In 2004, the National Right to Work Legal Defense Foundation filed one of the complaints that led to this FEC conciliation agreement. As a group that defends employees against forced political confromity by unions, we were alarmed by the diversion of $26 million by officials of the Service Employees International Union, taken mostly from workers’ forced union dues, into partisan and overt electioneering activity.

See attached letter I received yesterday from the FEC.

This FEC action is a mere slap on the wrist. The big problem with the FEC’s “enforcement” action is, at the end of the day, not one cent of the millions of dollars illegally funnelled into federal election activity will be returned to the unionized workers forced to foot the bill as a condition of employment.

The SEIU union was the biggest ACT donor at $26 million, according to SEIU’s president Andy Stern, a founder of ACT. And many other millions of dollars in workers’ forced union dues were transferred into ACT by officials of other major unions.

Stefan Gleason
Vice President
National Right to Work
Legal Defense Foundation

**Akron, OH (August 20, 2007)** – In order to avoid impending federal prosecution by the National Labor Relations Board (NLRB), a local union backed down from its unlawful attempts to fine several Goodyear Tire and Rubber Company (NYSE:**GT**) employees $620 each for refusing to abandon their jobs during a union-ordered strike.

The settlement won by National Right to Work Foundation attorneys requires United Steel Workers of America (USWA) Local 2L union officials to stop threatening employees who are not formal union members with internal union fines, to discontinue holding internal union trials used to discipline such employees, and to cease coercing and intimidating employees who choose not to walk off the job during a union-ordered strike. The settlement also requires notices to be posted in visible areas throughout the Goodyear plant advising employees of their rights.

USWA union officials also must stop “using bullhorns to intimidate” and threaten retaliation against employees at their residences, according to the settlement. USWA union officials must now withdraw the illegal strike fines levied against Goodyear employees as well as expunge all internal union disciplinary records on file.

Foundation attorneys originally helped Frank C. Steen III file federal charges after union officials targeted him with illegal retaliatory strike fines, threats, hate mail, and other recriminations. Having issued a formal complaint in June 2007, the NLRB had scheduled a trial for tomorrow, August 21.

“The outright contempt that these thuggish union officials have for employees who refuse to toe the union line is despicable,” said Stefan Gleason, vice president of the National Right to Work Foundation. “Such bully tactics underscore the Buckeye state’s need for a Right to Work law that would make union affiliation and dues payment strictly voluntary.”

Between October 2006 and January 2007, USWA officials ordered over 15,000 Goodyear employees across 16 plants in North America to walk off the job. However, in order to support their families, Steen and his coworkers resigned from formal union membership in November and exercised their right to return to work.

After resigning, Steen and his coworkers were ordered to appear at an internal “kangaroo” court (which the employees refused to attend), where union officials imposed the fines on the employees for continuing to do their jobs. USWA union officials also sought to retaliate against the workers for informing others of their legal right to refrain from formal union membership.

While at work during the strike, Steen received approximately 10 pieces of hate mail from union officials. On two different occasions, USWA union operatives shouted through bullhorns outside Steen’s residence, calling him a “low life” for refusing to abandon his job. And in a separate incident, another union-strike supporter threatened one of Steen’s coworkers over the phone that he would be fined for “everything he made and then some” and would be fired once the strike was over.

Download the settlement

**Los Angeles, CA (August 14, 2007)** – With free legal assistance from the National Right to Work Legal Defense Foundation, 54 grocery workers of Albertsons and Ralphs grocery chains won a major settlement agreement from the Teamsters Local 952 union requiring it to rescind over $100,000 in illegal strike fines.

Under the settlement approved late last week by the National Labor Relations Board (NLRB) in Washington, DC, Teamsters union officials will rescind all unlawful fines levied against employees during the Southern California grocery strike in 2003-2004.

The settlement also mandates that union officials allow several hundred – perhaps even thousands – of workers in eight different bargaining units to retroactively revoke their formal union membership and receive rebates of mandatory dues taken to fund union political and other non-bargaining activities. Under the settlement, the matter will now be remanded to NLRB Region 21 in Los Angeles, which will ensure the union’s compliance.

Led by Juan Saldana, Daniel Hernandez, Sr. and Mike MacDonald, dozens of Albertsons and Ralphs distribution center employees filed unfair labor practice charges in March 2004 with the NLRB after Teamsters officials issued illegal retaliatory fines against them ranging up to $7,200 per employee for refusing to participate in “sympathy strike” activity.

In fact, Teamsters Local 952 union officials socked employees with the confiscatory fines simply for observing the union’s own “no strike” contract with their employers. The targeted employees had continued to report to work during the crippling grocery strike ordered against Albertsons, Vons, and Ralphs by officials of a different union, the United Food and Commercial Workers.

“Although a significant victory for these employees, this case underscores that state law should not force any worker to affiliate with, or be ‘represented’ by, an unwanted union in the first place,” said Stefan Gleason, vice president of the National Right to Work Foundation.

Previously, an NLRB administrative law judge ruled that Teamsters Local 952 officials illegally failed to inform workers of their rights to refrain from formal union membership and to object to paying for the union’s nonrepresentational activities, such as politics. Because the employees thus cannot be considered voluntary members, the judge ruled that employees must be allowed to resign retroactively and thereby avoid internal union disciplinary measures taken against them. The ruling also overturned Teamsters officials’ illegal policy of forcing workers to renew annually their objections to financially supporting the union’s political activities, and to file such objections individually.

In the Foundation-won *Communications Workers of America v. Beck* decision in 1988, the U.S. Supreme Court ruled that employees are entitled to resign from formal union membership and withhold forced dues for activities other than union monopoly bargaining, such as union political activities and lobbying. And only truly voluntary union members can be subjected to internal union discipline, such as fines

**Gulfport, MS (August 14, 2007)** – Three employees of the Island View Casino have filed a lawsuit in federal court to stop union organizers from obtaining confidential information about Island View employees and from demanding other organizing assistance from Island View management in violation of federal labor law.

In the lawsuit, filed in U.S. District Court for the Southern District of Mississippi with the help of National Right to Work Foundation attorneys, the three employees, detail how Teamsters, International Union of Operating Engineers (IUOE) and UNITE-HERE union officials are attempting to violate the Labor Management Relations Act by demanding that Island View hand over “things of value” to union organizers. Among these, Teamsters, IUOE, and UNITE union organizers have demanded confidential records containing personal information about employees, sweeping physical access to Gulfside’s properties for organizing, and control over all communications Gulfside has with its employees concerning the unions.

The federal law provisions at issue are meant to prevent sweetheart deals between employers and unions which induce union officials to sell out the interests of the employees they are supposed to represent.

The unions’ demands are part of a “Memorandum of Agreement” that union officials signed with the management of the Grand Casino Gulfport. The remaining assets of the now-defunct Grand Casino were purchased by the Gulfside Casino Partnership in December 2005 after the Grand Casino was destroyed by Hurricane Katrina.

So-called “neutrality and card check” agreements give union organizers sweeping power to browbeat rank-and-file workers into union ranks. Armed with confidential personnel information, union organizers often make “house calls” where they can intimidate or harass employees into signing cards that are then counted as “votes” for unionization. “Card checks” also deny employees the privacy and limited protections afforded workers during a National Labor Relations Board-run secret ballot election over whether to unionize.

In past National Right to Work Foundation-assisted cases, employees have reported being misled about the cards’ true purpose, and some employees have even had to threaten police action to get union organizers off their property. The Island View employees and their co-workers are particularly concerned about the prospect of home visits from union organizers, after hearing stories of intimidation during organizing drives at other area casinos.

“Union bosses are determined to force unionization on Island View employees from the top down, like it or not,” said Stefan Gleason, vice president of the National Right to Work Foundation. “These employees believe that the union bosses are more concerned with bolstering union ranks than with representing rank-and-file employees.”

Mississippi is one of 22 Right to Work states in which union membership and dues payment is strictly voluntary. However, if union officials are granted monopoly bargaining power over Island View employees, the workers will no longer be free to negotiate individually over their own wages and working conditions.

Download the Federal Lawsuit

**Aberdeen, MD (August 8, 2007)** – Following challenges by employees unlawfully unionized by “card check,” International Association of Machinists & Aerospace Workers (IAM) union Local 2424 officials backed down and settled federal labor charges pending against them.

The settlement came after federal investigators found that union officials had violated the employees’ rights during a so-called card check organizing drive which bypassed the secret-ballot election process.

Last month, three employees working for private contractors at the Aberdeen Test Center military facility obtained free legal assistance from the National Right to Work Foundation. Foundation attorneys filed charges at the National Labor Relations Board (NLRB) Region 5 office in Baltimore. The NLRB charges detailed multiple union violations of the employees’ rights, including unionizing employees who did not support the union, unlawfully transferring these employees into a union bargaining unit, and threatening employees with termination if they did not join the union.

To avoid an embarrassing NLRB prosecution, IAM officials formally settled the charges by renouncing monopoly bargaining privileges over the more than 150 employees who were unlawfully unionized. The union brass also agreed that they would not attempt to unionize the engineers under a card check scheme, but instead would only use the less coercive NLRB-supervised secret-ballot election process.

“IAM union bosses got caught red-handed violating the rights of the very employees they claimed to represent,” said Stefan Gleason, vice president of the National Right to Work Legal Defense Foundation. “While this case highlights the coercion inherent in so-called ‘card check’ unionization, ultimately these abuses by union bosses will not end until their compulsory unionism privileges are eliminated.”

The case is one of many documented instances of fraud and abuse in card check organizing drives. Under card check, union-controlled authorization cards are used as “votes” for unionization. Employees report that cards are often collected under false-premises or through intimidation. In this case, the union declared a victory in their card check drive when it did not even have cards from a majority of employees.

The employees also filed charges against their employers (Jacobs Technology Inc., LogSec. Corporation and Science and Technology Corporation) for their role in imposing the unwanted union on the workers by recognizing IAM officials as the employees’ collective bargaining representative without proof that the union had the support of a majority of the employees.

**San Diego, CA (August 7, 2007)** – A local employee of Albertsons, Inc. filed federal charges against the United Food and Commercial Workers (UFCW) Local 135 union after union officials unlawfully demanded she be fired from her job unless she joined the union and paid full dues.

Sixteen year-old high-school student, Danielle Cookson, a front courtesy clerk for the grocery giant, obtained free legal assistance from attorneys at the National Right to Work Legal Defense Foundation and filed unfair labor practice charges with the National Labor Relations Board (NLRB). The federal charges highlight that UFCW Local 135 union officials are failing to respect employees legal rights and requiring them to join and pay dues to the union as a job condition.

In late July, UFCW Local 135 union officials sent a “termination notification” letter to Albertsons requesting Cookson be fired from her position. In their demand, union officials ordered Cookson to pay the forced dues within seven days of the notification, or else she would be removed from the schedule and terminated.

Since she began working at Albertsons in May, union officials have attempted to seize forced dues from Cookson’s paycheck. However, Cookson was never informed of her right to refrain from formal union membership or given proper financial notice of how her forced dues would be spent, as required by Foundation-won court decisions.

“In their lust for compulsory union dues, union officials will even bully children who are working to save money for their future. But they made a big mistake trying to push Danielle around,” said Stefan Gleason, vice president of the National Right to Work Foundation. “This abuse is all too common in California because there is no Right to Work law to ensure that payment of union dues is strictly voluntary.”

In the Foundation-won U.S. Supreme Court decision *Communications Workers v. Beck*, the Court affirmed that workers have the right to resign from formal union membership and halt and reclaim the portion of forced union dues spent on activities unrelated to collective bargaining, such as union politics. Unfortunately, they can still be forced to pay for bargaining expenses, even if they do not want union “representation.” However, employees have the right to have an independent third party audit the union expenditures and certify that the percentage of dues that non-members are forced to pay does not include political spending and other non-collective bargaining expenses.

Despite Cookson’s formal objections, the union hierarchy failed to provide her with an independently audited breakdown of union expenditures, as required by law. The NLRB’s Regional Office will now investigate the charges and decide whether to issue a formal complaint and prosecute the union.

“The attempts by union officials to run roughshod over workers’ rights show the inevitable greed and corruption that flow from forced unionism,” said Gleason.

**Butte, MT (August 6, 2007)** – The National Labor Relations Board (NLRB) has agreed to prosecute the United Food and Commercial Workers (UFCW) Local 4 union for illegally seizing forced union dues from multiple Safeway employees’ paychecks, unlawfully threatening termination, and rejecting requests to resign from formal union membership.

With help from attorneys at the National Right to Work Legal Defense Foundation, Safeway Inc. (NYSE: SWY) employees Gerald Rasmussen and Carla Crandall originally filed federal charges against the UFCW Local 4 union in April and May, respectively. After an initial investigation, the NLRB combined the complaints into one case and scheduled a hearing for September 2007 to prosecute the union.

The employees’ original charges cite that UFCW Local 4 union officials are attempting to enforce a compulsory unionism clause requiring employees to join or pay dues to the union or be fired from their jobs, despite a formal employee election recently stripping the union bosses of their forced unionism privileges.

All 34 Safeway employees participated in the late April NLRB-supervised deauthorization vote – a secret ballot election that gives employees the right to eliminate the mandatory dues clause from a monopoly bargaining contract. UFCW Local 4 union officials have been challenging the election result.

“No one should be forced to pay dues to a union,” said Stefan Gleason, vice president of the National Right to Work Foundation. “These sorts of abuses will continue to plague workers in states like Montana, where there is no Right to Work law to ensure that payment of union dues is strictly voluntary.”

After learning of their right to resign from formal union membership from sources independent of UFCW Local 4, Rasmussen, Crandall and other employees sent letters to union officials resigning from formal union membership. Union officials rejected their requests and never provided any of the legally-mandated financial disclosure statements to the Safeway employees.

Additionally, UFCW union officials invented their own bogus and illegal rules for resigning. In their correspondence, union officials claim the grocery employees’ letters were unacceptable because they were not notarized, the letters were not sent by certified mail in separate envelopes, and were not accompanied by copies of applicable NLRB decisions and Supreme Court rulings.

However, under the 1988 Foundation-won Supreme Court decision in *Communications Workers v. Beck*, union officials cannot require formal union membership or the payment of union dues unrelated to collective bargaining as a condition of employment. The decision also requires union officials to provide employees with verified financial disclosure of union expenditures, so that employees can cut off the seizure of forced union dues used for activities such as union politicking or lobbying.

Download the NLRB Complaint

**Corpus Christi, TX (August 1, 2007)** – A security guard helped by attorneys at the National Right to Work Foundation has forced Asset Protection and Security Services (Asset) to settle federal charges he filed in April after company and union officials required him to pay union dues in violation of Texas’ Right to Work law.

Carlos Banuelos, a Corpus Christi-based Asset employee, filed federal charges against the Security, Police and Fire Professionals of America (SPFPA) union and his employer, a federal contractor at a detention facility at Port Isabel.

The settlement requires Asset to reimburse Banuelos for dues paid and post a notice informing all security guards at the Corpus Christi facility about their rights. Specifically, Asset agreed not to “threaten” employees with termination for refusal to pay dues as well as make whole Banuelos “for any monies, plus interest, lost as a result of the discrimination against him.”

Banuelos’ charge detailed how the SPFPA union hierarchy maintains an illegal monopoly bargaining agreement with his employer that makes financial support for the union a mandatory condition of employment. Earlier this month, the National Labor Relations Board agreed to issue a complaint and prosecute the SPFPA union for threatening to have workers fired for refusal to pay dues. While Asset has settled, the defiant SPFPA union refuses and is scheduled to appear at trial before an Administrative Law Judge in October.

SPFPA union officials falsely claim without proof that Banuelos and his coworkers work on an “exclusive federal enclave” that is not protected by the Right to Work law – and thus can be forced to pay union dues as a condition of employment. Meanwhile, evidence shows that union officials have established these forced dues requirements at multiple worksites across Texas under apparently fraudulent agreements.

“Evidence indicates that union bosses have duped potentially thousands of Texans into paying compulsory union dues in violation of the law,” said Stefan Gleason, vice president of the National Right to Work Foundation. “They must refund every dollar seized – no one should be forced to pay union dues just to get or keep a job.”

After the National Right to Work Foundation called on Texas Attorney General Greg Abbott’s office for over eight months, his office followed up on two Foundation-led cases by initiating legal proceedings to enforce the state’s Right to Work law. Filed on July 24, the state’s lawsuits seek permanent injunctions against the collection of forced dues by the SPFPA union, as well as Asset in Corpus Christi and AKAL Security in El Paso.

In a parallel case, Foundation attorneys successfully secured reinstatement and back pay for Juan Vielma, a security guard for AKAL Security in El Paso, whom union officials had had illegally suspended without pay for over a year for refusal to pay dues. Agreeing with Foundation attorneys, a federal Administrative Law Judge ruled that SPFPA union officials had no legal authority to compel Vielma to pay dues.

Download the NLRB Settlement

**Corpus Christi & El Paso, TX** (July 24, 2007) – National Right to Work Legal Defense Foundation Vice President Stefan Gleason made the following statement regarding Texas Attorney General Greg Abbott’s long-sought legal action this afternoon to initiate the state’s enforcement of the highly popular Right to Work law:

“The National Right to Work Foundation welcomes the Attorney General to our ongoing battle to prevent the erosion of Texans’ Right to Work. No employee should be forced to pay union dues just to get or keep a job. But the violations Foundation attorneys uncovered in Corpus Christi and El Paso may only be the tip of the iceberg.

“Evidence obtained several months ago by Foundation attorneys during a federal labor board trial suggests that Big Labor’s phony ‘exclusive federal enclave’ scheme to violate the Right to Work law is widespread. Foundation attorneys are pressing ahead to protect all employees who are victim to this compulsory unionism scheme, and we urge the Attorney General to do the same.

“Union officials must be put on notice that a Texan’s Right to Work is sacred. Every violation must be prosecuted to the fullest extent of the law, or union officials will only be emboldened.”

**Background**: National Right to Work Foundation attorneys are currently representing two Texas security guards in cases before the National Labor Relations Board and have convinced federal officials to prosecute the Security, Police and Fire Professionals of America (SPFPA) union for unlawfully threatening the security guards’ jobs. Foundation attorneys first brought Texas Right to Work law violations to the attention of the Office of the Attorney General in November 2006. Today’s action is the first formal legal action taken by the State.

In April, Foundation attorneys filed federal charges for Carlos Banuelos, an Asset Protection and Security Services guard in Corpus Christi, against the SPFPA union and his employer after union officials unlawfully threatened to have him (and other employees) fired for asserting their legal right to refrain from formal union membership and payment of union dues.

Meanwhile, in recent days, Foundation attorneys successfully secured the reinstatement of Juan Vielma, a security guard for AKAL Security in El Paso, whom union officials had illegally suspended without pay for over a year for refusal to pay dues. Agreeing with charges filed by Foundation attorneys last November, a federal Administrative Law Judge ruled in June that SPFPA union officials had no legal authority to compel Vielma to pay dues.

Texas is one of 22 states that have a Right to Work law, ensuring that union membership and dues payment are strictly voluntary.

**Hartford, CT (July 24, 2007)** – The National Labor Relations Board (NLRB) has denied a local Colt Manufacturing employee’s request for a ruling now in his precedent-setting case that has already languished at the federal agency for four years.

With free legal help from attorneys at the National Right to Work Legal Defense Foundation, George Gally, a 40-year veteran Colt employee, originally filed unfair labor practice charges at the NLRB in March 2003. Gally is challenging the United Auto Worker (UAW) union’s nationwide policy of barring employees from paying for union political activities unless they object annually.

Rather than decide the long-pending case, the NLRB instructed its Region 34 to set a hearing date before an Administrative Law Judge, claiming that the record in the case is insufficient to issue a final decision.

In the Foundation-won U.S. Supreme Court *Communications Workers v. Beck* decision, the court recognized that workers have the right to refrain from formal union membership and cannot be forced to pay for activities other than monopoly bargaining. But UAW officials have eviscerated the Supreme Court’s Beck and related appellate court rulings by requiring Gally and his co-workers to renew their objections every year – a hurdle intended to discourage them from reclaiming their forced union dues.

Meanwhile, Gally has endured 16 years of illegal conduct by UAW officials. In December 2003, a federal Administrative Law Judge awarded Gally nearly $31,000 in compensation plus interest for pay lost after he was illegally fired at the order of UAW Local 376 union officials in 1991. Prior to his award, Gally filed the unfair labor practice charges challenging the UAW union officials’ annual objection scheme.

“Justice delayed is justice denied,” said Stefan Gleason, vice president of the National Right to Work Legal Defense Foundation. “By its pathetically slow processing of employee rights complaints, the NLRB helps UAW officials trap workers in union ranks. This situation underscores why Connecticut needs a Right to Work law that would make union affiliation and dues payment strictly voluntary.”

Gally’s case is one of many long-languishing cases at the NLRB, a federal bureaucracy long criticized for political in-fighting and institutional bias favoring compulsory unionism. In recent months, the U.S. Court of Appeals for the D.C. Circuit ordered the labor board to decide promptly another Foundation-assisted case that began 17 years earlier in 1989, when Schreiber Foods employees Sherry and David Pirlott first filed their challenge to being compelled to fund coercive union organizing drives.

Download the Board’s Order