New Right to Work Podcast: Foundation Files Federal Lawsuit After Big Labor Forcibly Unionizes Michigan Homecare Workers
Right to Work President Mark Mix joined Detroit-based radio host Frank Beckmann to discuss Big Labor’s efforts to forcibly unionize homecare workers in Michigan. Click here to download the MP3 or use the embedded player below:
You can also listen to the Foundation’s podcast via iTunes or manually subscribe to the feed.
Right to Work on Fox Business: Why Rank-and-File Union Members Don’t Vote the Way Union Bosses Tell Them To
In the wake of the Massachusetts Senate election, National Right to Work President Mark Mix explained why rank-and-file union voters aren’t willing to go along with union bosses’ hand-picked candidates:
Michigan Home-Care Providers File Class-Action Suit Challenging Union Boss/Granholm Unionization Scheme
Michigan Home-Care Providers File Class-Action Suit Challenging Union Boss/Granholm Unionization Scheme
Right to Work Foundation attorneys challenge Governor and union boss collusion to force home-care providers under union control
Lansing, MI (February 17, 2010) – With free legal aid from National Right to Work Legal Defense Foundation attorneys, a group of Michigan home-based day-care providers have filed a class-action federal lawsuit against government union officials and Governor Granholm’s Administration for illegally forcing them to pay union dues.
Carrie Schlaud and Diana Orr of Lapeer County, Edward and Nora Gross of Ingham County, and Peggy Mashke of Ogemaw County — with assistance from the National Right to Work Foundation — filed the federal suit today on behalf of all of Michigan’s 40,000 home-care providers.
The suit challenges a scheme created by Granholm, Michigan Department of Human Services (DHS) officials, and a union front group called “Child Care Providers Together Michigan” (CCPTM) to designate home-care providers who accept state assistance as “state employees” and foist CCPTM union political “representation” on them. CCPTM is an operation run by the United Autoworker (UAW) and American Federation of State, County, and Municipal Employees (AFSME) unions.
Under Granholm’s direction, DHS officials created the “Michigan Home Based Child Care Council” to provide the union bosses with an entity to deal with as the “management” of the home child-care providers. Even though only 15 percent of the 40,000 day-care providers voted in the union certification election, the CCPTM union hierarchy was granted monopoly bargaining privileges and political representation of all the home-care providers.
Michigan Home-Care Providers File Class-Action Suit Challenging Union Boss/Granholm Unionization Scheme
Lansing, MI (February 17, 2010) – With free legal aid from National Right to Work Legal Defense Foundation attorneys, a group of Michigan home-based day-care providers have filed a class-action federal lawsuit against government union officials and Governor Granholm’s Administration for illegally forcing them to pay union dues.
Carrie Schlaud and Diana Orr of Lapeer County, Edward and Nora Gross of Ingham County, and Peggy Mashke of Ogemaw County — with assistance from the National Right to Work Foundation — filed the federal suit today on behalf of all of Michigan’s 40,000 home-care providers.
The suit challenges a scheme created by Granholm, Michigan Department of Human Services (DHS) officials, and a union front group called “Child Care Providers Together Michigan” (CCPTM) to designate home-care providers who accept state assistance as “state employees” and foist CCPTM union political “representation” on them. CCPTM is an operation run by the United Autoworker (UAW) and American Federation of State, County, and Municipal Employees (AFSCME) unions.
Under Granholm’s direction, DHS officials created the “Michigan Home Based Child Care Council” to provide the union bosses with an entity to deal with as the “management” of the home child-care providers. Even though only 15 percent of the 40,000 day-care providers voted in the union certification election, the CCPTM union hierarchy was granted monopoly bargaining privileges and political representation of all the home-care providers.
The DHS now siphons union dues from the providers’ paychecks and forwards the money into the union bosses’ bank accounts. Recent media reports suggest that in exchange for their special government-granted privileges to force Michigan’s home-care providers under union monopoly control, the union bosses benefiting from this scheme contribute to various pro-compulsory unionism politicians in Michigan, including Governor Granholm.
The class-action suit challenges the forced-unionism scheme on the grounds that it violates the U.S. Constitution’s guarantees of free political expression and association.
“This scheme is nothing more than pure political payback; union bosses funnel millions of dollars to the campaigns of pro-forced unionism politicians, and the same politicians are forcing home-care providers to pay tens of millions of dollars into union boss coffers,” said Patrick Semmens, Legal Information Director of the National Right to Work Foundation.
The federal lawsuit was filed in the United States District Court for the Western District of Michigan, Southern Division.
Federal Labor Official to Prosecute Scheme to Force Nurses under Union Boss Control
Washington, DC (February 16, 2010) – After a protracted legal battle, the National Labor Relations Board (NLRB) General Counsel has sustained part of an appeal filed by National Right to Work Foundation attorneys challenging a backroom unionization deal between Tenet Healthcare Corporation and the California Nurses Association (CNA) union.
As part of their efforts to forcibly unionize hospital employees across the country, CNA officials and Tenet Corporation agreed to a series of measures designed to impose union monopoly bargaining on unwilling nurses. This so-called Election Procedures Agreement (EPA) gave union organizers preferential access to Tenet facilities and gagged nurses who opposed unionization.
The agreement between Tenet and the CNA also subverted the NLRB’s oversight role during workplace elections. Under the CNA union’s scheme, the NLRB’s only role is to count ballots and rubber-stamp the union’s monopoly bargaining privileges, effectively gutting the already limited rights of employees who wish to resist unionization.
With free legal assistance from the National Right to Work Foundation, nurses in Houston and Philadelphia have repeatedly challenged the legality of this arrangement. In earlier proceedings, Tenet was forced to give nurses who opposed forced unionism equal access to hospital facilities.
A recent appeal filed by Foundation attorneys challenging the EPA was partly sustained by the NLRB’s General Counsel. The General Counsel agreed with Foundation attorneys that a provision of the EPA committing Tenet to binding arbitration if union officials and the company are unable to agree on a first contract constitutes illegal pre-recognition bargaining between the union and the company, allowing union officials to negotiate substantive terms of employment for workers they don’t even represent. The legality of this provision will now be litigated before an administrative law judge and ultimately the federal courts.
“CNA bosses shouldn’t be empowered to negotiate on behalf of workers they don’t even represent,” said Patrick Semmens, legal information director of the National Right to Work Foundation. “Tenet Corporation and CNA operatives have stacked the deck in favor of union organizers, stifling independent-minded employees in an attempt to push Houston and Philadelphia nurses under union boss control, like it or not.”
By Hook or By Crook, Big Labor Wants Card Check
It appears Big Labor will stop at nothing to impose card check forced unionism on American workers and job-providers. Public opposition from energized Right to Work supporters and other concerned Americans to the draconian card check bill — which eliminates the secret ballot in workplace unionization drives, opens up workers to intimidating “home visits,” and allows government bureaucrats to impose contracts on workers — has thus far stalled the legislation in the Senate.
On Tuesday, in what may have been a test vote on card check, the Senate rejected an attempt to move President Obama’s nomination of radical union lawyer Craig Becker to a seat on the National Labor Relations Board (NLRB), the quasi-judicial agency that administers federal labor law. Becker’s writings indicated a willingness to impose the card check forced unionism mechanism through NLRB rules, without even a Congressional vote.
But despite this setback union officials aren’t giving up on card check, and neither are the forced unionism proponents in the Obama Administration. The Daily Caller reports that White House staffers are considering a new executive order that could effectively require all federal contractors to submit their workers to coercive card check campaigns:
Critics say the proposals would heavily favor unionized companies and significantly increase the cost and amount of time needed to award contracts. Estimates have the potential cost increase at 20 percent, adding about $100 billion a year to the federal budget.
“Making contracting decisions based on political or ideological litmus tests will waste taxpayer dollars and limit economic growth at a time when we can least afford to do so. The administration’s new rules amount to a backdoor attempt at card check. The last thing our small businesses need is to be saddled with new rules that effectively say ‘unionize or die,’” said John Hart, communications director for Senator Tom Coburn, Oklahoma Republican. Coburn and four other Senate Republicans sent a letter to Office of Management and Budget Director Peter Orszag last week asking for a briefing on the proposals; they have yet to receive a response.
…
Now the administration is facing increasing pressure to go around Congress and implement pro-labor policies via executive order. The Service Employees International Union, one of the groups lobbying the White House to adopt the new labor policies, did not respond to multiple requests for comment.
No surprises here: SEIU czar Andy Stern was the most frequest visitor to the White House in Obama’s first year.
Workers Prevail in Battle for Secret Ballot Vote After Corrupt Card Check Unionization Scheme
Workers Prevail in Battle for Secret Ballot Vote After Corrupt Card Check Unionization Scheme
Communications union bosses collude with AT&T to lock local group into union ranks without majority support
Seattle, WA (February 11, 2010) – A group of AT&T Mobility employees have won a legal victory countering union officials’ domination of their workplace using a coercive card check unionization campaign that occurred after union organizers colluded with AT&T officials to sweep the workers into union ranks in exchange for contract concessions.
Per a so-called “neutrality agreement” between the Communications Workers of America (CWA) union hierarchy and AT&T, workers in a 140-employee bargaining unit (which consists of various locations across the state of Washington) were “card checked” into the CWA union’s regional monopoly bargaining unit which consists of thousands of employees.
In exchange for AT&T foisting CWA monopoly bargaining on workers through a card check organizing drive, union officials agreed to subject employees to a contract which results in lost benefits for the workers, including promotion opportunities. Moreover, the employees’ inclusion in the larger regional unit would make it virtually impossible for them to later organize to remove the union officials’ monopoly bargaining privileges.
However, using precedent won by Right to Work Foundation attorneys in the National Labor Relations Board’s (NLRB) landmark 2007 decision in Dana Corporation, Joseph Simpson of Redmond and his colleagues filed a decertification petition demanding a secret ballot election to remove the unwanted union from their workplace.
Workers Prevail in Battle for Secret Ballot Vote After Corrupt Card Check Unionization Scheme
Seattle, WA (February 11, 2010) – A group of AT&T Mobility employees have won a legal victory countering union officials’ domination of their workplace using a coercive card check unionization campaign that occurred after union organizers colluded with AT&T officials to sweep the workers into union ranks in exchange for contract concessions.
Per a so-called “neutrality agreement” between the Communications Workers of America (CWA) union hierarchy and AT&T, workers in a 140-employee bargaining unit (which consists of various locations across the state of Washington) were “card checked” into the CWA union’s regional monopoly bargaining unit which consists of thousands of employees.
In exchange for AT&T foisting CWA monopoly bargaining on workers through a card check organizing drive, union officials agreed to subject employees to a contract which results in lost benefits for the workers, including promotion opportunities. Moreover, the employees’ inclusion in the larger regional unit would make it virtually impossible for them to later organize to remove the union officials’ monopoly bargaining privileges.
However, using precedent won by Right to Work Foundation attorneys in the National Labor Relations Board’s (NLRB) landmark 2007 decision in Dana Corporation, Joseph Simpson of Redmond and his colleagues filed a decertification petition demanding a secret ballot election to remove the unwanted union from their workplace.
In Dana, the NLRB, citing the coercive nature of card check organizing, recognized that employees should be able to file a decertification petition and demand a secret ballot election to toss out union officials from their workplace within 45 days after notice that a union has obtained monopoly bargaining powers through card check.
CWA union brass contested the employees’ request for a secret ballot election because it was not made within the 45-day window period. However, the NLRB regional director in Seattle investigating the matter confirmed employees had not been told of their right to request the election as Dana requires, because the notice was not posted at the facility where a majority of employees worked. Apparently the notice about their Dana rights was “taken down” at some point. The first time employees heard about their right to an election was when one of them contacted the Foundation. The regional director decided that the employees’ petition was therefore valid.
CWA union lawyers are now attempting to tie up the NLRB decision in an attempt to avoid an election at all costs and are appealing the regional office’s decision to the national board in Washington, DC – joining union lawyers in a handful of other high-profile cases asking the NLRB to undo workers’ Dana protections.
“Dana provides these employees with a last line of defense against a union boss-nurtured scheme concocted to force them under union control,” said Patrick Semmens, Legal Information Director of the National Right to Work Foundation. “While it is certainly important that these employees will now be able to challenge the unreliable card check unionization scheme with a secret ballot election, the fact is that employees should never be forced into union ranks to begin with.”
January/February Foundation Action Newsletter Available Online
The January/February 2010 issue of Foundation Action is now available for download as a PDF. This is the Foundation’s official bimonthly publication that provides an excellent overview of hard-hitting legal actions being taken by Foundation attorneys every day to combat forced unionism.
In this issue:
- Right to Work Sues Obama Administration, Demands Info on Big Labor Ties
- Big Labor Moves to Roll Back Sweeping Foundation Precedent
- Right to Work Combats Sneak Attack on Railway/Airline Workers
- Supreme Court Asked to Halt UAW Religious Discrimination
- Grocery Clerks Fight to Free Themselves From Union Ranks
In addition to to reading Foundation Action online, you can sign up to receive a free subscription by mail here.
Big Government: Big Labor’s “Bread and Butter”
The National Institute for Labor Relations Research (NILRR) just released a new study detailing the disturbing trend of the forced unionization of government workers. In it, NILRR points out that in 2008 and the first 11 months of 2009, unionized private-sector workers lost their jobs at more than double the rate than their private-sector non-unionized colleagues.
Meanwhile, for the first time ever, more than half of our nation’s government workers are now under union boss monopoly bargaining control and the number is growing with disastrous consequences:
While today 51% of unionized workers nationwide are government employees, as recently as 1981 there were more than twice as many unionized private-sector workers as their were unionized public-sector workers. The ever-increasing concentration of Big Labor’s power and influence in government employment will greatly exacerbate the harmful tendency of public employment to grow faster than private employment over time.
Not only that, but Congress is considering passing legislation that would help union bosses corral more city and local government emergency responders into union ranks — legislation that local government officials are warning will make their already-severe budgetary woes even worse.
Combined with NILRR’s recent analysis that taxpayers are fleeing forced unionism states, it’s easy to see their conclusion: Unless states take action to cut back Big Labor’s numerous government-granted special privileges, fewer and fewer American private-sector workers and their employers are facing a greater tax burden to sustain an ever-growing government — especially in forced unionism states.
Read NILRR’s report here.
And for more on the history of Big Labor’s campaign to acquire incredible power over local, state, and national government, order your free copy of Stranglehold: How union bosses have hijacked our government today.
