Full Foundation Action March/April 2019 Newsletter Now Online
All articles from the March/April 2019 issue of Foundation Action are now on the website.
In this issue:
- Lawsuits Successfully Challenge Schemes to Block Workers’ Janus Rights
- Housekeeper Challenges Labor Board Double Standard Promoting ‘Card Check’
- SCOTUS Asked to Hear Homecare Providers’ Case Seeking Return of Seized Union Fees
- Foundation Fights to Enforce Janus SCOTUS Victory and Halt Big Labor’s Coercive Tactics
- MA Supreme Court Hears Educators’ Challenge to Teacher Union’s Coercive Power
- Appeals Court Affirms Ruling That Union Bosses Violated Michigan’s Right to Work Law
To view other editions or sign up for a free copy of the newsletter via mail, click here.
Housekeeper Challenges Labor Board Double Standard Promoting ‘Card Check’
The following article is from the National Right to Work Legal Defense Foundation’s bi-monthly Foundation Action Newsletter, March/April 2019 edition. To view other editions or to sign up for a free subscription, click here.
Trump NLRB asked to enforce rule stopping companies from aiding union ‘card check’ drives
President Barack Obama’s NLRB pushed through Big Labor-friendly rules promoting coercive “card check” union organizing drives
Washington, D.C. – After UNITE HERE Local 8 union officials unionized Gladys Bryant’s workplace via a “card check” drive, the Seattle housekeeper couldn’t help but feel that her rights had been violated.
Union bosses had significant help from Bryant’s employer, Embassy Suites, to organize the employees – even a list of workers’ names and contact information. And when Bryant had sought to revoke her card asking for the union’s representation, a union organizer lied to her and her coworkers about the process, blocking Bryant from exercising her rights.
After the tainted “card check” drive resulted in UNITE HERE Local 8’s monopoly bargaining power over her and her colleagues, Bryant decided to challenge the union bosses and her employer over their coercive tactics.
She filed charges with free legal aid from Foundation staff attorneys. A National Labor Relations Board (NLRB) Regional Director dismissed her charges, but a Foundation staff attorney has filed an appeal with the NLRB General Counsel.
Bryant had been working at Embassy Suites in Seattle for a month before the company informed her and her colleagues that UNITE HERE Local 8 union officials would be organizing the workplace.
Union officials began conducting a “card check” drive, a coercive tactic that bypasses a secret ballot election. Embassy Suites actively promoted the drive, giving union organizers special access to the hotel to meet and solicit employees. The hotel even provided union bosses with a list of all employees’ names, jobs, and contact information to assist the union officials in collecting authorization cards from employees.
Although Bryant did at first sign a union authorization card, she and many of her colleagues reconsidered. When Bryant asked a union official how to revoke her card, the union official misled her and other employees that they had to appear in person at the union hall to revoke any previously signed cards.
Bryant made an appointment with the union official in an attempt to comply with the unlawful requirement. However, the union official did not show up. As a result, Bryant and her colleagues were unable to revoke their union authorization cards, which were then counted as “votes” toward unionization.
After Embassy Suites recognized UNITE HERE Local 8’s monopoly bargaining “representation” over employees, Bryant sought free legal aid from Foundation staff attorneys to file charges, arguing that the unionization violated the National Labor Relations Act (NLRA).
Bryant’s charges allege that Embassy Suites provided UNITE HERE’s organizing campaign with more than “ministerial aid.” The NLRB has long held that an employer taints employees’ efforts to remove a union if it gives the employees more than “ministerial aid,” such as providing a list of bargaining unit employees or use of company resources – as Embassy Suites gave union officials.
Foundation staff attorneys argue that the same “ministerial aid” standard must also apply when an employer aids union officials’ efforts to gain monopoly bargaining power over workers.
The Foundation staff attorney representing Bryant asks that the General Counsel issue a complaint on Bryant’s allegations to provide the Board with an opportunity to bring consistency to its “ministerial aid” standard
Bryant’s charges also argue that UNITE HERE violated the NLRA and fatally tainted its proof of employee support by misinforming employees that they could only revoke authorization cards by going in person to the union hall, blocking workers from exercising their rights. NLRB doctrine holds that, to revoke an authorization card, an employee must simply sign a document stating he or she does not support union representation.
Bryant and her coworkers had collected enough signatures for a decertification vote to remove the union. However, in a separate case covered in the January/February 2019 Foundation Action, the NLRB blocked their petition based on the “card check” recognition.
The block was due to Lamons Gasket, a 2011 Obama Board ruling barring decertification for one year after unionization via “card check.” Some Board members have noted in other recent cases that they would be willing to revisit the blocking charge policy in the future. “
“This case proves that not only are union bosses willing to manipulate and ignore the rights of the workers they claim they want to ‘represent,’ their coercion often goes unchecked because of double standards in how the NLRB interprets the law,” said National Right to Work Foundation Vice President Ray LaJeunesse. “What qualifies as ‘ministerial assistance and support’ under the National Labor Relations Act cannot depend on whether the employer is helping outside union organizers impose unionization on workers, or assisting workers in exercising their rights to remove an unwanted union. This case offers the Trump NLRB a chance to stand up for worker freedom and end a double standard that tips the scales in favor of forced unionism.”
Foundation Pushes for Rule Change to Stop Big Labor’s Illegal Medicaid Skim
The following article is from the National Right to Work Legal Defense Foundation’s bi-monthly Foundation Action Newsletter, September/October 2018 edition.
Union bosses have already diverted over $1 billion in Medicaid funds intended for caregivers
Pam Harris, a home health care provider for her son Josh, won the U.S. Supreme Court Harris v. Quinn decision with the help of Foundation staff attorneys. Although the High Court declared it unconstitutional to skim union dues from Medicaid funds, the skim continues.
WASHINGTON, DC – Each year, schemes enacted by ten states allow well over $100 million to be diverted from healthcare providers to union officials. By skimming money from Medicaid programs, union bosses flout federal law and a National Right to Work Foundation-won Supreme Court decision.
A rule proposed by the U.S. Centers for Medicare & Medicaid (CMS) would end the scheme. In August, the Foundation submitted formal comments to CMS supporting the agency’s proposal that would clarify that the diversion of Medicaid payments from providers to third parties, including unions, violates federal law.
In 2014, the Obama Administration promulgated a new regulation to give legal cover to ongoing schemes of the SEIU and other unions that siphoned money from Medicaid funds, violating the federal Medicaid statute that prohibits assigning benefits to third parties. Union officials have to-date skimmed over $1 billion in Medicaid funds intended for caregivers.
The Foundation’s comments call on CMS to halt the skim, urging the agency to repeal the Obama rule and replace it with clear language to give states notice that continuing to divert payments puts their Medicaid funding at risk.
“It is long past time for this outrageous exemption for union officials to be ended,” said Foundation Vice President and Legal Director Ray LaJeunesse. “The CMS should expeditiously issue a final rule to stop the illegal diversion of funds from Medicaid providers. Despite the wishes of the politicians whom they support, union officials are not exempt from federal law. All the current proposed rule change would do is close an illegal loophole the Obama Administration invented.”
Even as union officials circumvent the law through special privileges, the Foundation has fought to restore justice to the thousands of providers affected.
The 2014 Foundation-won Harris v. Quinn Supreme Court decision held that it is unconstitutional for states to force home care providers receiving Medicaid subsidies to pay union fees. The case continues, now designated as Riffey v. Rauner, as Foundation attorneys seek the return of over $30 million in funds seized from 80,000 providers in violation of their First Amendment rights.
Despite the Supreme Court ruling, the skim has not stopped. That is why in 2017 the Foundation sent a letter to the Department of Health and Human Services to bring its attention to the issue. Moreover, Foundation President Mark Mix personally raised the issue with Trump Administration officials at the White House earlier this year.
“Our National Right to Work Foundation-won 2014 Harris decision made it illegal for states to require providers pay fees to union officials, but the current scheme to deduct union fees from Medicaid payments is part of the union bosses’ attempts to undermine that ruling,” said LaJeunesse. “Nothing in the proposed CMS rule would stop providers from making truly voluntary dues payments to union officials by check or credit card each month. The rule would merely stop union bosses from using public payment systems to capture tax dollars intended for providers caring for those in need.”
UConn Professor Refunded Over $5,000 in Union Fees Seized in Violation of his First Amendment Rights
Supreme Court’s Janus decision leads AAUP union officials to quickly settle civil rights lawsuit filed by UConn School of Business accounting professor
Storrs, CT (April 24, 2019) – National Right to Work Legal Defense Foundation staff attorneys have secured a victory for a University of Connecticut School of Business professor who filed a lawsuit in January seeking the return of forced union fees seized from him by union officials in violation of his First Amendment rights.
Under the settlement, the American Association of University Professors union (AAUP) has returned $5,251.48 in unlawfully obtained union fees to accounting professor Steven Utke. Union officials were forced to settle because of the Supreme Court’s decision in Janus v. AFSCME, a 2018 Foundation-won case that found that any mandatory union payments taken from public employees without their consent violate their First Amendment constitutional rights.
Since Utke was hired by the university in 2015, AAUP, which has monopoly bargaining powers over all professors, including those opposed to union representation, deducted fees from Utke’s paycheck. Utke was not a member of the AAUP, and further never consented to have the money deducted from his paycheck.
Eventually Utke, with free legal representation from National Right to Work Foundation staff attorneys, filed a federal lawsuit in the United States District Court for Connecticut on January 14, 2019, on the grounds that AAUP officials had infringed his First Amendment rights. The suit cited the Janus v. AFSCME decision, which declared that forced fees for government employees constitute coerced speech and are thus unconstitutional.
Janus v. AFSCME, which was decided in June of 2018, overturned the wrongly-decided 1977 decision in Abood v. Detroit Board of Education that public-sector workers could be compelled as a condition of employment to pay union fees for bargaining-related purposes. In Janus, the Court ruled that it is unconstitutional to require government workers to pay any union dues or fees as a condition of employment, because bargaining with the government is political. Additionally, the Court clarified that no union dues or fees can be taken from workers without their affirmative consent and knowing waiver of their First Amendment right not to financially support a labor union.
Rather than face Foundation staff attorneys in court, AAUP backed down and settled the case earlier this month. Now, as stipulated by the terms of the settlement, AAUP officials have returned to Utke almost four years of union fees seized in violation of his rights plus interest. They further pledged not to collect any dues or fees from Utke’s future wages unless he affirmatively chooses to become a member of AAUP and authorizes such deductions.
“Steven Utke joins the growing ranks of workers across the country who, citing the Janus precedent, are receiving refunds for the forced union fees seized from them by greedy union officials in violation of the First Amendment,” commented National Right to Work Foundation President Mark Mix. “Unfortunately, tens of thousands of other public employees are still waiting for the refunds they should get, with Foundation staff attorneys continuing to litigate numerous such cases.”
Foundation staff attorneys secured the first-in-the-nation refund of forced union dues after Janus for Oregon Department of Fish and Wildlife employee Debora Nearman, and subsequently have won similar refunds for public employees elsewhere.
The Foundation has created a special website, MyJanusRights.org, to assist public employees in exercising their rights under Janus, which was successfully argued by National Right to Work Foundation staff attorney William Messenger.
National Right to Work Foundation Offers Free Legal Aid to VW Chattanooga Workers Targeted for Unionization by UAW Officials
Scandal-ridden Detroit-based union was rejected by workers in 2014 vote
Chattanooga, Tenn. (April 15, 2019) – The National Right to Work Legal Defense Foundation, a nonprofit organization dedicated to helping workers protect their rights against compulsory union abuses, is offering free legal aid to employees at Volkswagen’s Chattanooga, Tennessee plant. The offer comes as United Auto Workers (UAW) union officials once again attempt to force workers at the plant into the union’s monopoly bargaining ranks.
UAW organizers attempted to unionize the facility’s workers five years ago, even demanding that the company install the union through a coercive union card check. However, when the VW workers eventually held a secret ballot vote they rejected UAW representation 712-626. Foundation staff attorneys provided free legal aid to VW workers both before and after the 2014 vote, including in defending the result of the vote after UAW lawyers moved to overturn the union’s defeat at the National Labor Relations Board.
Foundation staff attorneys also assisted VW workers in filing charges, citing improprieties in the UAW’s card check campaign in Chattanooga, which included union attempts to get workers to sign union authorization cards through coercion and misrepresentation and the UAW’s use of cards signed too long ago to be legally valid.
To guard against similar improprieties surrounding the proposed election now sought by union organizers, the Foundation is once again offering free legal aid to VW Chattanooga team members. Additionally, Foundation staff attorneys have created a special legal notice to the workers explaining their legal rights. That notice can be found on the Foundation’s website here.
Regarding UAW officials’ renewed push for union monopoly bargaining powers over the Volkswagen Chattanooga employees, National Right to Work Foundation President Mark Mix offered the following comments:
“UAW boss demands that both Volkswagen and the community be silent suggests they are scared that if workers get all the facts the workers will want nothing to do with this scandal-ridden union. Just days ago a federal judge labeled the UAW a ‘co-conspirator’ in a corruption and embezzlement scandal that has already resulted in numerous UAW officials being sent to prison for their role in illegally stealing workers’ training funds. The UAW’s desire to hold this vote as quickly as possible is apparently an attempt to make workers vote without the full facts and before the next embarrassing development in the union’s ever-expanding corruption scandal.”
Stop & Shop Employee Hits UFCW Union with Federal Charges for Illegal Threats, Slurs During Union-Ordered Strike
UFCW boss misinformed worker about his rights by claiming union membership was mandatory. Others retaliated with slurs and threats when worker defied strike
Quincy, MA (April 18, 2019) – A Massachusetts Stop & Shop employee filed federal unfair labor practice charges against United Food and Commercial Workers (UFCW) Local 1459 alleging that a top union official blatantly misinformed him by telling him that he could not resign his union membership and return to work during a union-ordered strike or he would be fired. The charge was filed with free legal aid from National Right to Work Legal Defense Foundation staff attorneys.
The charging employee has worked at Stop & Shop Supermarket Company since 2017. When he started the job, he became a member of UFCW Local 1459 as union officials led him to believe that union membership was a condition of employment.
Earlier in April, UFCW union officials ordered over 30,000 Shop & Stop grocery employees on strike in Massachusetts, Connecticut, and Rhode Island. The charging employee asked UFCW Local 1459 about his rights to continue working despite the union-ordered strike. In response, a top union official told him in writing that Stop & Shop is a “closed shop” and that he would lose his job if he resigned union membership and returned to work.
That threat contradicts federal law, which protects a worker’s right to resign his or her union membership at any time. Resignation protects a worker who wants to return to work despite a union strike. As a nonmember, he or she cannot legally be subjected to punitive union strike fines.
Additionally, when there is no union monopoly bargaining agreement in effect, as is the case for workplaces impacted by the UFCW’s strike against Stop & Shop, workers who resign from the union can immediately revoke any authorization for payment of union dues.
After being misled, the charging employee learned his rights and decided to return to work. His charges allege that since his return, he has been subjected to slurs based on sexual orientation, threats of violence, and other similar harassment by, or instigated by, UFCW Local 1459 union officials.
To combat the threats and violations of his rights, he sought free legal aid from Foundation staff attorneys. His charges state that the UFCW Local 1459 union official’s claim that he would be fired if he resigned union membership to return to work was “a blatant falsehood and misrepresentation of the law,” because employees have the right at any time to revoke their union memberships and resume work during a strike to support themselves and their families.
Moreover, under federal law unions must give workers clear notice of their right to refrain from union membership and pay reduced nonmember forced fees. The employee’s charges allege that union officials have never given him such notice. His charges also state that the union officials’ harassment in retaliation for his choice to return to work violates the union’s duty of fair representation.
“This worker is refusing to let union bosses bully him into submission through outright lies and threats simply because he has decided that continuing to work is in his best interest,” said Mark Mix, president of the National Right to Work Foundation. “As is unfortunately common when union bosses instigate a work stoppage, union officials are again violating the rights of the workers they claim to ‘represent.’”
“Foundation staff attorneys stand ready to assist other workers who run into union misinformation and threats when they choose to exercise their right to return to work,” added Mix.
The National Right to Work Foundation released a special legal notice informing Stop & Shop employees of their rights during the union-ordered strike. The notice can be found at: https://www.nrtw.org/special-notice-for-new-england-based-employees-of-shop-stop/.
Final Brief Filed Asking Supreme Court to Hear Case Challenging Forced Union Affiliation as First Amendment Violation
Minnesota home-based personal care providers argue being forced under SEIU union monopoly ‘representation’ violates their freedom to associate
Washington, D.C. (April 17, 2019) – Today, National Right to Work Legal Defense Foundation staff attorneys filed the final brief in Bierman v. Walz asking the Supreme Court to hear a group of Minnesota home care providers’ challenge to forced union affiliation.
The home care providers are challenging a Minnesota state law used to force tens of thousands of home care providers under union monopoly “representation.” The providers, who work at home caring for disabled family members as part of a state-run Medicaid program, oppose union affiliation.
The case’s lead plaintiff, Teri Bierman, filed the suit with seven other home care providers to challenge a 2013 Minnesota state law used by the Service Employees International Union (SEIU) Healthcare Minnesota to force home care providers to associate with it as a condition of providing care under the state Medicaid program. Bierman v. Walz asks the Supreme Court to declare unconstitutional under the First Amendment’s free association guarantee the unions’ monopoly bargaining privileges, by which a union forces its representation on individuals receiving state funds who do not consent to the representation.
Mark Mix, president of the National Right to Work Foundation, issued the following statement about the case:
“These home care providers are bravely challenging an unconstitutional scheme that compels them to associate with a union to receive state funds to care for their own children in their own homes. We hope the Supreme Court takes this opportunity to apply the First Amendment’s protection of freedom of association to Big Labor’s unparalleled monopoly bargaining ‘representation’ privileges that force individuals to submit to union bosses’ control.”
Background Information
Teri Bierman and the other home care providers provide critical care to their family members who receive state assistance to help pay for their care. Bierman provides care at home for her daughter, who suffers from cerebral palsy and requires care throughout the day. The other plaintiffs in the case care for children diagnosed with severe autism, epilepsy, Rubenstein-Taybi syndrome, or other significant disabilities. Like the other plaintiffs, Bierman receives aid from a Minnesota Medicaid program (which provides funds to families to care for disabled relatives).
By asking the Court to declare monopoly bargaining a violation of the First Amendment, Foundation staff attorneys seek to build off two recent Foundation-won Supreme Court decisions. In the 2014 Harris v. Quinn decision, the Court applied exacting First Amendment scrutiny to rule that providers like the Bierman plaintiffs cannot be required to pay union fees.
Next, in the June 2018 Janus v. AFSCME decision, the Court declared that forced union fees for all public sector employees violate the First Amendment and opened the door to further cases seeking to uphold workers’ rights to freedom of speech and freedom of association. In his opinion for the majority, Justice Samuel Alito wrote for the Court that “designating a union as the employees’ exclusive representative substantially restricts the rights of individual employees.”
Both Harris and Janus were argued by National Right to Work Foundation staff attorney William Messenger, who is also the lead attorney in Bierman v. Walz. Bierman now asks the Supreme Court, for the first time, to apply the same First Amendment standard to forced association as it has already applied to forced subsidies of union speech.
Lawsuits Successfully Challenge Schemes to Block Workers’ Janus Rights
The following article is from the National Right to Work Legal Defense Foundation’s bi-monthly Foundation Action Newsletter, March/April 2019 edition. To view other editions or to sign up for a free subscription, click here.
Workers win first two settlements to end unconstitutional forced union dues seizures
Police clerk Sandra Anderson won a settlement against IBEW with help from Foundation staff attorneys, successfully challenging union bosses’ scheme to trap her into subsidizing a union.
BRAINERD, MN – The fight for public sector workers’ First Amendment rights took a huge step forward in the Foundation-won U.S. Supreme Court Janus v. AFSCME decision. However, across the country union bosses are attempting to limit when workers can exercise their First Amendment rights under Janus, to stop dues seizures through so-called “window period” policies.
In response, Foundation staff attorneys have filed many lawsuits for public employees challenging such schemes, which claim workers can be restricted from exercising their First Amendment rights under Janus outside brief union-created window periods. Such policies trap workers in forced dues against their will, which puts them at odds with the Janus ruling that any dues taken without workers’ consent violates their constitutional rights.
Two of those important lawsuits have ended in victories halting unions’ “window period” policies.
In 2004, when the City of Brainerd Police Department entered into a monopoly bargaining contract with International Brotherhood of Electrical Workers (IBEW) Local 31, clerk Sandra Anderson was told she must either join the union and pay dues or pay compulsory union fees as a non-member. Faced with being forced to fund the union either way, Anderson joined the union, signing a form authorizing the deduction of union dues from her paycheck.
Then, Anderson heard about the Janus ruling, argued and won by Foundation staff attorneys at the Supreme Court. Soon after, Anderson emailed an IBEW official and Brainerd representatives demanding that both parties stop collecting dues from her wages in accordance with Janus. However, IBEW officials claimed that Anderson could only stop dues payments during either a 10-day window prior to the expiration of the monopoly bargaining contract, or a 10-day window prior to the anniversary date of her dues deduction authorization.
Anderson came to the Foundation for help in filing a lawsuit challenging the “window period” policy as unconstitutional, because the policy limits when she can exercise her First Amendment rights under Janus, and allows IBEW Local 31 union officials to collect union dues without her affirmative consent.
In December 2018, IBEW union officials decided they wanted the case to go away, so they settled. Under the settlement, IBEW has refunded to Anderson all union dues they unconstitutionally collected from her after she notified the City of Brainerd and IBEW Local 31 that she no longer consented to financially supporting the union. IBEW officials have also acknowledged Anderson’s request to withdraw her union membership, and will not seek or accept union dues from her again unless she affirmatively chooses to become a union member.
Shortly after Anderson’s victory, a group of Ohio public sector employees freed themselves and thousands of their colleagues from another “window period” scheme that violated their rights.
Seven Buckeye State civil servants attempted to resign their union membership in American Federation of State, County and Municipal Employees (AFSCME) Ohio Council 8 and stop paying union dues after the Janus decision. However, AFSCME officials continued to deduct dues, citing a union policy restricting revocation of dues deduction to a narrow 15-day window prior to the expiration of a monopoly bargaining contract once every three years
The workers came to Foundation staff attorneys to file a class action lawsuit challenging the “window period” scheme. Rather than face Foundation attorneys in court, AFSCME Council 8 union officials settled the lawsuit.
Under the settlement agreement, AFSCME Council 8 stopped enforcing the existing policy restricting workers under their “representation” – as many as 30,000 individuals – from exercising their Janus rights. Additionally, union officials refunded to the plaintiffs all union dues they unconstitutionally collected after the plaintiffs notified union officials that they no longer consented to financially supporting the union.
Union officials were also required to identify any other workers whose rights were blocked by the scheme, honor their requests to resign and stop paying union dues, and refund the dues seized from them under the scheme.
“These seven workers bravely challenged the union bosses’ ‘window period’ scheme, and protected not only their rights but also the rights of tens of thousands of their colleagues,” said National Right to Work Foundation President Mark Mix. “Our first-in-the-nation victories enforcing workers’ rights under Janus should be precursors of many cases that result in union bosses dropping their illegal restrictions on workers seeking to exercise their rights secured in the Foundation’s JanusSupreme Court victory.”
