Welcome to the National Right to Work Legal Defense Foundation weekly news update. In this week's report we update our continuing legal battle to protect Michigan's Right To Work laws in addition to helping 15 More Caterpillar employees file charges against the Machinists union.
This week the Foundation announced a special program for Chattanooga, TN's Volkswagen Employees and legal actions involving the Machinists and SEIU unions.
The Right to Work Foundation is Offering Free Legal Aid to Chattanooga Volkswagen Employees in response to a public report that the United Auto Workers union reportedly pressuring Volkswagen to allow UAW to bargain for all the plant's employees.
Mark Mix said, "The National Right to Work Foundation has seen again and again the UAW union hierarchy pressure companies to cut backroom deals designed to push workers into a union without employees' support."
"For example, UAW officials vetoed pay increases and secretly pre-negotiated bargaining concessions at the expense of Freightliner workers in North and South Carolina in exchange for company assistance in unionizing the workers."
Workers who feel they are being unfairly pressured when deciding whether or not to associate with the UAW union may request free legal aid from National Right to Work Foundation staff attorneys by calling 1-800-336-3600 or on the Foundation's website at www.nrtw.org.
In California, the Service Employees International Union (SEIU) officials have violated the Foundation-won Federal Settlement dating back to 2011.
With free legal aid from National Right to Work Foundation staff attorneys, a Sutter Roseville Medical Center respiratory care practitioner filed another federal charge against the SEIU union for violating a federal settlement.
Back in 2011, Mary Massen won a National Labor Relations Board settlement against SEIU's United Healthcare Workers -- West union.
In Chicago, IL 24 Caterpillar Workers Filed Federal Charges Against Machinist Union Officials for illegal Strike Fines after Union officials demanded hundreds of thousands of dollars in strike fines from Caterpillar employees.
The two dozen Caterpillar workers filed federal charges against a local Machinists union for violating their rights and levying retaliatory strike fines against them after they continued to work during the strike last summer.
With legal help from Foundation attorneys, the have been filed with the National Labor Relations Board. Foundation attorneys anticipate more charges will be filed for other Caterpillar workers at the facility.
However, union bosses recently levied fines totaling in the hundreds of thousands of dollars against the workers for continuing to work during the strike.
One worker alleges that union militants physically assaulted his wife and child.
This week's update covers action involving the AFT, Plumbers, and Machinists unions.
To protect his constitutional rights against, a New York educator fights the New York State United Teachers union. National Right to Work Legal Defense Foundation staff attorneys took the first step by filing New York Public Employment Relations Board charges against the NEA-AFT local.
Teachers' union officials ignored Miller's rights and continue to collect full union dues from his paychecks and have failed to provide without providing any Supreme Court-precedent procedural protections.
Even though Delaware does not have Right to Work protections making union affiliation completely voluntary, the U.S. Supreme Court has long held that workers have the right to refrain from full-dues-paying union membership.
Ignoring constitutional protections, Plumbers and Pipe Fitters union officials deducted full union dues from these employees' paychecks.
After federal charges were filed on behalf of these employees, union officials agreed to back off their threats and intimidation of the workers, and to refund illegally seized union dues.
"Plumbers Local 74 union officials flushed these workers' rights down the toilet in order to keep their forced dues gravy train going," said Mark Mix.
In another victory for National Right to Work Foundation staff attorneys, this time on the West Coast, school bus drivers slam the brake on AFT union officials' threats.
In Gresham, Oregon, a group of local school bus drivers won a federal settlement including back pay.
Oregon School Employees Union officials had illegally demanded that demanded that all drivers join the union and pay full union dues or be fired.
The settlement stems from a federal charge six of the drivers filed with the National Labor Relations Board Regional Office in Seattle with free legal assistance from National Right to Work Foundation staff attorneys.
AFT union officials confiscated full union dues from the drivers' paychecks without informing the workers of their right to refrain from formal union membership. Union officials continued to confiscate full union dues from both drivers who refused to join the union.
After the six drivers represented by Foundation attorneys filed the federal charge, union officials were forced to settle the case and also agreed to refund back pay to four other drivers.
An update to one of our recent previous reports... With the help of National Right to Work Foundation staff attorneys, another Maryland IKEA employee filed federal unfair labor practice charges against IKEA and the International Association of Machinists union. Herman Brunswick, Jr. alleges that union officials failed to notify him of his rights not to join the union and pay full dues and illegally threatened to have him fired for refusing to pay up.
Brunswick's complaint follows similar charges filed by two of his coworkers, Kelvin Smith and Robert Rammel, last January.
Not only did IAM officials and IKEA fail to notify Brunswick and his coworkers of their rights, they actively misled employees about their obligations to the union. IAM officials claimed that joining the union and paying full dues were required as a condition of employment. Faced with the prospect of losing his job,
When Brunswick asked about his right to refrain from financially supporting the IAM's political activities, he was told by a Machinists union official that he had no such rights. After he learned otherwise, Brunswick resigned from the union and objected to paying for union political activities. The IAM, however, refuses to honor his objections.
Brunswick's charges will now be investigated by the National Labor Relations Board, a federal agency responsible for administering private sector labor law.
"Union officials actively misled IKEA employees about their rights in order to collect more forced dues cash for the IAM's coffers," said Mark Mix
We are now hearing the usual voices of protest in Detroit in the wake of Michigan governor Rick Snyder appointing an outside expert to take over financial management of the near-bankrupt city.
Detroit is the largest city in American history to be seized in this fashion and turned over to an outside manager.
Reported deficit of the city is $327 million dollars and long-term liabilities are in the range of $14 billion.
But no matter to the unions, politicians, and bureaucrats who have been at the helm for years as the city has spiraled into the depths of the black hole in which it now finds itself. These interest groups, who have been the driving force behind this fiscal travesty, have one interest – to keep their respective beds feathered. Citizens and public welfare be damned.
So they cry foul when adult supervision is sent in to take on the formidable rescue task.
The man Governor Snyder has put in charge, Kevin Orr, is a high-powered Washington, DC black attorney who, according to USA Today, “has extensive experience in municipal finances, public infrastructure projects, public pension matters, and litigation.”
Al Sharpton’s man in Detroit, Rev. Charles Williams III, has called Orr an “Uncle Tom.”
The travesty now taking place in Detroit should be carefully watched by all Americans. This is not a one off exception to the rule, but is just the latest case study of a pathology dragging down the whole nation. And it’s a pathology for which low-income minority Americans are paying the dearest price.
Economist Dr. Walter Williams has noted that the common denominator of the nation’s ten poorest cities with populations over 250,000, of which Detroit is number one, is that they all have been controlled by liberal, Democratic mayors for decades, the majority of which have been black.
Detroit’s former mayor, Kwame Kilpatrick, son of former congresswoman and Congressional Black Caucus member Carolyn Cheeks-Kilpatrick, is now in jail awaiting sentencing after being convicted on 24 counts for running a criminal enterprise out of the mayor’s office.
The point is that we need to discern a rule of thumb here: the more that human lives are governed by compulsion and entitlement rather than freedom, choice, and personal responsibility, the outcomes are uniformly undesirable.
Compulsion and entitlement, meaning liberal government and union power, means less service, less efficiency, more fraud, corruption, and waste, and insensitivity to changes in the marketplace.
If we are going to save our cities, we need to get back to what built them in the first place: freedom, enterprise, and entrepreneurship.
It took a hurricane and a flood to wake up and turn around the basket case that was New Orleans. Ray Nagin, New Orleans’ mayor during Katrina, who blamed everyone but himself for the debacle that occurred, was just indicted on 21 counts of corruption.
New Orleans is now undergoing a renaissance. The public school system was turned over to a charter operator and the number of failing schools has dropped and test scores are improving.
Low taxes and a new spirit of entrepreneurship, spurred by such imaginative initiatives as Idea Village, has kept unemployment in New Orleans at less than two-thirds the national average.
Let’s get going with ideas like urban enterprise zones, championed by the late Congressman Jack Kemp, and now by economist Art Laffer, and give preferential tax treatment to employers and employees in blighted urban areas.
Abolish the minimum wage in these areas and give kids a chance at entry-level jobs and learning critical job skills.
The possibilities are only limited by our courage and imagination. But only one theme will save our large, urban cities, and their poor minority citizens.
Get them out from under political and union control and restore freedom, competition, and entrepreneurship.
Welcome to the National Right To Work's weekly report. The National Right To Work Legal Defense Foundation averages about 200 active cases at any given time. Our goal is to help keep you informed about these cases as they move through the legal system.
This week's update covers action involving the NBC Sports, the Communications Workers of America union, and California Nurses Association which is affiliated with National Nurses Organizing union.
Welcome to the National Right To Work's Weekly Wrap-up for the Fourth Week of February. The National Right To Work Legal Defense Foundation averages about 200 active cases at any given time. Our goal is to help keep you informed about these cases as they move through the legal system.
This week's update covers action involving the Teamsters union and the Laborers International union.
We talk endlessly about improving public schools. So what's standing in the way? Stanford Professor Terry Moe identifies the biggest obstacle -- teachers unions.
Professor of Political, Science, Senior Fellow at the Hoover Institution, Ph.D., University of Minnesota
Now that ObamaCare is actually happening, labor unions who made a big push for the legislation three years ago are no longer rallying behind it. Unions are seeing healthcare promises made by President Obama broken left and right in the form of higher costs, more bureaucracy, loss of doctors Obama promised they could keep, slashing of healthcare benefits and more.
Sean Hannity continued to focus on union violence tonight and the plight of Fox News contributor Steven Crowder, who was punched while in the middle of a union protest in Michigan against right-to-work laws. Hannity brought Crowder back on his show tonight, along with union supporter Andy Sullivan, who not only opposed both Hannity and Crowder's positions on unions, but accused Crowder of releasing an edited tape and telling him he got what he deserved.
Hannity warned that the union violence might be an omen of things to come, including "blood in the streets" and "at some point, people may die." He touted how unions are losing, even in states where unions are considered particularly strong, and criticized President Obama for not condemning violence on the left.
Hannity brought up to Crowder how the people involved in the Michigan protest yesterday vigorously denied they tore down the tent, which Crowder practically laughed at. He dismissed criticism that he edited the video, and even if he did, he pointed to "hours" of footage of similar union violence on YouTube. Sullivan said Crowder's video was "well-edited," saying he saw video of Crowder pushing someone down.
Crowder immediately responded to Sullivan, and both of them got in a shouting match that led to this exchange (with quite a bit of crosstalk): Crowder: He was attacking a tent with women and children in it! People were pulling him off! Sullivan: Oh, he was attacking a tent! Then what were you doing? Crowder: We were there trying to prevent people from being hurt in the tent! Sullivan: Listen, Steve, you deserve what you got! Crowder: You are a liar, sir! Sullivan: You deserve what you got.
Sullivan scolded Crowder for taking potshots at union members who are just trying to speak out to protect their livelihoods. He said that union leadership are undoubtedly "taking advantage of" their members, but the violence Crowder says is widespread just isn't so. Crowder described the scene yesterday as a "melee" and said even if he had lacked restraint, it would not have justified his getting assaulted.
Sullivan said that he doesn't "need to be schooled by you" on unions, to which Crowder shot back with, "You just were!" Hannity asked Sullivan why right-to-work isn't fair, which Hannity framed as "freedom of choice." Sullivan agreed that there should be less "dictatorship" in the way unions are run, but said right-to-work laws are just too extreme.
Steven Crowder immediately made headlines after a video surfaced of him being repeatedly punched when he ventured to interview pro-union protesters in Michigan. On Wednesday (12/12/12) morning, Crowder paid a visit to Fox & Friends to discuss (and condemn) what happened.
Steve Crowder is attacked by Union Thugs when he asked them about 'Right to Work'. These are the people who helped elect and support Barack Obama and Barack Obama supports them 100%.
Originally posted at American ThinkerIn a "shared little-known facts about herself" interview, which revealed that along with sleeping with her dog when the president is out of town, the first lady admitted she partakes of the foods she forbids her husband to eat. Michelle told US magazine that while out campaigning she's tried" [e]verything from local farmers' market produce in North Carolina to fried Twinkies in Iowa."
Yet, prior to Barack Obama setting out on his summer Midwest bus tour, Michelle forbade him to indulge in fried Twinkies at state fairs. Now, Hostess, the makers of Ding-Dongs, politically incorrect Ho-Hos, Wonder Bread, and friable Twinkies, is officially out of business. Therefore, thanks to Mrs. Obama's dietary restriction, the President of the United States may never be able to enjoy a battered, deep fried specialty on a stick.
Although the iconic snack cake manufacturer had "already reached a contract agreement with its largest union, the International Brotherhood of Teamsters," it was too late. According to Hostess CEO Gregory F. Rayburn "thousands of members in [its] second-biggest union went on strike late last week after rejecting in September a contract offer that cut wages and benefits."
Rayburn apologized to dedicated Sno Ball fans, saying, "We deeply regret the necessity of today's decision, but we do not have the financial resources to weather an extended nationwide strike. Hostess Brands will move promptly to lay off most of its 18,500-member workforce and focus on selling its assets to the highest bidders."
Hopefully the Hostess buyout doesn't end up going to another Chinese bidder because somehow Rinkies and Fing Fongs just don't sound as appetizing as Twinkies and Ding Dongs.
As for the 18,000+ ex-Hostess personnel, "Most employees who lose their jobs should be eligible for government-provided unemployment benefits." Laid-off snack cake workers can now line up behind the thousands of other Americans who overwhelmingly decided to continue moving forward on the unemployment line for four more years.
Hostess said its "wind down would mean the closure of 33 bakeries, 565 distribution centers, approximately 5,500 delivery routes and 570 bakery outlet stores in the United States." Besides leaving flour, sugar, and unused hairnets behind, the demise of Hostess will also mean that state fairs will no longer get mass deliveries of Twinkies to fill those deep fryers.
As luck would have it, state fair concession stand owners still have time to hoard Twinkies because distribution centers "will remain open for several days to sell already-baked products."Stale Twinkies are not a problem because, urban legend or not, the spongy cakes do have a reputation for extended shelf life. Just ask Roger Bennatti, a Science Teacher at George Stevens Academy in Blue Hill, Maine. Roger "wanted to find out just how long a Twinkie could survive, so he left one sitting on his blackboard for three decades."
Unlike this past year, when Barack's state fair tasting tour was limited by Michelle to the "chocolate moose 'butter cow' statue," if a few Twinkies are secured for posterity there's a glimmer of hope that Obama may be allowed to indulge, just one last time, in what's now a historic delicacy.
Either way, thankfully, "Twinkies were included in the U.S. Millennium Time Capsule representing an object of enduring American symbolism." Good thing, because in the words of the George Rayburn, thanks to Hostess's second-biggest union, "It's over. This is it." Sadly, the same can be said of Barack Obama's America.
So the next time a time capsule is loaded up with iconic American symbols, it might be appropriate to bury a fried Twinkie alongside the no-longer-indestructible American flag and a copy of the recently outmoded U.S. Constitution.
3. Liberal media: The performance of Candy Crowley and others who acted as a tag team for Obama, acting more like lap dogs than as journalists. Among other things, the fact they ignored the scandals of the Obama administration has blinded the American electorate, and they exerted lots of leverage in the final results of Election 2012.
2. Big Labor: Unions accused of pursuying power grab. Chicago teachers strike (left hundreds of thousands of students without instruction), SEIU, UAW, Longshoremans Association (cooking up a port strike), the demise of Hostess Bakery ... all have helped solidify political power at the expense of the rank and file.
1. Stephanie Cutter on CNN: Cutter ran a dishonest campaign during the 2012 political season with her incessant lies told throughout the campaign season. She redefined the saying, "How low can you go?" In a very competitive year for political turkeys, she vaulted to the top of the list.
Liberal labor unions took another victim: Hostess Brands and the iconic Twinkie. Now they are talking about striking at Wal-Mart on Black Friday. Do liberals value laziness more than a hard day's work? Find out on this ZoNation.
Unions are now flexing their muscle, targeting ports, airlines, and stores just as holiday travel and the shopping season kick into high gear. Adding to that, billionaire George Soros is reportedly urging people to join anti-Walmart protests on Black Friday, even if they don’t work for Walmart. Critics claim it’s all part of a massive effort to unionize Walmart’s 1.4 million employees nationwide, which could bring in billions in union dues.
According to Michelle Malkin, these strikes aren’t about protecting workers, but are about protecting entrenched big labor power. During an appearance on Your World, Malkin called the protests a “toxic combination of these left-wing activist groups funded by George Soros … along with a rag tag group of Occupiers across the country who’ve been fomenting this kind of agitation for agitation’s sake for more than a year now.”
As many as 1000 Service Employees International Union (SEIU) workers at Los Angeles International Airport (LAX) are considering going on strike on Thanksgiving eve in what is the busiest travel day of the year.
Andrew Gross-Gaitan, the director of the Southern California Airports Division of SEIU, said the protest would be in response to an LAX contractor that failed to comply with the city’s Living Wage Ordinance.
Hostess Brands -- the maker of such iconic baked goods as Twinkies, Drake's Devil Dogs and Wonder Bread -- announced Friday (11/16/2012) that it is asking a federal bankruptcy court for permission to close its operations, blaming a strike by bakers protesting a new contract imposed on them.
Hostess' nearly 18,500 workers will lose their jobs as the company shuts 33 bakeries and 565 distribution centers nationwide, as well as 570 outlet stores. The Bakery, Confectionery, Tobacco Workers and Grain Millers International Union represents about 5,000 Hostess employees.
Detroit, MI - 32.5% of the population under the poverty line. Hasn't elected a Republican mayor since 1961.
Buffalo, NY - 29.9% of the population under the poverty line. Hasn't elected a Republican mayor since 1954.
Cincinnati, OH - 27.8% of the population under the poverty line. Hasn't elected a Republican mayor since 1984.
Cleveland, OH - 27.0% of the population under the poverty line. Hasn't elected a Republican mayor since 1989.
Miami, FL - 26.9% of the population under the poverty line. Has *never* elected a Republican mayor.
St. Louis, MO - 26.8% of the population under the poverty line. Hasn't elected a Republican mayor since 1949.
El Paso, TX - 26.4% of the population under the poverty line. Has *never* elected a Republican mayor.
Milwaukee, WI - 26.2% of the population under the poverty line. Hasn't elected a Republican mayor since 1908.
Philadelphia, PA - 25.1% of the population under the poverty line. Hasn't elected a Republican mayor since 1952.
Newark, NJ - 24.2% of the population under the poverty line. Hasn't elected a Republican mayor since 1907.
Welcome to the National Right to Work Legal Defense Foundation weekly news update. In this week's report we update our continuing legal battle to protect Michigan's Right To Work laws in addition to helping 15 More Caterpillar employees file charges against the Machinists union.
We are now hearing the usual voices of protest in Detroit in the wake of Michigan governor Rick Snyder appointing an outside expert to take over financial management of the near-bankrupt city.
Union members upset with health care law, rising costs.
We talk endlessly about improving public schools. So what's standing in the way? Stanford Professor Terry Moe identifies the biggest obstacle -- teachers unions. 
of Political, Science, Senior Fellow at the Hoover Institution, Ph.D., University of Minnesota
Now that ObamaCare is actually happening, labor unions who made a big push for the legislation three years ago are no longer rallying behind it. Unions are seeing healthcare promises made by President Obama broken left and right in the form of higher costs, more bureaucracy, loss of doctors Obama promised they could keep, slashing of healthcare benefits and more. 
Sean Hannity continued to focus on union violence tonight and the plight of Fox News contributor Steven Crowder, who was punched while in the middle of a union protest in Michigan against right-to-work laws. Hannity brought Crowder back on his show tonight, along with union supporter Andy Sullivan, who not only opposed both Hannity and Crowder's positions on unions, but accused Crowder of releasing an edited tape and telling him he got what he deserved.
on his summer Midwest bus tour, Michelle forbade him to indulge in fried Twinkies at state fairs. Now, Hostess, the makers of Ding-Dongs, politically incorrect Ho-Hos, Wonder Bread, and friable Twinkies, is officially out of business. Therefore, thanks to Mrs. Obama's dietary restriction, the President of the United States may never be able to enjoy a battered, deep fried specialty on a stick.
3. Liberal media: The performance of Candy Crowley and others who acted as a tag team for Obama, acting more like lap dogs than as journalists. Among other things, the fact they ignored the scandals of the Obama administration has blinded the American electorate, and they exerted lots of leverage in the final results of Election 2012.
Liberal labor unions took another victim: Hostess Brands and the iconic Twinkie. Now they are talking about striking at Wal-Mart on Black Friday. Do liberals value laziness more than a hard day's work? Find out on this ZoNation.
As many as 1000 Service Employees International Union (SEIU) workers at Los Angeles International Airport (LAX) are considering going on strike on Thanksgiving eve in what is the busiest travel day of the year.
Hostess Brands -- the maker of such iconic baked goods as Twinkies, Drake's Devil Dogs and Wonder Bread -- announced Friday (11/16/2012) that it is asking a federal bankruptcy court for permission to close its operations, blaming a strike by bakers protesting a new contract imposed on them.
Detroit, MI - 32.5% of the population under the poverty line. Hasn't elected a Republican mayor since 1961.
