**Olympia, WA (June 6, 2006)** – After union officials realized that they had no choice but to cease their illegal activity, a group of ten Washington State employees agreed today to settle a statewide federal class-action civil rights lawsuit challenging employee firings and union dues seizures in violation of due process protections.

The workers’ lawsuit embarrassed Washington Federation of State Employees (WFSE) union officials into asking the state to rehire the employees terminated at union officials’ behest, and the union hierarchy agreed to remedy their other violations of workers’ First Amendment rights. Because the union agreed to end all illegal behavior listed in the employees’ complaint, the employees, represented by National Right to Work Legal Defense Foundation attorneys, have agreed to settle the case with the WFSE.

“These workers have won the battle, but not the war,” said Stefan Gleason, vice president of the National Right to Work Foundation. “While an important victory, the fact that the law of the Ninth Circuit does not go the further step of forcing union officials to return the $10 million seized under their admittedly unlawful threats further underscores how vulnerable employees are without the protection of a state Right to Work law. A Right to Work law would make union membership and dues payment strictly voluntary.”

In May 2005, WFSE union officials sent a mailing to state employees informing them that they would be fired if they refused to pay union dues. But this notice failed to provide certain constitutionally-required safeguards of employees’ rights to ensure they are not forced to pay for more than the cost of collective bargaining. These safeguards include a verification or audit of union expenditures, as well as an explanation for the basis of the portions of the workers’ fees claimed to be chargeable. WFSE union officials also unlawfully required employees who wish to object to funding political and other non-collective bargaining activities to sign automatic payroll deduction forms.

The state workers charged that the seizure of forced dues by WFSE union officials without due process is a violation of their constitutional rights articulated by the U.S. Supreme Court in the Foundation-won *Chicago Teachers Union v. Hudson* decision. Hudson requires union officials to provide an independently-audited disclosure of their books and justify their expenditures before seizing any forced union dues from employees.

“These public servants never should have had to file a lawsuit in the first place in order for WFSE officials not to trample their basic constitutional rights,” concluded Gleason.

**Los Angeles, CA (June 5, 2006)** – Responding to federal charges filed by over 60 employees of Albertsons and Ralphs grocery chains who faced retaliatory fines for refusal to engage in “sympathy strike” activities during the California grocery strike in 2003, the National Labor Relations Board (NLRB) has ordered the Teamsters union to allow the workers to rescind and void the unlawful fines.

Agreeing with arguments presented by National Right to Work Foundation attorneys, an NLRB administrative law judge in Los Angeles handed down the ruling late last week that also mandated union officials must allow several hundreds – perhaps even thousands – of workers in eight different bargaining units to retroactively revoke their formal union membership and receive certain back-dues rebates.

In the wake of the grocery strike, Teamsters Local 952 union officials socked employees with confiscatory fines – ranging up to $7,400 per employee – simply for observing the union’s own “no strike” contract with their employers. The targeted employees had continued to report to work during the crippling statewide grocery strike ordered against Albertsons, Vons, and Ralphs by United Food and Commercial Workers union officials.

With free legal assistance from the Foundation, Juan Saldana and dozens of other Albertsons and Ralphs distribution center employees filed unfair labor practice charges with the NLRB after Teamsters officials issued the illegal retaliatory fines.

The judge ruled that Teamsters Local 952 officials illegally failed to inform workers of their rights to refrain from formal union membership and to object to paying for the union’s nonrepresentational activities, such as politics. Because the employees thus cannot be considered voluntary members, the judge ruled that internal union disciplinary measures could not be taken against them. The ruling also overturned Teamsters officials’ illegal policy of forcing workers to annually renew their objections to financially supporting the union’s political activities. The judge also struck down a restrictive union policy that required objections to be filed individually.

“Although a significant victory for these workers, this case underscores that state law should not force any worker to pay dues to an unwanted union in the first place,” said Stefan Gleason, vice president of the National Right to Work Foundation. “Without a Right to Work law to mandate that union membership is strictly voluntary, such abuses will inevitably continue to plague California workers.”

The actions of Teamsters union officials violated worker protections recognized in the U.S. Supreme Court, including rights affirmed in *Communications Workers v. Beck*, a case argued and won by Foundation attorneys. Under the Beck ruling, workers may not be compelled to pay dues beyond a union’s proven collective bargaining costs, and they are entitled to an independent audit of union expenditures.

**Washington, DC (June 2, 2006**) – With free legal aid from the National Right to Work Legal Defense Foundation, two Schreiber Foods employees from Green Bay, Wisconsin, have asked a federal appellate court to order the National Labor Relations Board (NLRB) to decide a long-delayed case the workers initiated in 1989. Having refrained from formal union membership, the workers are challenging union officials’ use of their forced union dues for activities unrelated to collective bargaining, such as union organizing.

The case – originally filed by David and Sherry Pirlott more than 17 years ago against Teamsters Local 75 in Wisconsin – is the oldest of scores of cases in which Foundation-assisted employees are trying to reclaim their forced union dues used for non-bargaining activity.

The NLRB, which has long been plagued by what critics have called political in-fighting and institutional pro-union bias, faced similar appellate court scrutiny in the *Pirlott* case in 1998. But rather than decide the case that had long been pending for many years on the docket in Washington, DC, the Board sent the case back to an administrative law judge for further fact finding. The case returned to Washington, DC, in 2001 where it has since collected dust awaiting a decision.

The Pirlott’s writ of *mandamus* petition, filed with the U.S. Court of Appeals for the District of Columbia, points out the Board’s egregious and unjustifiable delay in issuing a decision that could be subject to judicial review. The employees are simply asking the NLRB to follow U.S. Supreme Court rulings that uphold workers’ rights to not pay for recruiting more dues paying workers into organized labor’s ideological movement.

“Justice delayed is justice denied,” said [Stefan Gleason](mailto:shg@nrtw.org), vice president of the National Right to Work Legal Defense Foundation. “By failing to do its job, the NLRB is, in effect, helping union officials fill their coffers with forced-dues seized from the paychecks of countless Americans.”

Under the Supreme Court’s rulings in *Communications Workers v. Beck* and *Ellis v. Railway Clerks*, cases brought by employees represented by Foundation attorneys, workers may not be lawfully forced to pay for any union activities unrelated to collective bargaining, contract negotiation, or grievance adjustment such as union organizing, politics, extra-unit litigation, and member-only programs.

**Detroit, MI (June 2, 2006)** – With free legal assistance from the National Right to Work Legal Defense Foundation, a local health care worker filed federal charges against the American Federation of State and Municipal Employees (AFSCME) union after AFSCME officials illegally demanded her termination for refusing to pay union dues.

Yvette Smith, a rehabilitation specialist employed by Detroit East, Inc., filed the federal unfair labor practice charges with the National Labor Relations Board (NLRB) today. A letter dated May 26, 2006, from AFSCME officials to Smith’s employer unlawfully demanded her termination despite the fact that union officials never informed employees at the facility of their right to refrain from formal union membership and pay a reduced fee, nor did they inform Smith of the amount of forced union dues she supposedly owes.

AFSCME officials’ unlawful demands come on the heels of a petition she and her coworkers filed in September 2005 seeking an election to rid their workplace of the unwanted union. The employees recently appealed a local NLRB official’s decision to block the election using unrelated unfair labor practice charges filed by union officials against the company. The full NLRB in Washington, DC, will evaluate that appeal and decide whether to hold an election.

Foundation attorneys cite that AFSCME officials failed to inform employees at the Detroit East Community Mental Health Center of their right to object to paying for union political and other non-bargaining activities, failed to provide sufficient financial information (as required by U.S. Supreme Court rulings) regarding the union’s expenditures, and failed to apprise them of any procedures for filing objections to the union’s calculations.

“The top brass of the self-described ‘union . . . that cares’ seems to care little about employees who oppose the union,” said [Stefan Gleason](mailto:shg@nrtw.org), vice president of the National Right to Work Foundation. “These heavy-handed tactics demonstrate how far union officials will go to keep a steady stream of forced union dues flowing into union coffers.”

AFSCME officials’ demands violate workers’ rights recognized under the Foundation-won U.S. Supreme Court Communications Workers v. Beck decision. Under Beck and subsequent NLRB rulings, union officials must specifically inform employees of their right to refrain from formal union membership and withhold forced dues unrelated to collective bargaining

**Cincinnati, Ohio (May 16, 2006)** – In a dramatic development in a protracted legal battle by a group of nonunion firefighters against International Association of Firefighters (IAFF) union officials, U.S. District Court Judge Walter Herbert Rice has issued a renewed temporary restraining order against the union and city officials to block the seizure of forced union dues from their paychecks.

The ruling stems from a complaint filed in U.S. District Court for the Southern District of Ohio by five local members of the Cincinnati African-American Firefighters Association. The firefighters have had ongoing disputes with the union hierarchy, including charges of discrimination that allege racist treatment of minority firefighters by union officials. The decision, handed down this week, notes that the nonunion firefighters – receiving free legal assistance from National Right to Work Foundation attorneys – are likely to win their case on the merits, and that the court will likely protect the constitutional rights of all of the approximately 100 nonunion firefighters in Cincinnati.

The firefighters alleged that IAFF Local 48 union officials acted in concert with the City of Cincinnati and seized compulsory union dues from nonmembers without first providing an adequate independent audit of the union’s expenditures and subjected workers challenging the fee to unlawful appeal procedures. The complaint, filed in summer 2004, also named then-Cincinnati Mayor Charlie Luken, among other top City officials, for signing the agreement with the union and enforcing the unconstitutional fee seizures.

The firefighters’ suit points out that IAFF Local 48 union officials intentionally seized the forced union dues without first providing the financial disclosure and procedures required by the Foundation-won U.S. Supreme Court Chicago Teachers Union v. Hudson ruling. Under Hudson, before collecting any forced dues, union officials must provide an audited disclosure of the union’s expenses. Such audits are intended to ensure that forced union dues seized from nonunion public employees do not fund union activities unrelated to collective bargaining.

After City and union officials renewed their contract again authorizing the unlawful forced union dues seizures without providing adequate notice and procedures, Foundation attorneys filed a renewed request for a temporary restraining order, prompting the Court to grant a restraining order in November 2005. And in the latest ruling, Judge Rice concluded that the new contract still lacks adequate procedures to protect nonmembers’ rights.

“IAFF union officials continue to trample the basic constitutional rights of the very firefighters whose interests they claim to represent,” said Stefan Gleason, Vice President of the National Right to Work Foundation. “So long as Ohio’s workers labor under a system of forced unionism, such abuses will inevitably continue.”

Following a two-month media circus at the University of Miami that included strikes, high-profile visits from national politicians and activists, and even a hunger strike, Service Employees International Union (SEIU) officials are now claiming victory.

What’s the victory” Workers will have less freedom to choose whether to unionize, of course!

The union will now be allowed to use its weapon of choice—the notoriously abusive procedure called “card check” to sweep university janitors into union ranks. Under this scheme, rather than allowing employees to choose whether to unionize through the less-abusive election process run by the National Labor Relations Board (NLRB), union officials will now only have to collect the signatures of an agreed-upon number of employees before UNICCO, the employer, will recognize the union.

Having been armed with employee’s home addresses by UNICCO—a standard concession in such card-check arrangements—union organizers know it will be easy to coerce the signing of “authorization cards” from harassed and browbeaten employees.

Under card check, workers frequently report that union organizers lie to them about the cards’ true purpose. Some are told that they are health-insurance enrollment forms, requests for a unionization election, or even tax forms. These lies, along with outright threats, bribes, and stalkings suffered by others have triggered a legal backlash by workers with help from the National Right to Work Foundation.

Even the AFL-CIO knows that signed cards are not a true indicator of an employee’s wishes. In fact, its own handbook for union organizers has noted that workers will often sign such cards just “to get the union off their backs.” And in a legal brief to the NLRB, AFL-CIO lawyers argued that end-running the traditional procedure creates an environment where employees are unfairly susceptible to “group pressure.”

Furthermore, even though union organizers work for months to pressure employees to sign cards, revoking a previously signed card can be next to impossible. In 2000, an NLRB official told an employee who asked how to get back a card he had signed under false pretenses that union officials were not required to return it or rectify union organizers’ misrepresentations.

Not surprisingly, employees themselves oppose the card-check process. In a 2004 Zogby International poll, over three quarters of union members opposed the idea of mandating card check as the only legal unionization method, as Big Labor’s allies in Congress have proposed.

Yet for most union officials, this abusive and unpopular unionization procedure is their preferred method of bolstering their forced-dues revenue streams. In 2004, fully 80 percent of workers were unionized outside the traditional NLRB process. Summing up the SEIU union’s new *modus operandi*, one SEIU local chief recently quipped to the Wall Street Journal that “we don’t do elections”—a statement proved in Miami.

After all, if the employees had actually wanted the representation of union officials, they could have petitioned the NLRB—but they didn’t. So the union brass put on their charade—parading a steady stream of union professionals, Washington-based activists, and Hollywood stars through their makeshift “Freedom Village” to pressure the University to put the screws on UNICCO to grant card check.

The university officials wanted the circus to end before a flood of parents arrived for graduation, so they pressured UNICCO to cave to the union bosses’ demands. In exchange, union officials dropped their PR campaign and trumped-up legal complaints.

This shakedown of employers to agree to card check is the wave of the future because union officials know that workers won’t vote for unions like they used to.

SEIU chief Andrew Stern pulled the SEIU out of the AFL-CIO because he believed that the union conglomerate was not doing enough to pursue these tactics. And even before his “victory” at the University of Miami, dozens of other card-check pushes were targeting workers around the country.

Hopefully, the next time union officials and employee freedoms face off, workers will actually come out on top.

*This article originally appeared in the National Review Online.*

**Seattle, WA (May 4, 2006)** – With free legal assistance from the National Right to Work Foundation, a Safeway employee filed a federal civil rights lawsuit against the United Food and Commercial Workers (UFCW) union for maintaining a discriminatory policy intended to deter workers in King and Kitsat counties from exercising their religious freedoms.

Daniel Gautschi, manager in a Safeway meat department, filed the lawsuit in U.S. District Court for the Western District of Washington after union officials set forth conditions that force him to affiliate with – and pay additional money to – a union he finds morally offensive if he should ever have an employment grievance.

UFCW Local 81 union officials allowed the forwarding of Gautschi’s forced union dues (paid as a condition of employment) to a charity – an accommodation previously won by Foundation attorneys under federal law. However, they continue to maintain an illegal scheme intended to deter employees from exercising their right to assert religious objections in the first place. The scheme forces only employees who file religious objections to pay the union all costs associated with use of grievance procedures under the bargaining agreement – even though union officials tightly control the process and employees are totally barred from filing grievances on their own.

As a devout Christian, Gautschi believes that supporting the UFCW union violates his sincerely held religious beliefs due to the union hierarchy’s support for special rights for homosexuals.

On October 17, 2005, Gautschi filed charges (also with free legal aid from Foundation attorneys) with the Equal Employment Opportunity Commission (EEOC). The EEOC issued a letter to Gautschi dated March 8 advising him he has the right to institute a civil action in federal court under Title VII of the Civil Rights Act.

“Union officials want employees of faith to shut up and pay up,” said Stefan Gleason, vice president of the National Right to Work Foundation. “Employees should not be forced to choose between honoring their faith and exercising their workplace rights.”

Under Title VII, union officials may not force any employee to financially support a union if doing so violates the employee’s sincerely held religious beliefs. To avoid the conflict between an employee’s faith and a requirement to pay fees to a union he or she believes to be immoral, the law requires union officials to attempt to accommodate the employee – most often by designating a mutually acceptable charity to accept the funds.

Gautschi’s lawsuit seeks a permanent injunction barring the UFCW union from discriminating against him on the basis of religion, as well as an order that the union inform all employees under the monopoly bargaining agreement that those with religious objections need not additionally reimburse the union for any costs associated with grievance processing. Union officials demanded and received total monopoly control over the grievance process. Nevertheless, they seek to force religious objectors – but not others covered by the monopoly bargaining agreement – to pay large sums of money to the union if they have a grievance in the workplace.

**Decatur, AL (May 1, 2006)** – With free legal aid from the National Right to Work Legal Defense Foundation, eight Boeing employees have filed federal charges against the International Association of Machinists (IAM) union for illegal retaliatory fines levied against them for honoring their commitments to their employer and refusing to walk off the job during a union-ordered strike.

The employees, led by Larry Bonner, filed the federal unfair labor practice charges at the National Labor Relations Board (NLRB) against IAM union Local Lodge 44. The nonunion workers allege that IAM union officials illegally fined them $4,500 each for continuing to work during a union-mandated strike that lasted from November 2, 2005 to February 1, 2006.

“IAM union officials’ policy of bullying employees who do not toe the union line cannot continue with impunity,” said Stefan Gleason, vice president of the National Right to Work Legal Defense Foundation. “Union officials’ thuggish tactics demonstrate how the union hierarchy‘s interests are at odds with those of the very employees they claim to represent.”

The Boeing employees cannot be lawfully fined because they resigned their union memberships (and thus were no longer subject to internal union rules) before returning to work – their right under the Foundation-supported Patternmakers v. NLRB U.S. Supreme Court decision. In Patternmakers, the High Court ruled workers may resign their full, formal union membership immediately, at any time, and without restrictions.

Once an employee becomes a nonmember, union officials then have no legal basis for enforcing internal union “discipline” against them.

Additionally, IAM union officials’ actions run contrary to Alabama’s highly-popular Right to Work law – on the books since 1953 – which prevents workers from being forced to join or pay dues to an unwanted union as a condition of employment.

The NLRB will now investigate the workers’ charges and decide whether to issue a formal complaint and prosecute the IAM union.

**Charlotte, NC (April 27, 2006)** – The Regional Director for the National Labor Relations Board (NLRB) has filed a formal complaint and agreed to prosecute Freightliner LLC for federal unfair labor practices after an autoworker suffered retaliation for questioning a pattern of special treatment given to United Auto Workers (UAW) union officials by the company.

Kristi Jones, a Freightliner employee at the company’s Gastonia facility, sought free legal assistance from the National Right to Work Foundation to file unfair labor practice charges in early April after she was suspended, demoted, threatened, and stripped of her leadership position.

Company officials retaliated against Jones in response to an email she sent in December 2005 that simply questioned whether a new work rule applied to UAW union officials as well as nonunion workers. The rule specified that workers on the facility floor must wear safety glasses with clear lenses. Jones sought a clarification of how the new rule would be enforced due to an ongoing pattern of special treatment for union officials – including the exemptions of union stewards from ten-minute team “huddle meetings” and from a requirement that workers formally sign in when working overtime.

NLRB prosecutors agreed with Jones’ charges in finding that Freightliner maintained a work environment where even implicit criticism of union officials was met with harsh and unlawful disciplinary action.

Aside from violating the National Labor Relations Act, such actions also run contrary to the spirit of North Carolina’s highly popular Right to Work law – on the books since 1947 – which prohibits forcing workers to join or pay dues to a union as a job condition.

“UAW officials have enlisted Freightliner to do their dirty work by retaliating against employees that refuse to toe the union line,” said Stefan Gleason, National Right to Work Foundation Vice President. “The bullying of employees to support a corrupt union cannot continue unpunished.”

The formal complaint comes on the heels of a class-action federal racketeering lawsuit filed by employees in U.S. District Court in January seeking significant damages after Freightliner, a Daimler/Chrysler subsidiary, and UAW union officials had already been found to be in illegal collusion by NLRB investigators.

Jones and four other autoworkers from three major facilities in North Carolina, including the Gastonia facility, brought the lawsuit against the UAW union and Freightliner, also with free legal aid from Foundation attorneys. That complaint outlines a secret quid pro quo arrangement between Freightliner and the UAW in which union officials agreed in advance to significant concessions at the expense of Freightliner’s workers at its nonunion facilities in the state in exchange for valuable company assistance in organizing those workers.

The NLRB has scheduled a hearing before an administrative law judge on June 5 to prosecute Freightliner and remedy the allegations set forth in the complaint.

**Visalia, CA (April 21, 2006)** – California Agricultural Labor Relations Board (ALRB) prosecutors have issued a formal complaint against the United Farm Workers (UFW) union for misrepresentations, illegal threats, and unlawful dues demands against California Mushroom employees.
The complaint stems from unfair labor practice charges brought by a pair of California Mushroom (formerly PictSweet Mushroom Farms) workers in early March 2004 alleging that UFW union officials unlawfully demanded and/or collected full union dues from their paychecks, and threatened dissenting workers with a loss of health benefits if they refused to sign dues check-off authorization cards.

With free legal assistance from the National Right to Work Foundation, Guillermo Virgen and Gerardo Mendoza filed the class-action charges on behalf of roughly 400 workers employed by California Mushroom. Aside from unlawful dues collections and threats, the union hierarchy also failed to inform thousands of laborers statewide that they have the right to certain procedural protections to assure that their forced union dues do not finance activities unrelated to collective bargaining.

In accordance with the formal complaint received this week, the ALRB is demanding that UFW union officials inform California Mushroom employees of their right to refrain from paying full union dues, to provide the workers with an audit of the union’s books, and to establish and provide procedures by which the employees can challenge the amount of forced dues the union deducts from their paychecks.

“This ruling stalls UFW union officials’ all-out offensive on California agricultural employees’ rights,” said Stefan Gleason, vice president of the National Right to Work Foundation. “The union hierarchy’s repeated refusal to respect the workers’ basic freedoms shows a clear disdain, not only for the employees that they claim to represent, but also for the rule of law.”

The ALRB formal complaint states that UFW union officials intentionally misled workers by claiming all workers in the bargaining unit were required to pay full union dues as a condition of employment. The Board also found that UFW union officials unlawfully failed to inform employees of their rights to object to paying for non-collective bargaining activities, such as politics, and the right to challenge the union’s fee calculations before an impartial decision-maker.

Additionally, union officials demanded that workers sign dues check-off cards authorizing the automatic deduction of full union dues from their paychecks to keep their jobs. UFW officials then threatened workers with firings and loss of benefits if they failed to pay full dues and sign payroll deduction authorization cards. The actions of UFW union officials not only violated the California Agricultural Labor Relations Act, but also unlawfully infringed on constitutional rights recognized in several Foundation-won U.S. Supreme Court decisions.