Big Labor Payback | The National Right to Work Committee®

Big Labor ‘Medicine’ Making Illinois Sicker

On March 18, 2012, By NRTW Committee Staff

Union-label Illinois Gov. Pat Quinn has run up his state's public spending and debt to Greece-like levels. Credit: www.chicagonow.com

Compulsory-Unionism Stronghold State Drowning in Taxes and Debt

(source: National Right To Work Committee February 2012 Newsletter)

In early 2012, as the national economy continues struggling to recover from the severe 2008-2009 national recession, many states are in financial dire straits. But Big Labor-dominated Illinois is very arguably the worst fiscal basket case of all.

Early last month, Moody’s Investors Service downgraded Illinois debt to A2, finding its creditworthiness to be the worst of any of the 50 states, including even government union-controlled California. In its report, Moody’s specifically berated Illinois’s “weak management practices.”

On January 22, a Chicago Tribune editorial observed: “Deadbeat Illinois owes some $8.5 billion in old bills, tax refunds, employee health insurance and interfund borrowing debts. That’s roughly one-fourth the state’s spending this year from its general funds.” Over and above that, Illinois has “nearly $200 billion in debts and unfunded obligations.”

Burdened by labor policies authorizing union monopoly bargaining and forced union dues and fees in both the private and public sectors and a tax and regulatory climate that are hostile to private-sector job and income growth, the Prairie State has been in trouble for a long time.

Big Labor ‘Cure-All’ For Rapidly Rising Government Debt: Massive Tax Hikes

But Illinois’s outlook grew even bleaker after union-label Democratic Gov. Pat Quinn and like-minded legislators acted in January 2011 to put the state, in the governor’s words, “back on sound fiscal footing.” (more…)

Big Labor — Obama’s Shock Troops

On March 7, 2012, By NRTW Committee Staff

Nolan Finley of the Detroit News argues that “Now we know how United Auto Workers President Bob King will repay Barack Obama for holding the union harmless from the Detroit automakers’ bankruptcy: He’ll provide the ground troops for the president’s class war.” SEIU , Van Jones, and MoveOn.org are also involved in this program.

Finley continues:

The Daily Caller blog says it found evidence that King and the UAW are behind the “99 Percent Spring,” which aims to train and deploy 100,000 Americans for “non-violent direct action” in the months leading up to November’s presidential election. The Daily Caller says files on the group’s website, which have since disappeared, indicate the UAW is providing the organizational support for protests designed to support the president’s narrative that America is divided into two camps — the wealthy 1 percent and the struggling 99 percent.

“99 Percent Spring” will replace the Democrat’s previous grassroots charade, the tainted Occupy movement, with its filthy camps and allegations of violence and rapes that gave it no chance of resonating with mainstream voters.

This new movement will perpetuate the myth that Obama bears no responsibility for the economic suffering that has marked his tenure. It will foist the blame instead on wealthy individuals and big corporations, and mask the failure of the president’s wealth transfer schemes, oppressive regulations and job-killing tax plans.

It’s a perfect way for King to pay back Obama for tossing aside established bankruptcy law and moving the UAW to the top of the pecking order when Chrysler and General Motors filed for Chapter 11. (more…)

Tagged with: 99 Percent Spring • Bob King • Daily Caller • Mytheos Holt • Nolan Finley • Occupy America • President Barack Obama
Posted in: Bailouts to Unions, Big Labor Payback, Economics, Forced-Dues for Politics, Government Grants to Unions, Intimidation Tactics, Labor Organizations, Outsourcing, Political Activity

AFSCME & SEIU Bosses Spend Big Against Romney

On March 4, 2012, By NRTW Committee Staff

The Hill is reporting that big union bosses dipped into their forced-union dues treasuries to try to damage Republican presidential candidate Mitt Romney:

Unions including The American Federation of State, County and Municipal Employees (AFSCME) and Service Employees International Union (SEIU) are making ad buys to hit the Republican presidential contender.

AFSCME, the country’s largest public sector union, spent $500,000 on Internet, television and radio ads to air in Ohio that target Romney before the state’s GOP presidential primary this coming Tuesday, according to Federal Election Commission (FEC) records. Last month, the union also spent $1 million on Internet and television ads opposing Romney in Florida before that state’s GOP presidential primary.

Larry Scanlon, AFSCME’s political director, told The Hill that while Romney has yet to officially sow up [sic] the nomination, the general election season has begun.

“Our position is: We are in a general election now. We want voters to hear our message,” Scanlon said. “We have endorsed Obama, and we’re going to do what we can to get him reelected.”

Scanlon also said that unlike other GOP candidates, the ex-Massachusetts governor has concentrated on issues key to labor.

“Romney has been talking about our issues, workers’ issues, and he’s on the wrong side of those issues. So that’s why we’re going after him,” Scanlon said. (more…)

Tagged with: American Federation of State County and Municipal Employees • Larry Scanlon • Mitt Romney • Service Employees International Union • The Hill
Posted in: AFSCME, Big Labor Payback, Elections, Florida, Forced-Dues for Politics, Government Grants to Unions, Labor Organizations, Nevada, Obama Administration, Ohio, Political Activity, Public Employees, SEIU

Big Labor to Hide More Politcal Spending on Obama’s New Union Financial Reports

On February 29, 2012, By NRTW Committee Staff

The Obama Administration eliminated significant amounts of union financial disclosure and accountability. Now, Big Labor plans to conceal most of its 2012 political spending in its new Obama Department of Labor disclosure reports. The Wall Street Journal is reporting that the union bosses are “rejiggering” their political spending toward more undisclosed and non-reportable expenditures further leaving union workers in the dark about how their union dues are being spent.

Mike Podhorzer, the political director for labor federation AFL-CIO, which represents 57 unions, agreed that the AFL-CIO and some affiliates are donating less money to candidates and political parties this election. But he said that is because the AFL-CIO has decided to put “significantly more” resources “into independent advocacy rather than just writing checks to candidates,” the Journal noted.

Tagged with: Barack Obama • Mike Podhorzer • U.S. Department of Labor • Wall Street Journal
Posted in: Big Labor Payback, DOL, Elections, Forced-Dues for Politics, Government Grants to Unions, Obama Administration, Political Activity

Oppressed Federal Government Union Bosses Push for More Forced Unionism

On February 21, 2012, By NRTW Committee Staff

Put a group of Big Government union bosses in a room and they will inevitably push for more power, more dues money and more coerced unionism. That exactly what happened when President Obama created a board within the Office of Personnel Management. The board is pushing for more monopoly bargaining power, Government Executive reports. ”The Office of Personnel Management’s Labor and Management Relations Council has unanimously approved an outline of a report due to President Obama in May on personnel issues for which collective bargaining is currently optional,” they report.

The Providentially appointed members included:

• Teamsters Public Services Division Director Michael B. Filler;

• American Federation of Government Employees President John Gage;

• National Association of Government Employees President David Holway;

• International Federation of Professional and Technical Engineers President Gregory Junemann;

• National Treasury Employees Union President Colleen M. Kelley; and

President Obama, it seems, didn’t bother to appoint a representative of the taxpayers who will surely get milked in this backroom deal.

Barack Obama Sees No Taint in Teamster Brass

On February 13, 2012, By NRTW Committee Staff

Despite a judge's recent finding that Teamster chieftain Jim Hoffa "raided the Teamster treasury to try to buy his own reelection support with jobs and pensions," President Obama continues doggedly courting Mr. Hoffa's support. Credit: mediatumblr.com

Presidential Pal Jim Hoffa Recently Tried to Bribe Union Rivals

(Source: January 2012 National Right to Work Committee Newsletter)

For decades, Inside-the-Beltway politicians have again and again sullied themselves and the American public’s view of how Washington, D.C., works by turning a blind eye to Teamster union-boss corruption.

Undoubtedly, the best-known example is the Nixon Administration’s 1971 decision to pardon Teamster czar Jimmy Hoffa well before he had served out his 13-year sentence for mail fraud and attempted bribery of a federal jury.

More recently, the George W. Bush Administration publicly toyed from 2001 to 2003 with cutting an outrageous deal to end federal oversight over the Teamsters, even as major cases of ongoing rampant Teamster-boss corruption and orchestration of strike violence were making national news.

(Thanks largely to the fierce and vocal opposition of citizens who support the rule of law, the Bush Administration never actually cut the deal.)

And now it is Democratic President Barack Obama who is practicing the “old politics” of coddling corrupt Teamster officials in exchange for Teamster forced dues-funded “in-kind” campaign support as Mr. Obama prepares for a potentially tough re-election bid this fall.

Barack Obama and Teamster Kingpin Are ‘Like Tweedledum and Tweedledee’

As opinion writer and blogging maven Michelle Malkin pointed out in one of her syndicated columns early last fall, Mr. Obama and current Teamster President Jim Hoffa (the son of Jimmy, who disappeared in 1975 and is presumed dead) have over time become “like Tweedledum and Tweedledee,” that is, inseparable. (more…)

Tagged with: George W. Bush Administration • H.R.2040 • James Hoffa • Jimmy Hoffa • Mary King • Michelle Malkin • President Barack Obama • S.504 • Teamster
Posted in: Bailouts to Unions, Big Labor Payback, Forced-Dues for Politics, Intimidation Tactics, Legislation, National Right to Work Act, NRTWC Newsletter, Obama Administration, Political Activity, Right to Work, U.S. Congress

Obama NLRB Still ‘Screwing Up the U.S. Economy’

On February 12, 2012, By NRTW Committee Staff

Pro-Right to Work Congressman Darrell Issa wants to know more about why the Boeing complaint was filed. Credit: www.businesspundit.com

House Oversight Chairman Seeks Answers From Board’s Top Lawyer

(Source: January 2012 National Right to Work Committee Newsletter)

The legal blitz launched against Boeing and its Palmetto State employees last spring by Lafe Solomon, the President Obama-appointed acting general counsel for the National Labor Relations Board (NLRB), is now over.

Unfortunately, the grave threat to American employees’ Right to Work stemming from this case is unabated.

Last April 20, Mr. Solomon, the board’s top lawyer, asked an NLRB administrative law judge to block Boeing from initiating a second Dreamliner 787 aircraft production line in Right to Work South Carolina.

Mr. Solomon’s case was built on a complaint filed by International Association of Machinists (IAM/AFL-CIO) union bosses.

Employees in Right to Work States Are Mr. Solomon’s Principal Targets

Boeing had no right, union officials claimed, to expand production in a Right to Work state so as to cut the cost to customers, employees and shareholders of the disruptive strikes that the union brass had repeatedly instigated at the company’s west coast facilities over the years. (more…)

SEIU Tries to Grab Dues Money from Taxpayer Subsidies

On February 11, 2012, By NRTW Committee Staff

From the Washington Examiner:

In-home health care workers in Connecticut, like their counterparts in Michigan, may see so-called union dues deducted from paychecks they receive through a state subsidy for the poor . . . The Service Employees International Union (SEIU) is trying to unionize in-home health care workers, based on the theory that they qualify as public employees because the money paid to them is subsidized by the state. “The only notice home health care workers receive concerning a union election is a nondescript mailing asking them if they wish to join the union,” says the Competitive Enterprise Institute (CEI). “Under this process, the union only needs to receive a majority of returned cards—not a majority of all workers—to be recognized as those workers’ exclusive bargaining representative.”

The SEIU achieved this goal in Michigan, with the result that even low-income families who receive a Medicaid subsidy to take care of their adult, disabled children are losing $30 a month to the union. “Our daughter is 34 and our son is 30,” retired police officer Robert Haynes said of the Michigan unionization. “They have cerebral palsy. They are basically like 6-month-olds in adult bodies. They need to be fed and they wear diapers. We could sure use that $30 a month that’s being sent to the union.” (more…)

Tagged with: Dan Malloy • Robert Haynes • SEIU • Service Employees International Union • Washington Examiner
Posted in: Big Labor Payback, Connecticut, Forced-Dues for Politics, Government Grants to Unions, Michigan, Public Employees

Big Labor — Obama’s Shock Troops

AFSCME & SEIU Bosses Spend Big Against Romney

Big Labor to Hide More Politcal Spending on Obama’s New Union Financial Reports

Oppressed Federal Government Union Bosses Push for More Forced Unionism

SEIU Tries to Grab Dues Money from Taxpayer Subsidies

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