Committee Members Actions Trip Up Government Union Sneak Play

Committee Members Actions Trip Up Government Union Sneak Play

(Source: August 2010 NRTWC Newsletter) Public-Safety Forced Unionism Still High on Capitol Hill Agenda The American people do not support Big Labor's legislative scheme to establish a new federal mandate imposing union "exclusive representation" (monopoly bargaining) over state and local police, firefighters, and other public-safety employees nationwide. And powerful union-label politicians like U.S. House Speaker Nancy Pelosi (D-Calif.) and U.S. Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid (D-Nev.) know this public-safety scheme (H.R.413/S.3194) is unpopular. That's why they have repeatedly tried to sneak it through Congress. Most recently, in June, Ms. Pelosi and her top lieutenants cut a deal with AFL-CIO President Richard Trumka and other union bigwigs to attach H.R.413, the House version of the Police/Fire Monopoly-Bargaining Bill, to a massive spending bill that provides funding for U.S. troops. International Association of Firefighters (IAFF) union boss Harold Schaitberger openly admitted to helping concoct the scheme to tack H.R.413 on to H.R.4899, the Fiscal Year (FY) 2010 Supplemental Appropriations Act, in a June 30 message to officers of his union subsidiaries. Early last month, the National Right to Work Committee obtained a copy of Mr. Schaitberger's communication. Firefighters Union Chief 'Argued Strongly' For War Supplemental Strategy Mr. Schaitberger reported that he had "argued strongly" for attaching H.R.413 "to the War Supplemental funding proposal for our troops in Afghanistan." The backroom deal between House leaders and the union hierarchy allowed the public-safety forced-unionism measure to come to the floor so quickly that Right to Work members and their allies had virtually no time to mobilize for the vote.

Michelle Malkin: Obama’s Big Labor ethics loophole

[stream provider=youtube flv=http%3A//www.youtube.com/watch%3Fv%3D8ia-l1RASG8 img=x:/img.youtube.com/vi/8ia-l1RASG8/0.jpg embed=false share=false width=350 height=250 dock=true controlbar=over bandwidth=high autostart=false /] Michelle Malkin highlights the non-existent ethical standards applied to Obama Big Labor politcal appointees like  SEIU/AFL-CIO lawyer Craig Becker who Obama appointed to the National Labor Relations Board (NLRB): Everything you need to know about President Obama’s fraudulent ethics pledge can be summed up in four words: SEIU lawyer Craig Becker. It’s no surprise that Becker now refuses to hold himself accountable for the ethics pledge he himself signed in April. As the past two years have taught us, Team Obama’s operational slogan is: Rules are for fools. The contractual ethics commitment states: “I will not for a period of two years from the date of my appointment participate in any particular matter involving specific parties that is directly and substantially related to my former employer or former clients, including regulations and contracts.” Yet, Becker has participated in numerous NLRB cases involving the SEIU and its affiliates — and is parsing the definition of “former employer” by arguing that local SEIU chapters are “separate and distinct legal entities” that don’t fall under the ethics rules. The National Right to Work Foundation, which has fought both national and local SEIU officials in court on behalf of rank-and-file workers’ rights, eviscerates Becker’s lawyerly blather. SEIU’s own constitution considers local affiliates “constituent subordinate bodies” of the national union, the foundation notes. “Moreover, in 2009 over 85 percent of the SEIU’s receipts came from a per capita tax on the locals’ membership dues and fees. The national union even has the power to assume control over its locals if they do not conform to International policies.”
Obama Labor Bureaucrats to Bypass Congress?

Obama Labor Bureaucrats to Bypass Congress?

'Electronic' Voting Would Facilitate 'Card Check'-Style Abuses Three of the four current NLRB members who were appointed or reappointed by President Obama are veteran union lawyers. All three are expected to vote in lock-step to expand Big Labor's forced-unionism privileges. (Source: July 2010 NRTWC Newsletter) Since the beginning of 2009, Big Labor has had a cheerleader in the Oval Office. At the same time, ample majorities of both chambers of the U.S. Congress have been willing to vote for virtually any power grab sought by union officials, as long as they could do so without running into intense, across-the-board constituent opposition. Consequently, top union bosses have expected to see enacted in the current Congress legislation that would help them sharply increase the share of all private-sector workers who are under union monopoly-bargaining control. Their original vehicle for achieving this objective was S.560/H.R.1409, the so-called "Employee Free Choice Act." Sponsored by union-label Sen. Tom Harkin (D-Iowa) and Congressman George Miller (D-Calif.), S.560/H.R.1409 would grease the skids for Big Labor workplace takeovers in several ways. Most famously, it would effectively end secret-ballot elections in union organizing drives, replacing them with so-called "card checks." That means, if S.560/H.R.1409 became law, union organizers would have far more