Blacklisting Rule: Obama Makes First Major Payback to Big Labor

Washington, DC (January 30, 2009) – President Barack Obama issued two decrees today intended to corral millions more American workers into forced unionism while blacklisting non-union employees from working on taxpayer funded projects. “After spending more than a billion dollars in forced union dues to get Obama elected, the union bosses have received their first major payoff – two executive orders intended to grease the rails for coercive union organizing, give the Secretary of Labor the power to blacklist union-targeted employers and employees, and keep workers in the dark about their rights to refrain from union membership,” said Mark Mix, president of the National Right to Work Legal Defense Foundation. “Obama’s two executive orders serve one basic goal: to seize more forced dues revenue to fund Big Labor’s political agenda.”

U.S. Supreme Court Misses Opportunity to Expand Protections for Employees Forced to Pay Union Dues

Washington, DC (January 21, 2009) -- Today, the U.S. Supreme Court ruled that Maine state employees can be compelled under penalty of losing their jobs to pay into an international union’s litigation slush fund – even where all the litigation expenditures are made outside of their own bargaining unit. In doing so, the High Court affirmed a ruling by the U.S. Court of Appeals for the First Circuit affirming a loose standard of protection under the U.S. Constitution for employees forced to pay dues as a condition of employment. “America’s workers were not well served by this ruling. The U.S. Supreme Court missed an obvious opportunity to apply explicitly the same ‘strict scrutiny’ standard that applies under the First Amendment to other content-based government restrictions on free speech,” said Mark Mix, president of the National Right to Work Foundation, which provided free legal aid to the employees asserting their rights.

Worker Advocate: How Dare You Threaten National Right to Work and Its Supporters on National TV, Mr. Gettelfinger!

Washington, DC (December 12, 2008) – Mark Mix, President of the National Right to Work Legal Defense Foundation, made the following statement today in response to United Auto Workers (UAW) union president Ron Gettelfinger's angry lashing out on national television at the legal foundation's efforts to defend workers from forced unionism abuse: "How dare you blame the current debacle in the automotive business on efforts to give workers the right to join or not join a union. These problems have been caused by the forced unionism stranglehold you currently enjoy.

Supreme Court Case May Provide More Employee Protections Against Forced Union Dues

Washington, DC (October 3, 2008) – Mark Mix, President of the National Right to Work Legal Defense Foundation, made the following statement regarding the U.S. Supreme Court case Locke v. Karass scheduled for argument on Monday, October 6. “In previous cases argued by attorneys at the National Right to Work Foundation, the Supreme Court has thus far ruled that union officials may force employees to pay union dues or be fired from their jobs. But they may not legally charge nonmembers for any activities beyond what union bosses can prove is spent on collective bargaining and contract administration. “In their unquenchable thirst for more forced union dues, union bosses have developed a number of creative ways to stick nonmembers with the bill for union activism.