Washington, DC (February 2, 2012) – The National Right to Work Foundation announced today that it is launching a legal task force aimed at protecting Indiana’s newly-enacted Right to Work law.

Union officials publicly floated the idea of challenging the law in Indiana’s courts before the law was even passed by the Indiana state senate.

Indiana is the nation’s 23rd Right to Work state after the state senate passed the bill and Governor Mitch Daniels signed the bill into law on Wednesday.

Foundation attorneys have successfully defended state Right to Work laws in the past, including Oklahoma’s. The task force has already examined reported union lines of attack and determined that Indiana’s Right to Work law is on sound legal ground.

“Union bosses want to undo what thousands of Hoosier citizens have worked hard for over the past decade,” said Mark Mix, President of the National Right to Work Foundation. “Because union partisans cannot win the hearts and minds of Indiana’s workers and voters, they seek to have the courts strike down Indiana’s popular Right to Work law for them.”

In addition to defending the Right to Work law from spurious union legal challenges, National Right to Work Legal Defense Foundation staff attorneys are, as always, available to give free legal aid to employees seeking to exercise their Right to Work. Because the Indiana law applies only to forced dues clauses entered into after March 14, 2012, many employees may not be able to cut off all dues immediately. However, those employees can still exercise their right to refrain from formal union membership and cut off union dues being spent on politics.

Public polling shows that nearly 80 percent of Americans support the Right to Work principle, including 80 percent of union members.

Information about Indiana’s Right to Work law, including how Indiana employees can exercise their Right to Work can be found on the Foundation’s website: www.nrtw.org.

Union organizers verbally abuse Marriott employees and spy on workers in changing rooms after striking backroom deal with company officials

New York, NY (January 19, 2012) – A group of New York City Marriott (NYSE: MAR) employees – acting on behalf of their coworkers – have filed federal charges against the company and a local union for workplace intimidation and harassment.

The three SoHo Marriott employees filed the charges at the National Labor Relations Board (NLRB) with free legal assistance from National Right to Work Foundation attorneys.

New York Hotel & Motel Trades Council Local 6 union organizers entered into a backroom deal with company officials that allows union organizers unfettered access to the employees in order to install a union in the workplace.

Abusing this privilege, union organizers are attempting to browbeat the workers into supporting the union through a prolonged campaign of intimidation and harassment.  Meanwhile, company officials deny workers’ attempts to meet on company grounds.

Union officials have used video cameras in employee changing rooms, accessed employee lockers and handled employees’ personal possessions, and have even resorted to verbal abuse.  Union officials even took photographs of a female employee without her consent while she was changing her uniform in an employee changing room.

Moreover, company and union officials are retaliating against workers who dare to exercise their right to refrain from union affiliation.  For example, at least three workers were illegally interrogated and disciplined by company officials at the behest of union bosses.

In response, the workers unanimously signed a petition showing that they do not support the union hierarchy’s presence in the workplace.

“Union and company officials have colluded to force the union bosses’ so-called ‘representation’ on these workers,” said Mark Mix, President of National Right to Work.  “Marriott workers are being subjected to a vicious campaign of intimidation – including sexual harassment – at the hands of forced-dues hungry union bosses and with the approval of weak-kneed company officials.”

“New York desperately needs a Right to Work law to protect workers from forced unionism abuses like this in the future,” added Mix.

The National Right to Work Legal Defense Foundation is a nonprofit, charitable organization providing free legal aid to employees whose human or civil rights have been violated by compulsory unionism abuses.  The Foundation, which can be contacted toll-free at 1-800-336-3600, is assisting thousands of employees in nearly 200 cases nationwide. Its web address is www.nrtw.org.

From the National Right to Work Legal Defense Foundation:

Worker Rights Advocate Blasts Obama’s Unprecedented Recess Appointments to the NLRB

The President’s legally dubious NLRB recess appointments pave the way for another year of forced-unionism giveaways

Washington, DC (January 4, 2012) – Mark Mix, President of the National Right to Work Legal Defense Foundation, issued the following statement in response to President Obama’s unprecedented NLRB recess appointments:

“Obama’s recess appointments to the NLRB, despite there being no formal recess of Congress, show just how much this Administration is in the pocket of Big Labor. In the last two years the Obama Labor Board has repeatedly enacted one power grab after another on behalf of union bosses, to the detriment of the rights of individual employees – especially those who wish to refrain from union activities. The President’s legally dubious NLRB recess appointments pave the way for another year of forced-unionism giveaways.

“Union bosses know their coercive agenda is overwhelmingly unpopular with the American people, which is why they’ve turned to unelected administrative agencies like the NLRB to push through much of what they cannot get through Congress. That’s what makes these appointments all the more offensive in the face of Congress affirmatively taking action to block recess nominations.”

National Right to Work Foundation staff attorneys are already exploring possible legal challenges to these unprecedented recess appointments in defiance of Congress.

From The National Right To Work Legal Defense Foundation:

Washington, DC (December 19, 2011) – The National Labor Relations Board (NLRB), the federal agency charged with administering most private sector labor law, has upheld an Administrative Law Judge’s decision awarding over $55,000 in back pay to a television employee who was discriminated against by Teamster officials. The Board’s ruling stems from unfair labor practice charges filed by Thomas Coghill, an ABC driver who received free legal assistance from National Right to Work Foundation staff attorneys.

Teamster Local 509 union officials are party to a monopoly bargaining agreement with ABC in Charleston, South Carolina that forces workers to go through the union’s hiring hall to get a job with the studio. Because Local 509 union members were working on other sets when production of Army Wives started, Thomas Coghill – a member of a different Teamster local – was hired as a makeup driver during the show’s first two seasons.

As more Local 509 members became available to work on Army Wives, a dispute arose among various Teamster officials over who should be eligible to work on the program. Coghill was eventually removed from Local 509’s “Movie Referral List” because he did not belong to Local 509 while its members continued to receive preferential access to jobs on the set of Army Wives.

Coghill responded to Local 509’s biased hiring procedure by filing unfair labor practice charges against the union on the grounds that federal labor law prohibits union officials from discriminating against nonunion employees. National Right to Work Foundation staff attorneys subsequently persuaded an Administrative Law Judge to award Coghill over $55,000 in back pay. Union lawyers unsuccessfully appealed the ruling to the NLRB, which has now affirmed the judge’s decision in its entirety.

“Despite a tough economy, Teamster bosses had no qualms about discriminating against certain employees because they didn’t belong to the ‘right’ union” said Patrick Semmens, legal information director for the National Right to Work Foundation. “It should not have been necessary to resort to drawn-out litigation to hold Teamster officials accountable, but we’re pleased that Coghill will finally receive the back pay union bosses tried to deny him.”

“Until Big Labor’s many government-granted special powers are repealed, this type of abuse will continue as union bosses intimidate and retaliate against workers who refuse to toe the union line,” concluded Semmens.

A Coca-Cola employee who was fired for refusing to pay union dues has won a settlement of $4,175, the National Right to Work Foundation (NRWF) recently announced.

The employee worked in the company’s Houston, PA facility for several years without joining a union or paying union dues. Early in 2011, officials from the Teamsters Local 585 union ordered the worker to immediately pay full union dues for the previous 3 years along with additional union initiation fees, despite the fact that he had never been informed that the union represented him.

According to NRWF, when the employee refused to pay, union officials demanded that Coca-Cola fire him and the company complied. The employee filed a lawsuit against the union and the company with the National Labor Relations Board (NLRB) regional office in Pittsburgh.

As part of the settlement, the employee was awarded $3,356 from the union and $819 from Coca-Cola. He was also reinstated to his job with Coca-Cola.

“No worker should ever be extorted by union bosses to join or pay dues to a union in order to get or keep a job,” said Mark Mix, NRWF president. “Pennsylvania desperately needs right to work protections for its workers to strip from union bosses the power to compel workers to give up some of their hard-earned money in order to provide for their families.”

Foundation attorneys, who are litigating the case, filed the brief Monday for the eight California civil servants who initiated a class-action lawsuit against the California State Employee Association (CSEA) union, an affiliate of the Service Employees International Union (SEIU).

In 2005, CSEA union officials imposed a “special assessment” to raise money from all represented state employees for a union political fund, regardless of their membership status. The political fund was used to defeat several ballot proposals, including one that revoked public employee unions’ special privilege of using forced fees for political contributions unless an employee consents. Employees who refrained from union membership were given no chance to opt out of the CSEA union’s political fund.

Under the Right to Work Foundation-won Supreme Court decision Teachers Local 1 v. Hudson, public employees forced to pay union dues as a condition of employment must be notified of which part of their dues are spent on union activities unrelated to collective bargaining and be given an opportunity to opt out of paying for members-only events and union boss political activism.

In 2007, a federal district court ruled that the CSEA was required to provide a notice to nonunion employees about the assessment, allow them to opt-out of paying into the union political fund, provide a refund of monies spent on union-boss politics, and pay interest from the dates of the deductions to nonmembers who chose to opt out.

After CSEA union lawyers appealed the case, a Ninth Circuit panel reversed that decision in December 2010. On June 27, 2011, the United States Supreme Court announced it would review the Ninth Circuit’s ruling.

“Allowing the Ninth Circuit’s ruling to stand would further undermine state employees’ First Amendment rights and encourage union bosses to extract more forced dues from nonunion workers as a condition of employment,” stated Mark Mix, President of the National Right to Work Foundation. “It is unconscionable for a court to force employees who want nothing to do with the union or its so-called ‘representation’ to subsidize union political activities.”

From the National Right To Legal Defense Foundation who represented the employees at Lamons Gasket and who secured the “Dana Rights” for employees against Card Check Forced Unionism until the Obama NLRB took them away with this decision:

Obama Labor Board Kills Important Secret Ballot Precedent

Worker advocate denounces NLRB’s ruling to take away protection workers have against card check forced unionism

Washington, DC (August 30, 2011) – Today, Barack Obama’s National Labor Relations Board (NLRB) overturned its Dana Corp. decision, in which National Right to Work Foundation attorneys secured for employees the right to challenge union card check organizing campaigns with a secret ballot vote.

Under the Foundation-won Dana decision, workers may collect signatures to request a secret ballot election during a 45-day window period following notice that their employer has recognized a union based on a card check organizing drive. The ruling is intended to counteract coercive practices frequently associated with card check, which allow organizers to bully or mislead employees into signing cards that count as “votes” toward unionization.

The NLRB overturned Dana just as President Obama-appointed NLRB Chairwoman Wilma Liebman’s term expired. Meanwhile, Obama-appointed Board Member Craig Becker, who co-authored a union brief in the original Dana case, refused to recuse himself from the case. Becker, a recess nominee, faces bi-partisan opposition to his confirmation in the U.S. Senate. One Board Member, Bryan Hayes, vigorously dissented and called the ruling a blatant roll back of employee freedom.

Any decertification votes that have been cast but not counted by the NLRB will now be discounted, thereby invalidating the voice of thousands of workers nationwide.

The National Right to Work Legal Defense Foundation is a charitable organization that provides free legal assistance to employees nationwide. The Foundation is providing free legal aid in both the original Dana case and in the newly-decided Lamons Gasket case in which the Board overturned the Dana protections. Mark Mix, President of the National Right to Work Foundation made the following statement regarding the ruling:

“The Obama Labor Board’s ruling to kill the Dana Corp. precedent that allows workers a secret ballot vote to kick out a union that gained control of the workplace in an abusive ‘card check’ campaign adds to an already exhaustive list of paybacks from the Obama Administration to Big Labor.

“Big Labor and its allies have launched a full-scale assault on worker freedom and the Obama Administration is working tirelessly to appease them through bureaucratic means after they failed in Congress. The American people and their elected representatives in Congress oppose the Card Check Forced Unionism bill, but the Obama Labor Board seems determined to impose card check on American workers in every way it can.

“Taken with the NLRB’s other recent actions, the Obama Administration has made it easier for union operatives to steamroll over workers while making it next to impossible for independent-minded workers to stand up for their rights or decertify the union hierarchy.

“While the secret ballot provides at least a limited protection to ensure that union recognition enjoys the uncoerced support of a majority of employees, no worker should ever be compelled to join or pay dues to a union, or accept the union’s so-called representation, to get or keep a job.”

The National Right to Work Legal Defense Foundation is a nonprofit, charitable organization providing free legal aid to employees whose human or civil rights have been violated by compulsory unionism abuses. The Foundation, which can be contacted toll-free at 1-800-336-3600, is assisting thousands of employees in nearly 200 cases nationwide. Its web address is www.nrtw.org.

From the National Right To Work Legal Defense Foundation:

Worker Advocate Blasts Labor Board Ruling to Allow Charleston Workers Minimal Say in Boeing Case 

Big Labor watchdog slams ruling as insufficient; ploy to quietly sweep workers’ stories under the rug

Washington, DC (June 20, 2011) – The National Labor Relations Board (NLRB) in Washington, D.C. has ruled three Charleston-area Boeing Company (NYSE: BA) employees are allowed to intervene, albeit minimally, in the NLRB’s high-profile case against Boeing.

With free legal assistance from the National Right to Work Foundation, North Charleston Boeing employees Dennis Murray, Cynthia Ramaker, and Meredith Going, Sr. filed a motion earlier this month to intervene in the NLRB’s unprecedented case targeting the company for locating production of some of its 787 Dreamliner airplanes in South Carolina, in part due to its popular Right to Work law.

An NLRB Administrative Law Judge in San Francisco denied the workers’ request and the workers were forced to file an emergency appeal with the national Board in Washington, D.C. The Board in D.C. has ruled that the employees can only file a brief in the case once the hearings, occurring in Seattle, Washington, are concluded.

Mark Mix, President of National Right to Work, issued the following statement in the wake of the Board’s ruling:

“The Obama Labor Board is poised to set a dangerous precedent that would allow union bosses to dictate to job providers where to locate their jobs with the aim, of course, of avoiding states with Right to Work protections for their workers and forcing more workers into union-dues-paying ranks.

“The public outcry regarding the NLRB’s renegade, pro-forced-unionism actions – spearheaded by the NLRB’s Acting General Counsel Lafe Solomon – thus far has forced the NLRB to try to save face, but the ruling still leaves much to be desired.

“The NLRB’s half measure is just a ploy to quietly sweep these workers’ stories under the rug while allowing the forced unionism advocates on the Board to try to appear they are not ignoring the workers in this case.

“The Board’s ruling is a further injustice to these workers, allowing only a minimal role in a case so vital to their job prospects and the Charleston community at large. Once again the Obama Labor Board is putting union boss priorities ahead of the rights and well-being of individual employees.”

“Foundation staff attorneys plan to pursue all legal options to ensure that the rights of Charleston-area Boeing employees, and America’s independent-minded workers, are protected against the encroaching expansion of forced unionism.”

Late last week, Foundation attorneys also filed a federal unfair labor practice charge for Boeing employee Dennis Murray. This charge alleges that the union unlawfully retaliated against Charleston Boeing workers for removing the union from their facility. The NLRB regional office in Wilmington, North Carolina is investigating the charge.

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For more information, visit http://www.nrtw.org/boeing.

The National Right to Work Legal Defense Foundation is a nonprofit, charitable organization providing free legal aid to employees whose human or civil rights have been violated by compulsory unionism abuses. The Foundation, which can be contacted toll-free at 1-800-336-3600, is assisting thousands of employees in nearly 200 cases nationwide. Its web address is www.nrtw.org.

Union Member Seeks to Block Obama Labor Department’s Efforts to Roll Back Union Disclosure Rules

Department guts disclosure rule that has exposed numerous corrupt union boss schemes and let rank-and-file members know how dues are spent

Washington, DC (May 23, 2011) – With free legal aid from the National Right to Work Legal Defense Foundation, a Maryland county government employee is asking a federal court to stop the Obama Administration from allowing union bosses to conceal lavish and corrupt union expenditures from workers.

Chris Mosquera, a member of a Municipal County Government Employee Local of the United Food and Commercial Worker (UFCW) union, filed the lawsuit against Secretary of Labor Hilda Solis in the U.S. District Court for the District of Columbia for rescinding a union boss disclosure rule which would make it less difficult for workers to hold union officials accountable.

Unions covered by the Labor Management Reporting and Disclosure Act (LMRDA) with total annual receipts of $250,000 or more are currently required to submit annual financial statements to the U.S. Department of Labor. LM-2 forms are the public disclosure documents for these larger unions and are available online on the U.S. Department of Labor’s (DOL) website.

These forms have helped workers and citizen activists expose many unscrupulous union boss schemes, including lavish benefits to high-ranking union officials and loyalists, superfluous spending on union boss transportation (including private jets), and shady political spending (such as the Service Employees International Union bosses’ links to the disgraced political organization ACORN).

Mosquera seeks to intervene for the millions of workers who are forced by federal mandate to accept union boss “representation” and pay union dues or fees to a union in order to get or keep their jobs.

The lawsuit alleges that Solis exceeded her power as Secretary of Labor by repealing a January 2009 LM-2 Final Rule because the rule put a “burden” on union officials to report their expenditures to the public. However, under federal law, Solis cannot use “burden” as a justification for rescission of a rule. Solis further overstepped her legal authority by singlehandedly creating a new rule that allows union bosses to more easily evade and circumvent the LMRDA.

The Right to Work Foundation also has a federal lawsuit pending in U.S. District Court for the District of Columbia against the DOL over a Freedom of Information Act request for internal DOL communications and communications with union officials concerning the LM-2 rule change.

“Once again the Obama Administration puts union boss priorities ahead of the rights and well-being of individual employees,” said Mark Mix, President of National Right to Work. “Hilda Solis apparently believes that not only should union bosses have the power to compel workers to pay union dues and fees as a condition of employment, but that those same union bosses should be able to keep workers in the dark about how those forced union dues and fees are spent.”

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The National Right to Work Legal Defense Foundation is a nonprofit, charitable organization providing free legal aid to employees whose human or civil rights have been violated by compulsory unionism abuses. The Foundation, which can be contacted toll-free at 1-800-336-3600, is assisting thousands of employees in nearly 200 cases nationwide. Its web address is www.nrtw.org.

Worker Advocate Files FOIA Request to Disclose Political Motives Behind NLRB’s Attack on Boeing

Foundation offers free legal aid to current and prospective Boeing employees in South Carolina who would lose their jobs if IAM union bosses have their way

Washington, DC (May 16, 2011) – The National Right to Work Legal Defense Foundation filed a Freedom of Information Act (FOIA) disclosure request with the National Labor Relations Board (NLRB) on the heels of the agency’s recent announcement that it will prosecute airline manufacturer Boeing Corp.

If International Association of Machinists (IAM) union officials and the NLRB are successful, over 1,000 Boeing employees in South Carolina would be out of work as Boeing will be forced to relocate the aircraft assembly jobs to Washington State which lacks Right to Work protections for employees.

The NLRB’s acting general counsel, Lafe Solomon, issued the complaint against Boeing late last month at the behest of IAM union bosses.  In 2009, Boeing opened the new plant to produce 787 Dreamliner airplanes in South Carolina, largely because South Carolina is a Right to Work state that protects workers from being required to join or pay dues to a union just to get or keep a job. 

Foundation President Mark Mix submitted the FOIA inquiry on Monday.

In the request, Mix asks that the agency produce all the documentation regarding communications between NLRB officials and third parties, including communications with Obama administration officials; officials from the offices of the Governors of Washington and Oregon; and any other federal, state, or local government agency personnel regarding Boeing or the IAM union, the opening of the company’s facility in South Carolina, and about the NLRB’s complaint against Boeing itself.

“Once again the Obama Labor Board is putting union boss priorities ahead of the rights and well-being of individual employees,” said Mark Mix, President of National Right to Work.  “If the NLRB succeeds in its prosecution of Boeing and Boeing is forced to move its production at the whim of IAM union bosses, over 1,000 jobs in South Carolina would be eliminated and a troubling precedent would be set.”

“In addition, the National Right to Work Foundation has ramped up its legal program to assist all current or prospective Boeing employees who could lose their jobs as a result of the NLRB’s aggressive posture toward independent-minded workers.”

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The National Right to Work Legal Defense Foundation is a nonprofit, charitable organization providing free legal aid to employees whose human or civil rights have been violated by compulsory unionism abuses.  The Foundation, which can be contacted toll-free at 1-800-336-3600, is assisting thousands of employees in nearly 200 cases nationwide. Its web address is www.nrtw.org.

The National Right to Work Legal Defense Foundation battles for truck driver’s rights against the Teamsters and wins legal victory.

Allyson Bird of the Charleston Post and Courier:

A state judge has ruled that a Teamsters union local discriminated against a North Carolina trucker and owes the driver $55,500 in back pay for preventing him from working on the television series “Army Wives.”

The Lifetime cable drama currently is filming its fifth season locally. The labor dispute arose during the show’s third season, which left a makeup truck driver from Wilmington, N.C., named Thomas Troy Coghill out of work.

“Army Wives” typically uses 15 to 20 drivers daily when filming, according to a court filing. Coghill began working for the show during its second season, when many drivers with the South Carolina-based International Brotherhood of Teamsters Local 509 had committed to working on the movie “The New Daughter,” also shot locally.

Local 509′s business agent, L.D. Fletcher, threatened to picket, according to the court filing, unless “Army Wives” cut all drivers who were not members of his organization.

“Army Wives” transportation coordinator Lee Siler told Coghill that he should move to South Carolina and join Local 509 if he wanted to work the third season, the court filing says.

Coghill testified that he wrote and called the local — even while in India — but months passed without a response. Eventually, Fletcher told him the union was closed but that he would add Coghill to a “B list.”

Fletcher later admitted that no such list existed, according to court documents.

The South Carolina union submitted its movie referral list to “Army Wives” for the third season, and it excluded Coghill

Patrick Semmens, the National Right to Work Foundation’s legal information director, said union officials should not be allowed to force workers under their control in order to get or keep a job.

“In this tough economy, it is unconscionable that Teamster Local 509 union bosses would inflict such petty and disgusting discrimination on someone working to put food on the table,” Semmens said.

Marylanders need instruction in how entrenched the state’s teachers’ unions are:

1. Eleven counties, including all the more populous ones, allow unions to collect “agency fees” from nonmembers, generating huge war chests. While in theory such fees are not supposed to be used for political purposes, a famous [NRTW] lawsuit in Washington state revealed that nearly 80 percent of “agency fees” are in fact so used.

2. The State Board of Education has only qualified authority over teacher certification. A special board, eight of whose 24 members are named by unions and six of whom are from teachers’ colleges, can only be over-ridden by a three-fourths vote of the State Board.

3. Under a law signed by Gov. Martin O’Malley last year, another special board, two of whose five members are named by unions, has the last word in resolving impasses in school labor negotiations.

4. Local union contracts impose maximums on the length of the school year, limitations originally derived from the needs of agricultural societies

5. Maryland’s charter school law is one of the few that binds charter school teachers to union contracts, and it provides few checks against refusal of applications by self-protective county boards.  Experimentation with “virtual schools” and distance learning is limited by a law binding employees to union contracts.

8. Contracts severely limit teacher attendance at PTA meetings, in some counties to two hours per year; and at post-school meetings, frequently to one hour a month. Evaluations and observations are severely limited; only a handful of teachers are ever found to be incompetent.

9. In all but three counties, third-party arbitrators, rather than the local board of education, are given the last word in grievance proceedings. There is a three-to-five step grievance procedure, making discipline of tenured teachers all but impossible. Out of a tenured force of more than 5,600, no more than two Baltimore City teachers were fired for cause, per year, between 1984 and 1990.

10. Only two or three county contracts allow extra pay for teachers in scarce disciplines.  There are, instead, lockstep annual increases based on seniority — all but unknown in the private sector and particularly galling in periods of widespread private unemployment.

11. In most counties other than Montgomery, layoffs and transfers are on the basis of seniority. Good, young teachers are let go in preference to bad, older ones; experienced teachers are allowed to gravitate to the least troublesome schools.

12. Teachers are locked in to their existing unions. There can be only two bargaining units in each county, one for teachers and one for other staff. .

14. Prevailing wage laws have been extended to the state school construction program, escalating the cost of new schools by 10 percent to 15 percent.

15. Large portions of school budgets are expended not on teaching but on the provision of extravagant “Cadillac” health plans and retiree health benefits with very small deductibles and co-payments, many of them administered by unions. (The health professions, not teachers, derived an inordinate portion of the benefits from the Thornton Plan.)

Small wonder it is that an increasing percentage of the state’s parents — and indeed, a large number of public school teachers — spend tens of thousands of dollars sending their children to schools whose faculties enjoy none of these allegedly necessary safeguards. A Maryland electorate properly informed of these union abuses is not going to sing “Solidarity Forever.”

Wisconsin needs Right to Work law to protect workers from forced unionism abuses

Milwaukee, WI (March 16, 2011) – A U.S. Bank customer service and support employee has filed federal charges against a local union after AFSCME union officials illegally attempted to force him and his colleagues into full-dues-paying union membership.

Peter Quinones of Milwaukee filed the charges with the National Labor Relations Board (NLRB) on Tuesday with free legal assistance from National Right to Work Legal Defense Foundation staff attorneys.

After American Federation of State, County, and Municipal Employees (AFSCME) Local 777 union officials were granted monopoly bargaining privileges over approximately 300 U.S. Bank employees, Quinones sent a letter to union officials stating that he was exercising his right under National Right to Work Foundation-won Supreme Court precedent in Communication Workers v. Beck to refrain from full dues paying union membership.

Because Wisconsin is a forced unionism state, workers who refrain from formal union membership can still be forced to pay a certain amount of union dues, but cannot be compelled to pay the portion of union dues used for the union’s political, lobbying, and member-only activities.

Despite his letter, AFSCME Local 777 union officials continued to extract full union dues from his paycheck. After Quinones filed an unfair labor practice charge, union officials still refused to honor his request to exercise his legal rights.

Quinones’ latest charge seeks to prevent the AFSCME union hierarchy from requiring him to pay forced union fees by automatic deduction from his paycheck in violation of federal law.

“As we have seen in recent weeks, AFSCME union officials will stop at nothing to collect forced union dues from workers – whether they are in the public or private sector – to pay for their political activism,” said Patrick Semmens, National Right to Work Foundation legal information director. “Wisconsin’s workers desperately need Right to Work protections to protect them from the very union bosses that claim to care about workers’ rights while violating workers’ rights.”

If enacted, a Wisconsin Right to Work law would end compulsory union dues by making union membership and dues payment strictly voluntary. Polls consistently show that 8 in 10 Americans support the Right to Work principle, that no worker should be compelled to join a union or pay union dues to get or keep a job. Twenty-two states have already passed Right to Work protections for their workers.

The National Right to Work Legal Defense Foundation is a nonprofit, charitable organization providing free legal aid to employees whose human or civil rights have been violated by compulsory unionism abuses. The Foundation, which can be contacted toll-free at 1-800-336-3600, is assisting thousands of employees in nearly 200 cases nationwide. Its web address is www.nrtw.org.

When asked, workers choose freedom, even union workers. In Frank Luntz’ recent poll, 80% of union members chose the Right To Work which allows individuals to freely choose whether or not to belong or pay fees to union.

Here is the question Luntz’ pollsters asked union members across the country and the results are above:

Please tell me whether you strongly agree, somewhat agree, somewhat disagree or strongly disagree with the following statement: “Workers should have the right to decide whether to join a union. They should never be forced or coerced to join or pay dues to a union as a condition of employment.”

For the complete Frank Luntz – National Right To Work Legal Defense Foundation 2010 Union Member Survey click here.

New Nationwide Poll Shows Union Members Support Right to Work

A scientific survey of union members nationwide, conducted the week before the November elections by well-known pollster Frank Luntz for the National Right to Work Legal Defense Foundation, shows that Big Labor bosses are out of touch with the people they purport to represent as well as the public at large.

The poll gauged the opinions of both private- and government-sector union members regarding key aspects of the agenda Big Labor bankrolls with union treasury funds, which consist primarily of dues and fees that workers are forced to fork over as a condition of employment.

In the 2009-2010 campaign cycle, union officials funneled forced dues and fees extracted from an estimated nine million union members and forced union fee-paying nonmembers into what appears to have been their largest ever federal mid-term electoral war chest.

Top bosses of the AFL-CIO-affiliated American Federation of State, County and Municipal Employees (AFSCME) union openly admit to having spent a total of nearly $87.5 million, mostly union treasury money, on mid-term electioneering.

Service Employees International Union (SEIU) bosses acknowledge pouring $44 million, primarily forced-dues money, into 2009-2010 politics. National Education Association (NEA) teacher union chiefs have owned up to siphoning $40 million into politicking over the past two years.

Altogether, it’s safe to say Organized Labor shelled out more than a billion dollars in reported and unreported contributions, including “in-kind” support like phone banks and get-out-the-vote drives as well as cash, to its favored 2010 congressional candidates.

Four Out of Five Union Members Reject Forced Union Membership, Dues

In every election year, union strategists deploy Big Labor’s enormous campaign war chest to defeat pro-Right to Work candidates and elect and reelect candidates who support forced unionism.

Yet the Luntz survey shows that union members agree with the vast majority of Americans who support the Right to Work.

Most (54%) union members “strongly agree” that workers should “never be forced or coerced to join or pay dues to a union as a condition of employment.” An additional 26% “somewhat agree,” whereas only 14% disagree, either “somewhat” or “strongly.”

And the survey results indicate that support for the Right to Work is even stronger among government-sector union members than it is among private-sector union members.

In the 2009-2010 election cycle, Big Labor was also determined to defend politicians who had voted in early 2009 for President Obama’s $800 billion “stimulus” package.

AFL-CIO czar Richard Trumka and other union bigwigs have stubbornly insisted, despite the distinct lack of tangible benefits, that this legislation has been a success.

But the union members who were forced to finance the union brass’s efforts to protect pro-”stimulus” politicians don’t agree at all. They are nearly four times as likely to regard the “stimulus” as “very much a failure” than as “very much a success.” Overall, a 53% to 41% majority of union members see the stimulus as a failure.

While union members are far more likely to vote for the candidates promoted by Big Labor than they are to support Big Labor’s forced-unionism, Tax & Spend agenda, the divide between the union rank and file and the hierarchy on candidates is still wide.

Making, or Not Making, Campaign Contributions Is A Personal Decision

According to the latest accounting, 93% of union federal PAC contributions in 2010 went to Democratic candidates, while more than one in three union household members voted for the GOP candidate in their U.S. House district.

“Regardless of how the individual unionized worker votes, it should be up to him or her to decide which candidates, if any, to support financially,” said Mark Mix, president of the National Right to Work Committee and the National Right to Work Legal Defense Foundation.

“To ensure that what should be a personal decision truly is one, forced union dues must be abolished. And that is pro-Right to Work Americans’ unchanging goal.”

ACORN Founder Wade Rathke regarding SEIU Lawyer Craig Becker’s appointment to the five-member National Labor Relations Board once wrote:

“Thanks for a solid, President Obama!” And, “Craig Becker will no longer be a secret weapon for workers [read SEIU & AFL-CIO bosses] at the NLRB…” 

Rathke is right, Becker is no secret and, according to Washington Examiner’s Mark Hemingway and the National Right to Work Legal Defense Foundation, he appears to be willing to violate ethical restrictions to help his “former employer SEIU.

From Hemingway’s 12/10/2010 story:

National Labor Relations Board member Craig Becker recused himself from a decision earlier this week that advanced organized labor’s top public policy goal, Card Check, but worries continue to grow in at least a dozen other cases before the board in which he participated despite apparent conflicts of interest for the former labor lawyer.

Becker recused himself from the case because he had written a brief supporting labor prior to joining the board.

Card Check is a bullying tool used by unions that … exposes workers to threats and actual physical intimidation by union organizers.

Becker refused to discuss the case with the Examiner or his rationale for recusals, as did a board spokesman.

Since joining the NLRB, the National Right to Work (NRTW) Foundation has filed 13 motions noting Becker’s conflict of interest in cases before the NLRB.Since joining the NLRB, the National Right to Work (NRTW) Foundation has filed 13 motions noting Becker’s conflict of interest in cases before the NLRB.

The cases from which Becker did not recuse himself involve significant issues and his former clients, including a case involving the SEIU, for which he did extensive legal work for in the past.

Becker claimed he would have no conflicts of interest in cases involving local chapters of unions whose national organizations he had represented because the former are “distinct legal entities” from the latter.

In fact, SEIU’s constitution says the national union has “jurisdiction over its affiliated bodies and all Local Unions.”

Becker also appears to be violating the Obama administration ethics pledge he signed in which he promised: “I will not for a period of two years from the date of my appointment participate in any matter involving specific parties that is directly and substantially related to my former employer or former clients, including regulations and contracts.”

Becker also refuses to hold himself to the same level of objectivity required of his fellow NLRB members, according to the foundation.

“[Becker] refuses to adopt the more stringent federal judge standard for recusal used by current NLRB Chair Wilma Liebman in cases concerning affiliates of the Teamster union, her former employer before being installed on the Board by President Bill Clinton,” the foundation said in a filing before the board.

Becker also has a long history of public criticism of NRTW, which often works on cases before the NLRB, further compromising his objectivity.

The NLRB will soon rule on another important case involving Card Check, the Lamons Gasket case, which is confusingly enough, also referred to as “the Dana decision.”

Lamons Gasket could reverse a  2007 NLRB decision also involving the Dana Corp., the AFL-CIO and UAW in which it said employees could invalidate a union that was organized through Card Check by holding a secret ballot election on the matter within 45 days of the new union’s certification.

The Right to Work group also argues that Becker denies having pre-judged attempts to overturn the 2007 Dana decision despite a long career of advocating an extreme version of forced unionism that considers secret ballot elections “profoundly undemocratic” and despite having authored an amicus brief in that case opposing granting employees the opportunity to petition for decertification of unions recognized by card check.

Becker’s brief argued the case “there is no essential difference between Card Check and secret ballots” and called the 2007 decision ‘bad labor-relations policy,” according to the Wall Street Journal.

For more information involving the legal teams invloved in the cases, visit the National Right to Work Legal Defense Foundation website.

An employee at the Hilton Hawaiian Village Beach Resort & Spa has filed another unfair labor practice complaint against Unite Here Local 5, the union representing most of Oahu’s hotel workers.

The complaint alleges union officials attempted to have Grant Suzuki fired for resigning from the union, refusing to pay dues and informing co-workers of their workplace rights, according to the National Right to Work Legal Defense Foundation Inc., a nonprofit, charitable organization that provides free legal aid to employees against compulsory unionism.

Suzuki filed a successful unfair labor practice charge in 2008 requiring the union to return union dues that he believed were illegally taken. He said he has since been targeted for harassment for informing his co-workers of their rights to opt out of union dues, resign from union membership and work during a union-instigated strike, according to a press release issued by the organization.

Union officials agreed to a settlement with Suzuki in 2009 to refund all dues collected for activities unrelated to workplace bargaining and post public notices informing hotel employees of their rights. However, following the settlement, union officials harassed Suzuki and attempted to have him fired, the organization said.

The National Labor Relations Board said it is investigating Suzuki’s complaint. A call to a Local 5 representative was not returned.

As Big Labor has realized it won’t get “card check” legislation through Congress, it is turning to its secret weapon inside the Obama Administration—labor lawyer Craig Becker. And as many Senators feared when he was nominated, Mr. Becker is using his position on the National Labor Relations Board to bypass the will of Congress.

President Obama gave Mr. Becker a recess appointment in March after Senate Democratsrefused to confirm him to the NLRB, the agency charged with fairly overseeing union elections. As a top lawyer for the Service Employees International Union, Mr. Becker had suggested that the NLRB has the legal authority to impose card check—which eliminates secret ballots in union elections—without the approval of Congress. And lo, at the end of August the NLRB dropped the bombshell, when, in a 3-2 decision, it decided to revisit its important 2007 Dana Corp. ruling.

Card check is a top labor priority because it allows a workplace to be organized if 50% of workers at the site sign a union card. Without a national law, unions have tried to persuade individual businesses to allow card check rather than secret ballots, and some have gone along.

When a workplace is organized after a secret ballot, workers are barred from a vote to “decertify” the union until after the first negotiated contract expires. In its Dana decision, however, the NLRB recognized that card check was an inferior substitute to secret ballots. It therefore held that when a company recognized a union via card check, workers had the right to force an immediate secret vote on whether they really wanted to join that union.

The Dana ruling is about protecting workers from union harassment. And if card check is as popular as unions claim, labor leaders should have no problem letting workers vote to ratify or reject a card-check process. As NLRB member Peter Schaumber, a Bush appointee, noted in his dissent to the NLRB decision to revisit the case, the Dana ruling has in no way chilled the current card-check process. [click to read more at the Wall Street Journal]

Michelle Malkin highlights the non-existent ethical standards applied to Obama Big Labor politcal appointees like  SEIU/AFL-CIO lawyer Craig Becker who Obama appointed to the National Labor Relations Board (NLRB):

Everything you need to know about President Obama’s fraudulent ethics pledge can be summed up in four words: SEIU lawyer Craig Becker.

It’s no surprise that Becker now refuses to hold himself accountable for the ethics pledge he himself signed in April. As the past two years have taught us, Team Obama’s operational slogan is: Rules are for fools. The contractual ethics commitment states: “I will not for a period of two years from the date of my appointment participate in any particular matter involving specific parties that is directly and substantially related to my former employer or former clients, including regulations and contracts.” Yet, Becker has participated in numerous NLRB cases involving the SEIU and its affiliates — and is parsing the definition of “former employer” by arguing that local SEIU chapters are “separate and distinct legal entities” that don’t fall under the ethics rules.

The National Right to Work Foundation, which has fought both national and local SEIU officials in court on behalf of rank-and-file workers’ rights, eviscerates Becker’s lawyerly blather. SEIU’s own constitution considers local affiliates “constituent subordinate bodies” of the national union, the foundation notes. “Moreover, in 2009 over 85 percent of the SEIU’s receipts came from a per capita tax on the locals’ membership dues and fees. The national union even has the power to assume control over its locals if they do not conform to International policies.”

Despite the White House’s much-heralded policy of binding every executive appointee to strict conflict-of-interest guidelines, a defiant Becker now remains free to rule on cases involving his former Big Labor bosses. And the most ethical administration in U.S. history isn’t doing a thing to stop him.

He favors radical rewriting of union organizing rules and elimination of the secret ballot process by administrative fiat.

In any case, Becker has also acknowledged playing a key role in providing “advice and counsel” to the powerful SEIU affiliate in Illinois “relating to proposed executive orders and proposed legislation giving homecare workers a right to organize and engage in collective bargaining under state law.” [forced individual non-state employees to pay union fes to SEIU] Championed by Big Labor water-carrier and disgraced former Democratic Gov. Rod Blagojevich and current SEIU-endorsed Democratic Gov. Pat Quinn, such measures effectively bust into private homes for the Purple Shirts of the SEIU and other union competitors hungry for new dues-paying members.

Now, Becker is in the catbird seat — adjudicating challenges to the power grab rules he helped author.

(full article avaialbe at MichelleMalkin.com)

The National Right to Work Foundation [NRTW] has aggressively pursued recusal motions against Craig Becker, a recess appointment by President Obama to the National Labor Relations Board. Becker had previously served as associate general counsel for the AFL-CIO and the Service Employees International Union, an organization which has come under increasing scrutiny in connection to illicit activities by Obama and his supporters.

Becker took an ethics pledge last April, at the time of his recess appointment, in which he swore to abstain for a period of two years from involving himself in any matter before the board in which a client or former employer had been involved. Despite this pledge, the NRWF [NRTW] has identified cases involving SEUI locals and in which Becker participated in the cases. Becker has insisted that local unions are “separate and distinct entities” from the SEIU itself. This contradicts the SEIU Constitution, which presumably Becker would know something about as counsel for that organization, and which describes local affiliates as “constituent subordinate bodies” of the national union.

The NLRB Inspector General, David Berry, sided with the Obama appointee, finding that an SEIU local and the SEIU national union were “separate and distinct.” As shaky as this reasoning may be, a case involving the Pomona Valley Hospital Medical Center may display ever deeper ethical concerns with Becker participating in NLRB deliberations: The SEIU local at the Pomona medical center wishes to disassociate itself from SEIU. The NLRB has not yet responded to NRWF [NRTW] request for Becker to recuse himself from that case. It notes that his involvement in the Pomona case is even more troubling because Becker personally was involved in SEIU activities to get healthcare workers to join the SEIU.

Wade Rathke, who founded ACORN and was a former SEIU leader, lavished praise on the work that Becker did, stating: “His role was often behind the scenes devising strategy with the organizer and the lawyers, writing briefs for others to file, and putting all the pieces together, but he was the go-to-guy on all of this.” Rathke in further comments made it clear that Becker was much more active than simply a staff attorney representing a client: Becker was actively leading the drive to organize healthcare workers and to organize them as part of the SEIU.

… But it is unlikely that he will or that Attorney General Holder will move to compel Becker to do the right thing. The connect-the-dots unseemliness of Craig Becker on the National Labor Relations Board is too obvious and, sadly, in Washington, all too familiar.