National Right to Work Foundation Issues Special Legal Notice to Infinity Healthcare Employees Amid SEIU Strike Threat
Foundation warns workers that those wishing to continue caring for patients during a strike should resign their memberships before returning to work
Chicago, IL (September 2, 2023) – The National Right to Work Legal Defense Foundation has issued a special legal notice to the approximately 1,000 Illinois nursing home workers who may be impacted by Service Employees’ International Union (SEIU)-Healthcare Illinois union officials’ planned strike order. If SEIU officials order the strike, employees from 11 Infinity Healthcare nursing facilities in the Chicago area will be ordered off the job.
The legal notice informs Infinity Healthcare workers of their rights, including their right to not abandon their patients and to keep working despite the union-ordered strike. The notice discusses why workers across the country frequently turn to the National Right to Work Foundation for free legal aid in such situations.
“This situation raises serious concerns for healthcare employees who believe there is much to lose from a union boss-ordered strike,” the notice reads. “Employees have the legal right to rebuff union officials’ strike demands, but it is important for them to be fully informed before they do so.”
The full notice is available at www.nrtw.org/infinity
The notice outlines the process that Infinity Healthcare workers should follow if they want to exercise their right to return to work during the strike and avoid punishment by union bosses, complete with sample union membership resignation letters. The notice reminds workers that SEIU union officials have no disciplinary power over workers who are not union members, and advises Infinity Healthcare employees who wish to work during the strike to resign their memberships at least one day before returning to work.
“That is the best way to avoid potential union fines and other discipline,” the notice says.
Further, the notice reminds employees of their rights to cut off all union dues payments in the absence of a monopoly bargaining contract with the nursing home company. The notice encourages employees to seek free legal aid from the Foundation if they experience union resistance as they attempt to exercise any of these rights.
“Infinity Healthcare employees are likely aware of the impact this strike may have on the Chicago senior population, and may rightfully question whether the upcoming union-ordered strike is really best for employees, their families, and their patients,” commented National Right to Work Foundation President Mark Mix. “Infinity Healthcare employees should know they unequivocally have the right to reject union strike orders and continue to care for those in need.”
“Any nursing facility employee who wants to exercise her or her right to rebuff SEIU union officials’ sweeping strike order should immediately contact the Foundation for free legal aid should SEIU bosses violate their legal rights,” added Mix.
Philly Good Karma Café Employees Will Soon Vote on Whether to Boot Out Workers United Union Officials
Workers United has been targeted for removal by Starbucks and other coffee employees across country; vote slated for September 7
Philadelphia, PA (August 23, 2023) – Employees at two locations of Good Karma Café, an independent Philadelphia-based coffee shop, are requesting a vote to end the Workers United union’s monopoly bargaining power over workers. Good Karma employee Marco Camponeschi submitted a petition backed by his coworkers to the National Labor Relations Board (NLRB) Region 4 in Philadelphia with free legal aid from the National Right to Work Foundation.
Camponeschi’s petition contained signatures from enough Good Karma workers to trigger a vote to remove the union (or “decertification election”) under the NLRB’s rules. NLRB Region 4 this week scheduled the election to take place on Thursday, September 7, at Good Karma’s locations on 331 S. 22nd Street and 265 S. Broad Street in Philadelphia.
Because Pennsylvania lacks Right to Work protections for its private sector employees, Workers United union officials have the power to enter into an agreement that will compel Camponeschi and his coworkers to pay money to the union hierarchy as a condition of keeping their jobs. In contrast, in states with Right to Work laws, union membership and all union financial support are strictly voluntary and the choice of each individual worker.
The Good Karma employees’ election comes as coffee employees across the country are seeking votes to remove unwanted unions from their workplaces, most notably at Starbucks. Workers United is the same union that is waging an aggressive and high-profile unionization campaign on Starbucks, bolstered by the money and resources of the gigantic Service Employees International Union (SEIU). The New York Post reported in July that Workers United spent nearly $2.5 million on hiring “salts” and other union activists. “Salts” are covert union agents who obtain jobs at nonunion firms to agitate in favor of union control, and often quit soon after the union is installed.
“After the Workers United union was installed, there was a lot of employee turnover and we soon found ourselves very short-staffed,” Camponeschi commented. “Workers United union officials have been bad for the stability of Good Karma and have not stood up for the interests of me and my coworkers, and I’m sure that a majority of my coworkers will vote to move forward without their presence.”
Coffee Employees Nationwide Seek Foundation Aid in Exercising Right to Remove Unwanted Unions
In just the past few months, Starbucks employees in Manhattan, NY, Buffalo, NY, Pittsburgh, PA, Bloomington, MN, Salt Lake City, UT, and Greenville, SC, have all sought free Foundation legal aid in pursuing decertification efforts against Workers United union bosses at the NLRB. Foundation attorneys also assisted Seattle-based Storyville Coffee Company employees in a decertification effort against United Food and Commercial Workers (UFCW) union officials in July, but UFCW bosses disclaimed interest in the unit before an election could occur, likely to avoid an unfavorable election result.
The flurry of decertification attempts at Starbucks is occurring roughly one year after Workers United union officials unionized many of the coffee chain’s employees. Workers United union officials also gained power at Good Karma last April. Federal labor law forbids workers from decertifying a union for a year after a union’s installation, meaning many coffee workers are seizing on the earliest possible opportunity to rid themselves of the Workers United union’s “representation.”
Outside of coffee shops, union decertification efforts are becoming much more common. Currently, the NLRB’s data shows a unionized private sector worker is far more likely to be involved in a decertification effort as their nonunion counterpart is to be involved in a unionization campaign. NLRB statistics also show a 20% increase in decertification petitions last year versus 2021.
“Workers United union officials seem to have a penchant for rapidly expanding their control over employees without regard for their interests,” commented National Right to Work Foundation President Mark Mix. “It is thus unsurprising that coffee employees nationwide are banding together to vote Workers United out.”
“While we’re glad the NLRB plans to hold an election for Good Karma employees, it should be noted that NLRB officials across the country are blocking Starbucks employees from exercising that same right at the behest of Workers United union officials,” Mix added. “Workers should be in charge of their own right to vote out unwanted unions, and the NLRB should not stifle that right according to union officials’ whims. That’s especially important as the Biden NLRB seeks to make several rule changes which will make it harder for workers to vote out union officials.”
Greenville, SC Starbucks Employees Latest to Demand Vote to Remove SBWU Union from Workplace
One year after highly publicized unionization efforts, workers from at least five different states have begun efforts to remove SBWU
Greenville, SC (August 14, 2023) – An employee of a Starbucks Coffee location near Greenville-Spartanburg International Airport has submitted a petition to the National Labor Relations Board (NLRB), asking the federal agency to hold a vote among her colleagues to remove the Starbucks Workers United (SBWU) union from the workplace. The employee, Kacie Bory, is receiving free legal representation from National Right to Work Foundation staff attorneys.
Bory’s petition contains signatures from the requisite number of her coworkers to trigger a union decertification election under the NLRB’s rules. While South Carolina is a Right to Work state, meaning SBWU bosses can compel neither Bory nor her coworkers to pay union dues or fees as a condition of staying employed, SBWU is still empowered by federal law to impose a union contract on employees at the store who oppose the union. A successful decertification vote would strip union officials of that power.
“My coworkers and I are very disappointed with the performance of SBWU union officials. They’ve done a lousy job of communicating with me and my colleagues and also haven’t stood up for our interests in the workplace,” commented Bory. “I am confident that the majority of my colleagues will vote to send SBWU officials packing and we hope that the union will not try any legal maneuvers to derail this election.”
Greenville Starbucks Workers Join Burgeoning Worker Movement Against SBWU
Bory and her coworkers’ effort is the latest in a chain of SBWU decertification pushes across the country. In just the past few months, Starbucks employees in Manhattan, NY, Buffalo, NY, Pittsburgh, PA, Bloomington, MN, and Salt Lake City, UT, have all sought free Foundation legal aid in pursuing their decertification petitions at the NLRB.
The flurry of decertification attempts is occurring roughly one year after SBWU union agents engaged in an aggressive unionization campaign against the coffee chain’s employees. Federal labor law forbids workers from decertifying a union for a year after a union’s installation, meaning many workers are seizing on the earliest possible opportunity to rid themselves of the SBWU union’s “representation.”
A potential motivating factor for many of the Starbucks workers currently seeking to oust the SBWU lies in the fact that the union’s campaign on Starbucks included the hiring of “salts.” “Salts” are covert union agents that obtain jobs at non-union workplaces solely for the purpose of agitating in favor of union control. The New York Post reported in July that, according to a Labor Union News report, SBWU spent nearly $2.5 million on seeding Starbucks locations with “salts” and other activists.
Outside of Starbucks, union decertification efforts are becoming much more common. Currently, the NLRB’s data shows a unionized private sector worker is far more likely to be involved in a decertification effort as their nonunion counterpart is to be involved in a unionization campaign. NLRB statistics also show a 20% increase in decertification petitions last year versus 2021.
However, union officials have many ways to manipulate federal labor law to prevent workers from voting them out, including by filing unrelated or unverified charges against management. SBWU officials at the Greenville Starbucks have already filed a motion seeking the dismissal of Bory and her coworkers’ petition, which Foundation attorneys are opposing.
“The well-funded and highly politicized campaign to install union power at Starbucks is fast unravelling, as more and more workers are discovering that their interests deviate from those of union organizers, many of whom left soon after installing the union,” commented National Right to Work Foundation President Mark Mix. “While SBWU officials nationwide are using every trick in the book to try to block the workers they claim to ‘represent’ from voting on whether the union deserves to stay, Foundation staff attorneys will continue to fight for the exercise of this essential free choice right.”
Southwest Airlines Faces Second Round of Sanctions in Litigation Over Flight Attendant’s Discriminatory Firing at Union Behest
Company already faced sanctions for not making witness available for deposition, now faces discipline for misleading employees about judge’s order
Dallas, TX (August 14, 2023) – The U.S. District Court for the Northern District of Texas last week issued a second round of sanctions against lawyers from Southwest Airlines, stemming from a federal discrimination case in which flight attendant Charlene Carter sued both the airline and the Transport Workers Union (TWU) Local 556 for firing her over voicing religious objections to the union’s political stances. Carter, who is receiving free legal representation from National Right to Work Foundation staff attorneys, received a $5.1 million jury verdict in her case last June and a favorable court ruling last December.
District Court Judge Brantley Starr’s current order results from a motion for sanctions Carter’s attorneys filed in December 2022. Carter’s motion contended that Southwest management, in the wake of the December ruling against the airline, had failed to follow the District Court’s instructions to inform flight attendants that the airline “may not discriminate” against flight attendants on the basis of religion, and had instead issued a “Recent Court Decision” notice to flight attendants stating the airline “does not discriminate” on the basis of religion. Carter’s December motion argued that Southwest further breached the Court’s instructions by subsequently issuing an “Inflight Information On the Go” memo to flight attendants, conveying the airline would scrutinize their union-related and religious speech in the same way it did with Carter.
Judge Starr’s order from last week granted Carter’s motion for sanctions and castigated Southwest’s lawyers for blatantly ignoring the court’s instructions.
“…Southwest’s notice communicated that there’s nothing to see here—aside from the Court’s bequeathing Southwest a badge of honor for not discriminating (which the Court did not do). Not content with merely inverting the Court’s notice, Southwest also sent a memo to its flight attendants the same day, stating that its employees must abide by the types of policies over which Southwest fired Carter and that it believed its firing of Carter was justified because of those policies,” Judge Starr’s order reads. “It’s hard to see how Southwest could have violated the notice requirement more.”
“…Southwest devoted diligence and energy only to circumventing the Court’s order—not to complying with it,” reads the order, rejecting a substantial compliance defense proffered by Southwest’s lawyers. “The…documents with privileged information indicate that decision was willful—not accidental.”
Southwest Already Faced Sanctions for Not Making Witness Available
Judge Starr’s order this week, which Southwest says they will appeal, is not the first time Southwest has faced discipline for its conduct during this litigation. In November, the District Court slammed the airline with sanctions after it failed to make flight attendant Brett Nevarez available for a deposition in the case.
According to the November order granting sanctions against Southwest, the airline’s management did not modify Nevarez’s flight schedule so he could actually attend the deposition. “[T]he Court didn’t order Defendants to sternly exhort Nevarez. It ordered Defendants to ‘ma[k]e [him] available . . . for deposition.’ Defendants didn’t rearrange Nevarez’s flight schedule or otherwise take any action to ensure his availability,” the order said.
“Thus, the Court concludes that Defendants violated its discovery order to make Nevarez available for his deposition,” read the order.
“Southwest’s repeated recalcitrance toward following court orders is shameful but not particularly surprising,” commented National Right to Work Foundation President Mark Mix. “The airline’s management already cooperated with TWU union bosses in the discriminatory and illegal firing of Charlene Carter, so it was obvious long before the sanctions that the company is willing to flout the law and undermine the rights of its employees.”
“Hopefully the court’s most recent order provides hope to other independent-minded workers that their right to express their religious dissent against union and company political agendas cannot so easily be waved away,” Mix added.
New Flyer Employee Slams CWA Union with Federal Charges, Claims Union Lied to Employees to Attain “Majority Status”
Following suspect ‘card check,’ union bosses seek to invalidate worker-backed petition for secret ballot vote to oust union
Shepherdsville, KY (August 9, 2023) – An employee of bus manufacturer New Flyer has filed federal charges against his employer and the Communications Workers of America (CWA) union, maintaining that CWA officials illegally imposed union control over him and his coworkers despite the union lacking a demonstrated majority support among the workers. The employee, Gregory Mabrey, filed his charges at National Labor Relations Board (NLRB) Region 9 in Cincinnati with free legal aid from the National Right to Work Legal Defense Foundation.
Mabrey’s charges explain that CWA union officials gained power in his workplace through a process called “card check,” which bypasses the NLRB’s standard secret ballot election process for installing a union. Under card check, employees are denied the right to vote in private on whether they want the union in the workplace, and union officials can instead claim majority status by demanding union authorization cards directly from workers.
The card check scheme’s lack of privacy exposes workers to a variety of coercive behaviors from union officials who are seeking to collect cards from a majority of employees in a work unit. Workers often report being told signing the card only requests “more information” about the union or serves some other purpose, even though the card will be equivalent to a “vote” in favor of union representation. Workers have also experienced threats and unwanted home visits during card check campaigns.
Cards Union Bosses Used to Support “Majority Status” Claims Had Multiple Problems
Mabrey’s unfair labor practice charges report that his employer, New Flyer, recognized the CWA union despite multiple flaws with the union’s card check claim of majority status. The charges state that union officials “misrepresent[ed] to employees that the cards were for a single, restricted purpose other than to designate the Union as their representative,” and that “the Employer and CWA relied on authorization cards that employees revoked or cancelled prior to the date of recognition.”
To make matters even worse, the charges also point out that “the card check was based on a unit of employees that was smaller than the Employer-recognized bargaining unit.” This means that, even if CWA bosses hadn’t made misrepresentations or relied on cards that workers had actually revoked, the number of cards they submitted to support their claim of majority status may have been too small, even under the coercive card check regime.
Mabrey’s charges seek an NLRB prosecution of the union and employer for their respective roles in illegally granting CWA union officials monopoly bargaining powers over his coworkers.
NLRB Blocks Workers’ Attempt to Vote Out the Union, Even Amid Deception
Mabrey’s charges come as another New Flyer employee, Megan Sowder, is pressing for the NLRB to accept an employee-backed petition she submitted to the NLRB in June that asks for a secret ballot vote to remove the CWA union. Sowder sought to take advantage of a Foundation-backed reform the NLRB adopted in 2020, which gives workers a 45-day window to file for a secret ballot election after an employer notifies employees that it has recognized a union pursuant to a card check.
Filing for a secret ballot vote in this way counters the NLRB’s so-called “voluntary recognition bar,” which normally locks workers under union power for up to a year or more after a card check recognition.
However, as the Request for Review filed by Sowder’s Foundation staff attorneys points out, NLRB Region 9 wrongly dismissed Sowder’s petition. Although Sowder submitted the requisite number of signatures twice to support her petition for a decertification election (30% or more is required to trigger a vote), NLRB Region 9 dubiously claims that Sowder collected the signatures “too early” and that an arbitration meeting that modifies the unit also nullifies the petition. NLRB Region 9 even claims that it never received all the signatures, despite Sowder’s evidence of faxing them directly to NLRB Region 9.
“The Region’s error has caused severe prejudice to Sowder and the bargaining unit employees’ rights under [the National Labor Relations Act], and review should be granted to correct that error,” Sowder’s Request for Review to the full National Labor Relations Board in Washington, D.C., states.
Biden NLRB Plans to Eliminate Workers’ Ability to Challenge “Card Check” Drives
The New Flyer employees’ cases come as the Biden NLRB is poised to issue a final rule as soon as this month to overturn the 2020 Foundation-backed reforms that allow workers to challenge the imposition of union monopoly bargaining power via card check with a secret ballot election. Foundation attorneys filed comments opposing the Biden NLRB’s proposed rule to nix these provisions.
“This situation demonstrates exactly how rank-and-file workers’ rights will be further trampled if the Biden NLRB moves forward with its attempt to expand union bosses’ card check power and simultaneously restrict workers’ statutory right to hold decertificiation votes to remove unwanted unions,” commented National Right to Work Foundation President Mark Mix. “Even absent the misrepresentations CWA union bosses made to foist union so-called ‘representation’ on workers, such card check drives are inherently prone to union pressure tactics that would be grounds for invalidating an NLRB-supervised vote.”
“Meanwhile, despite a lack of evidence of true majority support, the NLRB has improperly denied two submissions of valid employee signatures from workers simply asking for a vote to challenge the invalid card check recognition,” added Mix. “It is not too late for the Biden Board to stop its rulemaking to eliminate the Election Protection Rule, and give rank-and-file workers some hope that their statutory right to decertify a union they oppose will not be steamrolled by the NLRB’s desire to protect incumbent union power.”
It’s Official: Oregon Masami Foods Workers’ Vote to Oust UFCW Union Officials is Certified
Despite union legal tactics delaying the certification of an NLRB decertification election, Masami Foods workers are free of unwanted union
Klamath Falls, OR (August 3, 2023) – A vote by workers at Masami Foods in Klamath Falls to remove United Food and Commercial Workers (UFCW) Local 555 union officials’ forced representation powers has been certified. A petition filed by employee Scott Child with the National Labor Relations Board Region 19 (NLRB) led to this successful vote. Child received free legal aid from the National Right to Work Legal Defense Foundation.
Child and his coworkers at Masami Foods filed for a decertification vote on March 2, 2023. Under federal labor law, workers can trigger such a decertification vote with the support of at least 30% of workers in a unionized workplace. The NLRB then scheduled a vote for May 11, 2023.
On May 11, Masami employees made their position on the union clear, voting 54-25 to remove the union from their workplace. However, UFCW union officials had previously filed a number of “blocking charges,” presumably to delay the NLRB’s certification of the results. As a result of these blocking charges, the vote certification was delayed until August 1, 2023, when the NLRB Regional Director certified the election results.
The case is an example of how the NLRB’s union decertification process is prone to union boss-created roadblocks. Foundation-backed reforms the NLRB adopted in 2020 made it somewhat easier for workers to remove unwanted union officials. However, the Biden NLRB is attempting to roll back these protections and make it much harder to decertify a union.
For example, the 2020 reforms blocked union officials from resubmitting overlapping charges, which often contain unverified and unrelated allegations of employer actions and delay the process further. Had these reforms not been in place, the three-month delay for these workers could have been extended much longer, possibly effectively indefinitely.
The Masami Foods decertification is another example of a growing movement among workers to remove incumbent unions from their workplace. Currently, the NLRB’s data shows a unionized private sector worker is far more likely to be involved in a decertification effort as their nonunion counterpart is to be involved in a unionization campaign. NLRB statistics also show a 20% increase in decertification petitions last year versus 2021.
“We are honored to have been able to help the Masami Foods workers exercise their rights under federal law to remove a union they clearly, overwhelmingly, oppose,” stated Mark Mix, President of the National Right to Work Legal Defense Foundation. “While the outcome is favorable, the union-instigated delays in certifying the results of the decertification vote highlight the lengths UFCW officials are willing to go to in order to maintain control over workers, even those who clearly want nothing to do with them.”
“The blocking charge tactics used by UFCW union officials in this case demonstrate how wrong it would be if and when the Biden NLRB reverses the Election Protection Rules that cut back on such ‘blocking charge’ abuses,” continued Mix. “Without those modest 2020 reforms, these workers would almost certainly still be trapped in union ranks they oppose with no end in sight.”
Employee Advocate Blasts Fourth Circuit Decision Giving ILA Union Power to Force Out Nonunion Workers at Charleston’s Leatherman Terminal
National Right to Work Foundation offers free legal aid to union-free workers whose jobs are threatened as the result of Biden NLRB ruling
Washington, DC (July 28, 2023) – The National Right to Work Foundation today blasted the Fourth Circuit Court of Appeals’ 2-1 decision in South Carolina Ports Authority v. National Labor Relations Board (NLRB). The decision upheld an NLRB reversal of an Administrative Law Judge’s ruling that the International Longshoremen’s Association (ILA) union’s actions violated federal law.
By embracing the Biden NLRB’s nearly limitless definition of “work preservation,” the Court of Appeals decision has greenlighted the ILA union’s scheme to sue any carrier that attempts to utilize Charleston, SC’s Hugh K. Leatherman Terminal until the union gains control of every job at the port.
Foundation President Mark Mix issued the following statement criticizing the ruling:
“By accepting the NLRB’s contorted definition of ‘work preservation’ to allow ILA union officials to gain control over port jobs that have never been under union control, the 2-1 Fourth Circuit decision has put the jobs of hundreds of union-free South Carolina state employees at Charleston’s Leatherman Terminal on the chopping block. It is outrageous that these jobs, created with the investment of over $1 billion in South Carolina taxpayer dollars, will now be handed over to ILA union bosses to protect their monopoly on port jobs that stretches from Texas to Maine.
“The South Carolina state port workers at Leatherman Terminal, whose jobs are under attack because of this decision, should reach out to the National Right to Work Foundation for free legal aid so they can explore their full legal options to defend their jobs and work opportunities.”
Union’s Aggressive Pursuit of Monopoly Power Will Lead to Hundreds Losing Their Jobs
In South Carolina Ports Authority v. NLRB, the Port Authority is challenging the Biden NLRB’s ruling (now affirmed by the Fourth Circuit’s split decision) that approved the ILA’s gambit to gain control of the Leatherman Terminal’s crane lift equipment jobs. That work is currently performed by state employees free from the union’s control, and those state employees have performed this work for the Port Authority for many years.
The Foundation, a nonprofit legal organization that provides free legal aid to employees facing compulsory unionism abuses, submitted a legal brief in the case in April, noting that “the inevitable result of the National Labor Relations Board’s erroneous 2-1 decision will be devastating to Charleston, South Carolina port workers who have chosen to work as non-union employees for the State of South Carolina or its Port Authority.”
The brief spelled out the consequences of the ILA union’s maneuver for Leatherman’s 270 state employees, who are protected by state law from monopoly union control. It explains that South Carolina spent over $1 billion to develop the terminal, but because of the ILA’s aggressive attempts to enforce its alleged monopoly at the port, “the only way for South Carolina’s $1 billion Leatherman Terminal to be usable would be for the State to turn the facility over to a private employer with an ILA contract and discharge the 270 State employees.”
The devastating effects for current employees wouldn’t stop there if the ILA is victorious in the case, the brief argued. The brief pointed out that, even if fired state workers were to seek new employment at Leatherman with a private contractor under the union’s control, the ILA would prioritize those workers far below existing union members because of union seniority provisions and hiring hall referral rules.
As the brief noted, the ILA union has an extensive history of exploitation. The New York Daily News reported in 2022 that ILA chiefs negotiated deals by which mob-linked longshoremen in the New York/New Jersey area could get paid for 27 hours of “work” per day. The ILA hierarchy organized such arrangements while trying to shut down ports like Leatherman which allow both unionized and union-free workers to work side-by-side.
Salt Lake City-Area Starbucks Workers Latest Seeking Vote to Remove SBWU
Utah Starbucks workers join other stores by filing decertification petition to remove “Workers United”
Cottonwood Heights, UT (July 27, 2023) – Employees at the Cottonwood Heights Starbucks in Utah have just submitted a petition to the National Labor Relations Board (NLRB), asking the federal agency to hold a vote to end the Chicago and Midwest Joint Regional Board Workers United/SEIU, also known as Starbucks Workers United (SBWU), officials’ monopoly “representation” powers at their workplace. Indya Fiessinger, who filed the petition on behalf of a group of her coworkers, is receiving free legal representation from National Right to Work Foundation staff attorneys.
With the petition filed, the NLRB should now promptly schedule a secret ballot election to determine whether a majority of workers want to end union officials’ power to impose a contract on the workers.
Utah is a Right to Work state meaning union payments must be voluntary and cannot be required as a condition of employment. However, under federal law, SBWU officials’ monopoly bargaining powers still allow them to impose a union contract on all employees at the store, even those who are not union members and who oppose SBWU’s so-called “representation.” A successful decertification vote would strip union officials of that extraordinary monopoly bargaining power.
The Cottonwood Heights Starbucks workers are the latest group of Starbucks workers seeking to exercise their right to vote out unwanted union officials. Foundation attorneys are currently assisting Starbucks employees who filed decertification petitions in Manhattan, NY, Buffalo, NY, Pittsburg, PA, and Bloomington, MN.
Federal labor law prevents workers from exercising their right to remove an unpopular union for at least one year after one is installed. In each instance, the decertification petition was filed shortly after the one-year period concluded. For example, the NLRB only certified SBWU officials as the monopoly bargaining “representative” in late June 2022 at the Cottonwood Heights location.
The growing movement among Starbucks partners to eject unwanted union officials from their stores is part of a larger trend. The NLRB’s own statistics also show a 20% increase in decertification petitions last year versus 2021. However, union officials still have many ways to manipulate federal labor law to prevent workers from voting them out, including by filing unrelated or unverified charges against management.
“We call on SBWU officials and the NLRB to respect the wishes of these workers who simply want a prompt decertification vote to decide whether or not they want the union in their workplace,” commented Mark Mix, President of the National Right to Work Foundation. “The right of workers to oust a union that lacks majority support is supposed to be fundamental to federal labor law, otherwise the NLRB is just protecting incumbent union bosses to the detriment of actual rank-and-file workers’ wishes.”
Seattle Mariners Retail Employees Vote Out UFCW Union, Defeat Union Boss Attempt to Block Election Using “Card Check”
UFCW Local 3000 swept out in “double header” as Mariners and Storyville Coffee workers both successfully remove unwanted union
Seattle, WA (July 26, 2023) – Seattle Mariners employees have successfully voted 50-9 to remove United Food and Commercial Workers (UFCW) Local 3000 union officials from power at the Mariners’ retail stores in T-Mobile Park and the Westlake area of Seattle. The news follows the National Labor Relations Board’s denial of a union attempt to overturn the election. The employees received free legal aid in their effort from the National Right to Work Legal Defense Foundation.
The Mariners’ retail workers filed a petition in April asking National Labor Relations Board (NLRB) Region 19 to hold a vote on whether the union should be removed. The petition followed UFCW union officials’ imposition of union power over the retail shop employees via an October 2022 “card check” drive. “Card check” is a coercive and abuse-prone scheme in which union officials can bypass the secret ballot union election process, and instead attempt to obtain a majority of union authorization cards by demanding them directly from workers.
Over the objection of UFCW union officials, the NLRB Regional Director in May ordered a union decertification election at the request of the Seattle Mariners’ retail employees. Union bosses subsequently filed a Request for Review at the NLRB in Washington, D.C., seeking to halt the election. They argued that a so-called “voluntary recognition bar” should be imposed to block the Mariners’ employees from exercising their right to vote on the union’s removal. However, the NLRB denied the union’s Request for Review on July 25. After NLRB Region 19 certifies the 50-9 vote result, the Seattle Mariners’ retail employees will finally be free from the unwanted UFCW union.
Foundation-Backed Election Protection Rule Safeguards Employees’ Rights
The retail workers were able to challenge union officials’ card check drive thanks to the Election Protection Rule (EPR), a reform to the election rules enacted by the NLRB in 2020 following Foundation advocacy. While union officials pre-EPR were able to manipulate the so-called “voluntary recognition bar” to block employees from voting out a union for at least a year after an employer recognized a union’s supposed card check victory, the EPR granted employees a 45-day window in which to petition for a secret ballot election to challenge the card check result.
The NLRB Regional Director’s May decision noted that, even though the Mariners’ employees filed the petition outside the 45-day window, the “bar” following the card check recognition would still not apply because neither the union nor the employer had followed the proper procedure to ensure that the retail employees were informed of their right to challenge the card check drive. “There is thus no bar to an election in the instant matter,” the decision read.
The process by which workers can challenge card check drives by requesting secret ballot elections was originally established by Foundation attorneys in the Dana Corp. NLRB case. Though this decision was later overturned by the Obama NLRB, “Dana elections” were codified in the EPR.
Predictably, the wildly pro-Big Labor Biden NLRB has announced rulemaking to eliminate the Election Protection Rule, as well as rulemaking to impose harsh penalties on employers that challenge card check drives. Such changes would let unions seize power virtually automatically after a card check drive, with no opportunity for employees to have a secret ballot vote instead.
Seattle Storyville Coffee Employees Also Remove UFCW 3000 Union
Just hours after the NLRB denied UFCW Local 3000 officials’ Request for Review in the Seattle Mariners case, employees of Storyville Coffee Company in Seattle received word that UFCW Local 3000 officials had filed paperwork to end their control at the shop. Storyville employees, led by Paris Hunt, also petitioned for a union decertification vote with free Foundation legal aid. Apparently fearing another loss at the ballot box, UFCW Local 3000 officials pulled out as opposed to facing the will of the workers in an election.
“While the Seattle Mariners’ retail employees were able to shut down UFCW bosses’ scheme to force them under union control without even a vote, workers’ right to get a secret ballot vote is now under severe threat from the Biden NLRB, which is eager to empower the Administration’s union boss allies,” commented National Right to Work Foundation President Mark Mix. “NLRB officials should look to the Mariners’ employees as real-life examples of workers whose rights would be stripped away if the Election Protection Rule is done away with at Big Labor’s behest.”
“No worker should be trapped under the ‘representation’ of a union they oppose, and at the very least every employee should have a right to cast a private ballot before union bosses gain power in their workplace,” Mix added.
National Right to Work Foundation Files Brief Defending Law to Protect Teachers’ First Amendment Rights
Court of Appeals reviewing teacher union bosses’ lawsuit against Indiana law to ensure compliance with Foundation-won Janus 2018 Supreme Court precedent
Chicago, IL (July 24, 2023) – The National Right to Work Legal Defense Foundation has just submitted a brief at the Seventh Circuit Court of Appeals in Anderson Federation of Teachers, et al. v. Rokita, defending an Indiana Law that protects teachers’ First Amendment rights against a lawsuit brought by teacher union bosses. The case is an appeal of a District Court judge’s preliminary injunction issued at the behest of union lawyers to stop the bill from going into effect.
At the District Court, the Anderson Federation of Teachers challenged Indiana’s State Enrolled Act 251 and 297. Those Acts require written consent from teachers, including an acknowledgement of their constitutional right to refrain from financially supporting a union, before taxpayer-funded government payroll systems can be used to deduct union dues from teachers’ paychecks.
The U.S. Supreme Court recognized that employees have a First Amendment right to refrain from subsidizing union speech in the 2018 Janus v. AFSCME Supreme Court decision. That case was argued and won by National Right to Work Foundation staff attorneys.
In Janus, the Court ruled that forcing public sector workers to subsidize union activities as a condition of employment violates the First Amendment. The Court also held that no union dues or fees can be taken from a public worker’s wages without a knowing and intelligent waiver of that employee’s First Amendment right not to pay, and that such a waiver “cannot be presumed.”
The brief filed by National Right to Work attorneys defends the Indiana law and urges the Seventh Circuit Court of Appeals to overturn the injunction, arguing the lower court ruling made three critical errors in justifying its ruling.
“It is outrageous that teacher union bosses in Indiana apparently believe they are entitled to use taxpayer-funded payroll systems to seize money directly from teachers’ paychecks – without the State taking steps to ensure that those teachers’ constitutional rights are protected,” said Mark Mix, President of the National Right to Work Legal Defense Foundation. “Precedents in the Seventh Circuit and elsewhere make it clear that the injunction should be rejected, and this law should be allowed to take immediate effect.”
“It would be fully within the prerogative of Indiana lawmakers to ban union officials from deducting dues from government workers’ paychecks all together, or ban all monopoly bargaining to ensure individual teachers are not subjected to unwanted union so-called ‘representation,’” Mix continued. “If anything, Indiana teacher union bosses should count themselves lucky lawmakers have so far not been more proactive in protecting teachers’ First Amendment free speech and freedom of association rights.”
