Continue to Collect Dues from Worker, Despite Lack of Authorization
On October 20, 2021, Mr. Coates sent a message to CWA union officials declaring that he was resigning from his position as shop steward and terminating his union membership.
Because no union monopoly contract was in effect, under longstanding law, Coates should have been able to immediately cut all financial support for the CWA union which he no longer supports. The charges say a union official rebuffed both of Mr. Coates’ requests the next day, insisting that he had to remain both a union member and a shop steward.
From December 2021 to February 2022, Mr. Coates followed up with union officials several times via email and mail. He repeatedly asked when union officials would cease taking dues money from his paychecks and what process he had to follow to revoke his dues deduction authorization to stop money from being seized from his paychecks.
“To date, the Union has not responded . . . and dues and contributions continue to be deducted from his wages,” the charge reads. Because Pennsylvania currently lacks a Right to Work law, union officials can legally force employees to pay some union fees just to keep their jobs. However, those forced fees cannot be demanded when no union contract is in effect.
Further, even in states without Right to Work protections full union membership cannot be required. Additionally, under the U.S. Supreme Court’s decision in CWA v. Beck (1988), won by Foundation attorneys, forced fees are limited to only the part of union dues that union officials claim goes toward a union’s core “representational” functions and cannot be collected for other activities like union politics and lobbying.
Conflict of Interest: NLRB General Counsel is a Former CWA Union Official
Currently, the NLRB General Counsel is former CWA attorney Jennifer Abruzzo, who has expressed support for a number of policies which give union officials greater power to force workers into dues-paying union ranks, even without a vote. Foundation attorneys requested last year that Abruzzo recuse herself from a case involving an Oregon ABC cameraman who accused another CWA local of demanding illegal dues from him, including dues for politics.
Coates’ case represents another potential conflict of interest for Abruzzo, who has repeatedly sided with union officials against the rights of workers opposed to union affiliation.
“Mr. Coates’ right to refrain from funding union activities is being ignored by CWA union officials as they continue to unlawfully seize full union dues, which includes money used for union political activities,” commented National Right to Work Foundation Vice President Patrick Semmens. “This case shows why Pennsylvania workers need the protection of a Right to Work law to make all union payments strictly voluntary: So union bosses cannot so brazenly collect money to which they are not entitled under longstanding federal law.”
“Further, Mr. Coates’ case demonstrates the obvious conflict of interest that exists as Abruzzo, a former CWA lawyer, is charged with enforcing workers’ rights violated by her former CWA union colleagues,” Semmens added.
Healthcare Workers at Cuyuna Hospital Successfully Petition for Votes to Remove Union
NLRB reverses itself after wrongly undercounting number of technical employees seeking vote to remove union
Minneapolis, MN (September 21, 2022) – A vote to remove union representation at Cuyuna Regional Medical Center (CRMC) in Minneapolis, Minnesota, will move forward after the National Labor Relations Board (NLRB) Region 18 reversed itself and admitted to undercounting workers’ signatures in support of removing the Service Employees International Union (SEIU) from their workplace. National Right to Work staff attorneys filed a Request for Review on August 24, 2022, pointing out that the Region clearly miscounted the number of valid signatures on a union decertification petition. Now that the NLRB has acknowledged its mistake, a new pre-election hearing date is scheduled for later this month.
Employee Laurie Murphy filed the decertification petition for CRMC Unit II technical employees, which includes employees in the laboratory, respiratory therapy, physical therapy and radiology departments, plus licensed practical nurses, engineers, certified occupational therapy assistants, pharmacy technicians, and accredited records technicians.
“CRMC employees would like to work for an organization that doesn’t have to run everything through the union. CRMC is a great company to work for and they care about all of their employees,” Ms. Murphy said in a statement explaining the widespread support among her Cuyuna Regional Medical Center colleagues for removing the SEIU.
“In my opinion, all they are is a middleman that we pay to ‘negotiate’ on our behalf with our employer. Frankly, I feel who better to negotiate on my behalf than myself,” added Murphy. “I don’t see any benefit in having a union at CRMC.”
Under federal law, when the required number of workers in a bargaining unit sign a petition seeking the removal of union officials’ monopoly bargaining powers, an NLRB-conducted secret ballot vote whether to remove the union is triggered. If a majority of workers casting ballots against vote for the union, the union is stripped of its government-granted monopoly “representation” powers.
Those powers let union officials impose contracts on all workers in the workplace, even workers who are not union members and oppose the union. Further, because Minnesota is not a Right to Work state, union-imposed contracts can include mandatory union dues or fees, with nonmember workers fired if they do not pay.
Under the National Labor Relations Act (NLRA), the federal statute the NLRB implements, workers possess an specified statutory right to remove an unwanted union through a decertification election. Yet the NLRB has invented out of whole cloth a “contract bar” that blocks workers’ right to hold a decertification election for up to three years after union officials and a company finalize a monopoly bargaining contract.
After miscounting the signatures, the NLRB Regional Director cited the “contract bar” as a reason for dismissing the petition. Had the Region not ultimately reversed itself, that erroneous decision could have blocked a decertification vote for three more years because of the contract bar.
In response, Murphy’s Foundation staff attorneys filed a Request for Review with the National Labor Relations Board in Washington, D.C., asking them to not only review the dismissal of the petition, citing the undercounting of workers’ signatures, but also to reconsider the “contract bar” given its role in stifling workers’ statutory right to a decertification vote. Before the NLRB could rule the Region, finally admitting its miscount, reversed the earlier ruling not to move forward with the vote the workers had requested.
“We’re glad to see Ms. Murphy and her coworkers able to move forward with their decertification election, clear mistakes by the NLRB all of which, perhaps not coincidentally, served the interests of SEIU union bosses who don’t want to face a vote of rank-and-file workers,” commented National Right to Work Foundation President Mark Mix. “The fact that a worker needs our legal support and expertise just to get the Labor Board to do really simple math is just the latest example of how the NLRB is biased against workers who oppose coercive unionization.”
Union Seeking to Destroy Ballots of Cuyuna Regional Medical Center Clerical Workers Who Want to Remove SEIU
The technical employees covered by Murphy’s petition are not the only group of workers at Cuyuna Regional Medical Center seeking to free themselves of unwanted SEIU so-called “representation.” Also with free legal aid from National Right to Work Foundation staff attorneys, CRMC employee Terri Larson filed a separate decertification petition for clerical employees working in the business office or medical records department.
The clerical employees’ petition was promptly processed by the NLRB and a mail-ballot decertification election has already taken place. However, before the votes could be counted, the SEIU sought to block the election by filing “blocking charge” allegations. Now, not only are the votes impounded, the NLRB has announced it intends to decide whether or not to destroy the ballots at the request of SEIU lawyers.
“As this situation shows, winning the right to hold a decertification vote is often just the beginning for workers seeking to free themselves from union wanted union ‘representation,’” added Mix. “Biased NLRB-invented procedures give union officials the ability to block the tallying of votes against the union, often indefinitely, leaving workers trapped in union ranks they overwhelmingly oppose.”
Indiana US Brick Employees Target ‘Successor Bar’ for Demolition
Over 70 percent of workers want Teamsters gone, but non-statutory policy prevents vote
Though Kerry Atkins and roughly 70 percent of his coworkers want to kick Teamsters bosses from their facility, the “successor bar” and other non-statutory “bars” could block a vote for years.
INDIANAPOLIS, IN – National Right to Work Foundation staff attorneys have made big strides in recent years for independent-minded workers who want to exercise their right to vote unpopular unions out of their workplaces.
The National Labor Relations Board’s (NLRB) adoption in 2020 of Foundation-backed reforms to the decertification process have made it significantly less difficult for workers to exercise their rights. But, there’s much more work to be done to eliminate contrived, union boss-friendly NLRB policies that stifle worker rights just so unwanted unions can stay entrenched.
Enter Kerry Atkins and his coworkers at US Brick in Mooresville, Indiana. With free Foundation legal aid they are fighting an NLRB policy called the “successor bar” that arbitrarily blocks employees’ right to vote out an unwanted union when management changes hands in a workplace.
Atkins filed a petition signed by his colleagues in December 2021, asking the NLRB to hold a vote on whether to decertify Teamsters Local 135 union officials. NLRB Regional Director Patricia Nachand ruled on February 9 that US Brick’s recent acquisition of the plant triggered the so-called “successor bar” and rendered the employee petition invalid.
NLRB-Invented Policy Traps Workers in Union They Strongly Oppose
Nachand blocked the vote even though, according to her own order, plant management has in its possession a parallel petition expressing disaffection with the Teamsters, which bears the signatures of about 70 percent of the employees.
The “successor bar” is a non-statutory policy invented by NLRB appointees that immunizes union officials from being voted out by employees for up to a year after management changes as a result of a sale, merger, or acquisition.
The National Labor Relations Act (NLRA), the federal law the NLRB is charged with enforcing, explicitly states that employees have a right to remove union monopoly “representation” they oppose. The “successor bar,” however, is found nowhere in the NLRA’s text.
The only “bar” to employees requesting a decertification election that is mentioned in the NLRA is a one-year restriction after employees certify a union in a secret-ballot vote. That the “successor bar” — which isn’t even in the NLRA — can stave off attempts to vote out a union for up to four years when combined with a “contract bar” makes it especially offensive to workers’ rights.
To make matters even worse, two different federal agencies — the NLRB and the Department of Justice — effectively worked together to impose the “successor bar” on Atkins and his coworkers. The Department of Justice in an antitrust complaint forced the former owner of the Mooresville brick facility to sell it to US Brick. The NLRB now says that event should be grounds for blocking the employees from ejecting a union they overwhelmingly oppose.
‘Successor Bar’ Disregards Desires and Experiences of Workers, Brief Says
Atkins’ Foundation attorneys have filed a Request for Review of Nachand’s order with the NLRB in Washington, D.C. It contends that the “successor bar” serves no purpose other than to block the will of rank-and-file employees, entrenching union bosses who ought to be accountable to the employees.
“The successor bar undermines the NLRA’s core purpose of employee free choice by disregarding employees’ actual desires and past experiences with their union representative,” the Request for Review argues.
Restriction Shows How NLRB-Invented Policies Stifle Individual Rights
“The NLRB-invented ‘successor bar’ is just one example of how the Board neglects its mandate to protect the rights of individual workers, including those opposed to forced union affiliation, just to protect union boss power,” observed National Right to Work Foundation Vice President Patrick Semmens. “The ‘successor bar’ not only overrides the statutory right of workers to vote out unions they oppose, but does so at the very moment when workers are most likely to reevaluate their union status: the turnover of the old management that perhaps was the reason for unionization in the first place.”
Atlantic Aviation Employees Win Freedom from Unwanted Union
Incompetent Machinists union bosses fly away to avoid worker vote
IAM union officials loafed around at Tiffany Lipyanic’s workplace for years, all the while siphoning dues from her and her coworkers. She’s thankful to the Foundation for aid in navigating the complex process to vote them out.
PHILADEPHIA, PA – Atlantic Aviation PNE, Inc. employees have freed themselves from unwanted union monopoly “representation” after filing a decertification election request with the National Labor Relations Board (NLRB). Tiffany Lipyanic, a line service technician, filed the petition to end the union’s monopoly bargaining powers for all workers at the Atlantic Aviation facility at Philadelphia Northeast Airport. International Association of Machinists (IAM) union officials then abandoned their “representation” rather than face an overwhelming vote against the union.
‘We Were Paying Union Officials and Got Nothing in Return’
Lipyanic and her colleagues received free legal assistance from National Right to Work Foundation staff attorneys in filing their petition for a vote to oust union officials. The petition, filed on February 15 by tire service and customer service representatives, was signed by more than twice the number needed to trigger an NLRB-supervised “decertification” secret-ballot election, after which union officials lose monopoly bargaining power if a majority of workers vote to remove them.
Rather than proceed to a vote, IAM District Lodge 142 and Local Lodge 1776 officials filed documents with the NLRB disclaiming their monopoly bargaining powers on February 28.
“After trying to work with union officials for years, it became apparent our pleas fell on deaf ears. We were paying union officials and got nothing in return, so we’re glad to finally be free of them,” Lipyanic commented. “Having the National Right to Work Foundation’s assistance gave us confidence in our journey to finally free ourselves from union bureaucrats that took our money and disregarded us at every turn.”
Foundation-Backed Rules Aid Workers in Removing Unpopular Union Bosses
This is the latest in a series of successful worker efforts to oust unwanted union officials aided by National Right to Work Foundation staff attorneys. Just since the beginning of 2021, Foundation attorneys provided legal assistance in well over 50 NLRB decertification efforts, which together sought to end union boss control of over 7,000 workers.
Recent Foundation efforts to break down union boss-created legal barriers to unseating unwanted union officials have allowed more workers to free themselves from unwanted union ranks. In 2020, following detailed formal comments submitted by Foundation attorneys, the NLRB adopted rules eviscerating union bosses’ ability to stop a decertification effort with “blocking charges,” i.e., accusations made against an employer that are often unverified and have no connection to workers’ desire to kick out unwanted union officials.
“Under the protection of a Right to Work law each individual worker can decide whether or not to join or financially support a labor union. Unfortunately, current law empowers union bosses in many states to use their monopoly bargaining status to force workers to pay up or be fired,” commented National Right to Work Foundation Vice President and Legal Director Raymond LaJeunesse.
“The Foundation is glad to have helped the workers at Atlantic Aviation exercise their right to free themselves of a union they oppose. But to better protect all workers’ freedom of association, Right to Work laws should be on the books in all states,” LaJeunesse added.
Teamsters Officials ‘Beck’ Down: Must Return Thousands in Dues Seized for Politics
Foundation-won settlement also forces union officials to stop threatening non-members
SoCal Shenanigans: Teamsters officials’ disrespect for rank-and-file workers and their rights led to multiple Foundation-backed employee actions against them in just the past year.
LOS ANGELES, CA – When Nelson Medina and about 60 of his coworkers at Savage Services in Long Beach tried to exercise their right as union non-members to opt out of funding Teamsters Local 848 officials’ political expenditures, Teamsters bosses responded with harassment, misinformation, and threats of termination.
Now, with free legal aid from the National Right to Work Foundation, they have won a settlement that required Teamsters honchos to pay back thousands of dollars in dues union officials seized in violation of workers’ rights under the Foundation-won CWA v. Beck Supreme Court decision.
Because California lacks Right to Work protections, even Golden State private sector workers who oppose a union’s presence in their workplace can be required to pay union dues or fees to keep their jobs. However, under the Beck decision, union officials can never require non-members to subsidize union political activity. Beck also entitles employees who have abstained from union membership to receive union financial disclosures.
Teamsters Bosses to Workers: Fund Union Politics or Be Fired
Medina originally filed charges against Teamsters officials for illegal dues practices in September 2021. The charges stated that he had sent Teamsters officials a letter on August 15 exercising his right to reject formal union membership and invoking his right under Beck to cut off dues deductions for union politics.
About a month after the letter, the charge noted, union officials informed Savage Services management by mail that if Medina and 12 fellow employees who also objected to full union membership did not complete membership applications and pay full dues for the month of September, the employer should terminate the employees before September’s final week.
The settlement, in addition to requiring Teamsters bosses to return nearly $6,000 in illegally taken dues to Savage Services employees, also mandated that union officials declare in a public notice that they “will not fail to provide non-member employees with a breakdown of dues and fees required for Beck objectors upon request.”
They also had to declare they “will not threaten employees who have raised Beck objections with termination for failing to complete a union application as a condition of employment.”
“That Teamsters Local 848 officials illegally siphoned money for politics from almost 60 Savage Services employees and threatened termination of those who dared to stand up for their rights demonstrates clearly that Teamsters officials prioritize power far above the employees they claim to ‘represent,’” commented National Right to Work Foundation Vice President and Legal Director Raymond LaJeunesse. “Based on the sheer number of employees in Medina’s workplace who received refunds as the result of this settlement, Teamsters officials apparently played fast and loose with the rights of all workers who objected to the union agenda.”
Foundation Attorneys Counter Teamsters Coercion Across Southern California
Last September, Foundation staff attorneys also aided Ventura, CA, Airgas employees in removing Teamsters Local 848 from their facility. After litigation that had lasted almost a year, as well as two submissions of petitions demonstrating a majority of workers at the plant wanted the Teamsters gone, union officials finally departed the plant. They did so just before the NLRB was slated to conduct a secret-ballot vote whether to remove the union at the plant, likely leaving to avoid an embarrassing rejection by the workers.
The string of Foundation-assisted worker victories over unwanted Teamsters officials in Southern California continued last year when Ozvaldo Gutierrez and his XPO Logistics coworkers forced Teamsters Local 63 union bosses out of their Los Angeles facility in October.
St. James Mayo Clinic Nurses Overwhelmingly Vote to Remove AFSCME Union; Certified by Labor Board
Certification of result follows similar vote by hundreds of nurses at Mankato Mayo Clinic location to remove Minnesota Nurses Association union
St. James, MN (August 1, 2022) – Healthcare workers at the Mayo Clinic Health System in St. James, Minnesota have formally removed the American Federation of State, County and Municipal Employees (AFSCME) Council 65 from their hospital. The National Labor Relations Board (NLRB) made the 15-2 vote official after the 7-day deadline for union election objections passed without any objections filed.
The workers’ decertification petition was filed by registered nurse Heather Youngwirth with the NLRB Region 18 office in Minneapolis, MN with free legal representation from National Right to Work Legal Defense Foundation staff attorneys. The vote on whether to end AFSCME union officials’ monopoly bargaining powers at the Mayo Clinic was 15-2 in favor of decertification of AFSCME, with the Labor Board’s official tally happening last week.
Minnesota is not a Right to Work state, meaning workers can be forced to pay dues or fees to union officials as a condition of keeping their jobs. Because the workers’ decertification vote was successful, AFSCME union officials are stripped of their monopoly “representation” powers, including the ability to impose a forced dues requirement on the nurses in the bargaining unit.
National Right to Work Foundation legal aid has recently assisted workers in several decertification efforts in Minnesota. In addition to the St. James Mayo Clinic, hundreds of nurses at Mayo Clinic in Mankato, Minnesota recently voted to remove the Minnesota Nurses Association. Meanwhile, two groups of employees at four Cuyuna Regional Medical Center locations recently filed petitions seeking decertification votes seeking to remove SEIU union officials.
Because the NLRB has made the decertification process unnecessarily complicated, workers often need to turn to Foundation attorneys for free legal aid in navigating the process. The Foundation recently aided metalworkers at Minneapolis Washer and Stamping, who endured a year and a half of litigation, but have finally voted out Communications Workers of America (CWA) union officials.
“While these nurses have successfully removed a union they oppose, we should not lose sight that thousands of Minnesota workers are forced to pay union dues, not because they voluntarily choose to, but because they would be fired if they don’t pay up,” commented National Right to Work Legal Defense Foundation President Mark Mix. “It is past time Minnesota joins all of its neighboring states and ensure Minnesota workers have Right to Work protections so all workers can decide for themselves whether to financially support union activities.”
Hundreds of Minnesota Mayo Clinic Nurses Seek Vote to Free Themselves of Unwanted Union ‘Representation’
Nurses signed decertification petition filed with Labor Board to end Minnesota Nurses Association officials’ monopoly bargaining powers
Mankato, MN (June 27, 2022) – Hundreds of healthcare workers at the Mayo Clinic Health System in Mankato, Minnesota have signed a petition seeking a vote on the removal of the Minnesota Nurses Association (MNA) union, affiliated with the National Nurses United. The workers’ decertification petition was filed with the National Labor Relations Board (NLRB) Region 18 office in Minneapolis, MN with free legal representation from National Right to Work Legal Defense Foundation staff attorneys.
Brittany Burgess, a registered nurse of the Mayo Clinic, filed the petition. The request seeking to end MNA union officials’ monopoly bargaining powers at the Mayo Clinic was signed by more than two hundred nurses in the bargaining unit, well over the number needed to trigger an NLRB-conducted secret ballot vote to remove the union.
Minnesota is not a Right to Work state, meaning workers can be forced to pay dues or fees to union officials as a condition of getting or keeping their jobs. If the workers’ vote is successful, MNA union officials will be stripped of their monopoly “representation” powers, including the ability to impose a forced dues requirement on the nurses in the bargaining unit.
National Right to Work Foundation legal aid has recently assisted workers in numerous successful decertification efforts across the nation, including workers in Kansas, Illinois, and Delaware. Because the NLRB has made the decertification process unnecessarily complicated, workers often need to turn to Foundation attorneys for free legal aid in navigating the process.
Foundation-advocated reforms to decertification elections that were adopted by the NLRB in 2020 have curtailed union officials’ abuse of so-called “blocking charges” to delay or block workers’ from exercising their right to decertify a union on the basis of unproven allegations made against an employer, often completely unrelated to workers’ desire to free themselves of the union. However, just days ago the Biden-appointed NLRB majority announced it was starting rulemaking to overturn those reforms and make it easier for union officials to block decertification votes no matter how many rank-and-file workers want a vote.
“Ms. Burgess and her coworkers, who provide lifesaving medical care to the people of Minnesota, should not have to be subjects of Minnesota Nurses Association union bosses whose so-called ‘representation’ they oppose,” commented National Right to Work Legal Defense Foundation President Mark Mix. “These nurses represent just one example in what has been a surge of decertification efforts over the past year, which makes it all the more outrageous that the Biden Board has announced it intends to give union bosses more power to block workers from exercising their statutory right to vote out unions they oppose.”
Ascension Providence Rochester Hospital Lab Techs Secure Victory in Effort to Remove Unwanted Union
After failing to block the vote using cynical legal arguments, OPEIU union officials ran away rather than face loss in decertification election
Rochester, MI (June 13, 2022) – Lab technicians at Ascension Providence Rochester Hospital in Michigan, have finally won their effort to be free of unwanted so-called” representation” by union officials of the Office and Professional Employees International Union (OPEIU) Local 40. After workers secured a decertification vote over union officials’ objections, the union disclaimed interest in representing the bargaining unit rather than face a vote of the workers they had claimed to “represent.”
Ascension workers Alyse Gschwender and Delaney Warren received free legal representation from National Right to Work Legal Defense Foundation staff attorneys during the decertification process before the National Labor Relations Board (NLRB).
The petition for the vote to remove OPEIU officials, which signed by numerous Ascension lab technicians, was filed April 6, 2022, by Ms. Warren. After she took a position outside of the bargaining unit, Ms. Gschwender became the petitioner.
During the protracted process, Foundation staff attorneys successfully fought off OPEIU union lawyers’ efforts to block the vote cited the pending sale of the facility by Ascension to LabCorp as grounds for rejecting the workers’ request for an election. Union lawyers had urged the NLRB to block a vote whether to remove the union on the grounds of an upcoming “cessation of operations” by the employer, a policy previously applied only to certification elections.
In briefs to the NLRB Foundation staff attorneys countered that such grounds for blocking the vote were unjustified both as a matter of law and considering the facts of Ascension Providence Rochester Hospital’s announcement regarding the potential transfer of the operation to LabCorp. Foundation attorneys also noted that the attempt to block the vote was likely a cynical attempt to keep power over the bargaining unit, because if the sale ultimately went through the union would have likely sought to block a decertification vote citing the NLRB-created “successor bar” that insulates union officials from decertification votes after an employer’s change in ownership.
The Board rejected the union lawyers’ arguments and scheduled a decertification vote by mail-in ballot with the votes set to be counted later this month. However, rather than go forward with a vote they apparently knew they were going to lose, OPEIU officials instead disclaimed interest in the unit, finally giving the workers the freedom from unwanted union representation they sought.
Because Michigan is one of 27 states with Right to Work protections for private sector employees, unions cannot force workers to pay union dues or fees as a condition of keeping their jobs. However, even in Right to Work states union officials are empowered to impose monopoly representation on entire units of workers even over the objections of many workers within the unit, necessitating decertification elections to remove unwanted union “representation.”
“No worker anywhere should be forced under a union’s so-called ‘representation’ against their will. Foundation staff attorneys stand ready to provide legal aid to workers wanting to hold a decertification election to oust a union they oppose and believe they would be better off without,” commented National Right to Work Foundation President Mark Mix. “This case shows the lengths union lawyers will go to block workers from even holding votes to remove a union, even when union officials know that the vote will likely demonstrate that most workers want nothing to do with the union.”
