When it comes to the critical policy issue of employees’ Right to Work, whether or not they personally choose to support a union financially, International Brotherhood of Teamsters (IBT) President Sean O’Brien is no different from other power-hungry union bigwigs.
Along with AFL-CIO President Liz Shuler, United Autoworkers (UAW) President Shawn Fain, etc., Mr. O’Brien despises the 26 state Right to Work laws that are currently on the books.
The mere fact that these laws, many of them passed with the National Right to Work Committee’s active support, protect roughly 57 million private-sector American employees from the threat of losing their jobs if they refuse to join or bankroll an unwanted union infuriates Mr. O’Brien.
He is determined to get rid of all Right to Work laws.
National Right to Work Committee President Mark Mix commented: “While no one should doubt Sean O’Brien’s commitment to the cause of promoting forced unionism at all times and in all places, he has come down in a different place from the vast majority of his fellow union bosses with regard to tactics.
“Liz Shuler, Shawn Fain, et al. are clearly convinced they can help hasten the day when all Right to Work protections for employees are obliterated by venting their hatred, again and again, for political candidates who have pro-Right to Work track records, including, of course, former President Donald Trump.
“Mr. O’Brien’s goal is the same. But he is attempting, at least for now, to get there by ‘making nice’ with Mr. Trump and a handful of other GOP politicians, even as the overwhelming majority of Teamster political contributions continue to go to rabidly pro-forced unionism Democrat candidates.
“He is hoping thereby to convince the GOP’s 2024 nominees for President and Vice President — Mr. Trump and Ohio U.S. Sen. J.D. Vance — to repudiate, openly or tacitly, the unmistakably pro-Right to Work record the first Trump Administration compiled between January 2017 and January 2021.
“It is understandable that the Trump Vance campaign would want to avoid facing this year the same across-the-board Big Labor opposition Trump-Pence faced in 2016 and 2020, as long as it could be done without paying too high a price.
“But selling out Right to Work would be a complete betrayal of the GOP base. A new nationwide Rasmussen poll, commissioned by the Committee, shows Republican registered voters support the Right to Work principle by a mind-boggling 86% to 8% margin.
“Frankly, it would be a bone-headed move for the Trump-Vance campaign to ignore the wishes of a 10-to-one majority of GOP voters in order to make Sean O’Brien happy.”
It may well be that, as recently as June, when Mr. O’Brien was formally invited to speak at the 2024 Republican National Convention (RNC), Mr. Trump and his advisors still hoped they could get a Teamsters endorsement without having first to flip-flop with regard to federally authorized forced unionism.
If so, Mr. O’Brien laid all such hopes to rest during the 17-minute speech he delivered to the RNC on the evening of July 15.
Several minutes into his spiel, the Teamster czar emphasized to bemused RNC delegates and other attendees exactly when he and his cohorts had “started walking” with Republican U.S. Sen. Josh Hawley, who received a much ballyhooed $5,000 from the IBT Political Action Committee this spring.
Even this modest contribution, amounting to 0.02% of Mr. Hawley’s reported contributions for his 2024 reelection campaign, could happen only after the senator had turned his back on Right to Work supporters and renounced his 2018 campaign pledge to support federal forced dues repeal, explained Mr. O’Brien.
“Aligning oneself with Sean O’Brien is not remotely ‘pro-worker,’” said Mr. Mix. “This is a man who, by his own account, has no respect for workers’ rights or the law.
“In 2014, as an officer of IBT Local 25 in Massachusetts, Mr. O’Brien publicly warned union members not to run against Joe Bairos, a Rhode Island IBT boss and an ally. Any worker who dared to run against Mr. Bairos would ‘need to be punished’ and have a ‘major problem’ after the election, said Mr. O’Brien.
“Just a few months ago, he was at it again, publicly vowing to deploy ‘legal or illegal’ tactics to ensure ‘no Teamster crosses picket lines’ in the future.
“Sean O’Brien is not a leader of workers. He’s a thug.”
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