Obama’s Labor Pains

On July 5, 2011, By NRTW Committee Staff

Despite efforts to help unionize Delta employees by the Obama Administration and their cronies, Delta employees continue to refuse to give up their freedom and a portion of their salaries to the union bosses.

Fortune magazine’s Nina Easton looks at the effort to assist the unionizing campaign — including efforts to stack the deck in favor of the union bosses — and sees that Administration’s priorities are way off.  As Easton writes:

Earlier this month AFL-CIO President Richard Trumka President warned Democratic politicians that they had better deliver for organized labor if they want financial help in the 2012 elections. “For too long, we have been left after Election Day holding a canceled check waving it about — ‘Remember us? Remember us? Remember us?’…Well, I don’t know about you, but I’ve had a snootful of that shit,” Trumka declared. “If [political] leaders are not blocking the wrecking ball and advancing the interests of working families across the country, working people will not support them.”

It’s pretty obvious that’s the message the White House and its allies are hearing. But with the economy stuck in mud, it would make more sense to listen to these telling comments from Delta’s Anderson: “Attacking American businesses directly undermines the administration’s stated goal of encouraging job creation and economic growth. Delta has created new jobs, but unfortunately this environment makes it difficult to predict what we will be able to do going forward.”

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Posted in: Forced Dues, Forced-Dues for Politics, Government Grants to Unions, Intimidation Tactics, Monopoly Bargaining, National Mediation Board (NMB), Obama Administration
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Fred Barnes “Is there anything Obama won’t do for unions?”

On June 26, 2011, By NRTW Committee Staff

 

Former murdered Mineworkers International presidential candidate “Jock” Yoblonski’s campaign manager and Weekly Standard Executive Editor Fred Barnes reminds us that Obama has created more Big Labor Boss paybacks than just the NLRB v. Boeing case.

Besides the Obama National Labor Relations Board’s assault on Boeing’s South Carolina employees and workers in Right To Work states in general, Barnes mentions the recent new regulations proposed by DOL to hamper employees getting to hear both sides of the story during union organizing campaigns.

But, the main focus of the article is the Obama Administration’s repeated attempts to overturn multiple defeats of unions to organize DELTA airlines. If you want to get more outraged at the Obama administration for its continuous assaults on free enterprise and individual employee choices, then read Barnes’ America’s Labor Party, Is there anything Obama won’t do for unions? Here are a few quotes to whet your appetite:

How far will President Obama go to advance the interests of organized labor? Awfully far. We know this not only from the effort to keep Boeing from building a plane in a right-to-work state, South Carolina, but also from the way Delta Airlines is being railroaded into recognizing unions its employees have repeatedly rejected. (more…)

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Posted in: Bailouts to Unions, Big Labor Payback, DOL, Government Grants to Unions, Intimidation Tactics, National Mediation Board (NMB), NLRB, Obama Administration, Organizing, Political Activity, Right to Work, Right To Work States, State Right To Work
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Big Labor Organizing Amendment Fails in House

On April 9, 2011, By NRTW Committee Staff

 

Despite a veto threat from President Obama, the House of Representatives rejected a Obama-backed, pro-big labor amendmentto the FAA Reauthorization bill. In July 2010, the National Mediation Board — without the consent of Congress — decided that unions could organize airline and railroad workers if a majority of voting workers supported unionization, rather than a majority of all workers in the proposed bargaining unit — as had long been the case. This means that unions can be certified as the sole bargaining agents under the Railway Labor Act with support from a minority of workers.

For example, if a company has 100 workers but only 80 turn out to vote in the election, it would only take 41 pro-union votes for the union to organize the company’s workers. The amendment passed in the House would overturn the Mediation Board’s appeasement of the union bosses.

 Sixteen Republicans voted with Big Labor. The bill now goes to the Senate.

  • Rep. Diaz-Balart (FL)
  • Rep. Emerson (MO)
  • Rep. Gibson (NY)
  • Rep. Grimm (NY)
  • Rep. Johnson (IL)
  • Rep. Jones (NC)
  • Rep. King (NY)
  • Rep. LaTourette (OH)
  • Rep. LoBiondo (NJ)
  • Rep. Platts (PA)
  • Rep. Reichert (WA)
  • Rep. Rivera (FL)
  • Rep. Ros-Lehtinen (FL)
  • Rep. Runyan (NJ)
  • Rep. Smith (NJ)
  • Rep. Young (AK)
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Posted in: Big Labor Payback, Economic Impact of Unionization, Economics, Forced Dues, Forced-Dues for Politics, Government Grants to Unions, Legislation, National Mediation Board (NMB), Organizing, Union Work Rules
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The Question

On April 5, 2011, By NRTW Committee Staff

It’s the question that the union bosses don’t want you to ask: Are Workers Choosing Unions, or Are Unions Choosing Them? Rep. Phil Gingrey (R-GA) is asking the question:

What if we lived in a country where private employees were forced to unionize, even if most hadn’t agreed to? Spoiler alert: We do — thanks to the recent decision of an unelected three-person panel.

This new reality came about in 2010, when a voting rule enacted through the Railway Labor Act was stripped away by the National Mediation Board (NMB). This resulted in the potential for groups of railroad and airline workers to be unionized without the majority of them being in favor of it. Now, only a majority of those who choose to vote, as opposed to a majority of the total, are needed to unionize. To allow the fate of the majority of workers to be decided by only a small handful is not only undemocratic — it fails to protect private-industry workers at a time when they need it the most.

Not only does this new rule disregard a fair and democratic precedent that’s been maintained in the industry for 75 years, it does so in the face of an American public fed up with regulatory agencies’ infringing upon private industry. In a time when our country is clearly calling for less intrusion on free enterprise in order to stimulate our weak economy and create more jobs, why should union bosses be allowed to unfairly take control of more industries for their own political incentives?

What’s more appalling is the argument that reinstating the 75-year-old democratic rule somehow hinders union organization. To the contrary, union representation has been the result in more than two-thirds of the 1,850 elections reported since 1935. An average of 72 percent of employees in these industries are represented by unions.

This week, my colleagues in the U.S. House of Representatives will vote on the FAA Reauthorization and Reform Act of 2011. This bill includes a provision to reverse this NMB decision. It would restore fairness and integrity to the choice to unionize.

As Americans continue to call for a stronger economy, less spending, and more jobs, we cannot stand idly by and let union leaders push fairness and democracy aside. With the House voting on the FAA Reauthorization Bill this week, we have a chance to make our country a place where people choose unions again — instead of unions choosing them.

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Posted in: Legislation, Monopoly Bargaining, National Mediation Board (NMB)
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White House Carries More Water for Big Labor

On April 2, 2011, By NRTW Committee Staff

The President has issued a veto threat on the Federal Aviation Administration (FAA) Reauthorization bill because of an effort to restore 75 years of labor law that was overturned by the National Mediation Board. The Board overturned precedent by issuing a new rule that allowed a simple majority of votes cast to determine unionization in those industries, reversing a rule that stood for 75 years that had required the support of a majority of all workers. Congress is looking to restore balance to the law but balance in labor law is not the goal of the Obama Administration.

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Posted in: Economics, Forced Dues, Government Grants to Unions, National Mediation Board (NMB)
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Congress can and Should protect workers from Obama’s National Mediation Board

On March 30, 2011, By NRTW Committee Staff

The Daily Caller notes that Congress will be asked to protect workers from the National Mediation Board which decided that labor bosses now have the ability to forcibly unionize workers in the airlines and railroad industries:

And with labor bosses struggling to secure new members and private-sector union membership at an anemic 6.9 percent, Big Labor has been keenly searching for new avenues to increase its revenue and power. New members mean more union dues, and bosses are hungrier for those dues now than ever before as they struggle with their own budget issues, including massive pension liabilities that they currently cannot finance.

After pouring millions of dollars of forced union dues into campaigns to elect the current administration and countless representatives and senators that their membership may not even support, Big Labor bosses now find themselves strapped for the cash they need to fund their political activities and promised worker benefits. As a result, they will do and say anything to gain new members, even if that means pressuring relatively unknown government agencies like the NMB to do their bidding.

As workers around the country express their discontent with Big Labor’s agenda, instead of listening, big union bosses are using regulations to force airline and railroad employees into unions. And all of this is executed by a purported “independent” government agency funded by your tax dollars.

The NMB’s decision to overturn a rule that has been in place since Franklin Roosevelt was president for the sole benefit of Big Labor bosses and their political allies is abhorrent. Congress has the opportunity with the FAA reauthorization bill to restore a rule that protects the rights of workers and keeps a runaway regulatory arm of the Obama administration in check.

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Posted in: Government Grants to Unions, National Mediation Board (NMB), Political Activity, RLA
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