Union Chiefs Bestow Cushy Union Jobs on Spouses, Kids, Siblings

When loudly defending current federal policies that authorize the termination of employees for refusal to join or bankroll a union, Big Labor bosses like to claim that, as ugly as such coercion seems, it is actually for employees’ “own good.” 

But a simple review of the disclosure forms bosses of larger private-sector unions are required to file with the U.S. Labor Department and the IRS suffices to show that employees’ best interest is often the furthest thing from union bosses’ minds. 

In a December 31 article for the Washington Examiner, journalist Robert Schmad discussed what he had recently learned about how International Union of Operating Engineers (IUOE/AFL-CIO) union President James T. Callahan spends workers’ forced-dues money largely by reviewing such disclosure forms.

Many High-Paid Union Officers ‘Have Never Even Been on a Job Site’ 

In addition to raking in nearly half a million dollars a year in forced dues-funded union compensation, Mr. Callahan keeps three high-paid “family members” on the IUOE payroll. James J. Callahan, for example, makes $250,000 annually as an IUOE “director,” and John Callahan collects roughly $215,000 a year as an “equipment assistant.” 

As National Right to Work Committee President Mark Mix told Mr. Schmad after being asked to comment on Boss Callahan’s evident misuse of unionized employees’ money, many of the high-paid union “executives” who get their jobs through cronyism “have never even been on a job site.”

Besides being hit up for the handsome salaries of Boss Callahan’s family members, rank-and-file IUOE forced dues-payers have handed over millions of dollars to pay for top IUOE bosses’ stays at “beach-front resorts, including multiple trips to locations in Hawaii.” 

And the overwhelmingly private-sector heavy equipment operators, mechanics, building maintenance workers, etc., who constitute the IUOE rank and file also helped cover the cost for the “well over $10 million” IUOE kingpins reportedly spent supporting federal Democrat politicians in 2023 and 2024. 

Boss Callahan and his cohorts turned over millions of dollars to the Harris Victory Fund, the Democratic Congressional Campaign Committee, and the Democratic National Committee. 

“As a recent analysis by the National Institute for Labor Relations Research showed, it’s highly likely a majority of the private-sector, blue-collar unionized workers who voted in last year’s presidential race voted for Donald Trump,” said Mr. Mix. 

“But Boss Callahan and other Big Labor bosses who head basically private-sector unions made up of blue-collar workers didn’t hesitate to spend those workers’ money to help elect Kamala Harris anyway.” 

National Right to Work Law Would Go a Long Way Toward Ending Abuses

Unfortunately, the IUOE hierarchy’s manifest disregard for what rank-and-file unionists want and need is the norm for Organized Labor today. 

For example, a January 7 Examiner article by Mr. Schmad following up on his December 31 IUOE exposé reported that the paper’s investigators had recently identified “family employment conflicts of interest” in a dozen large U.S.-based international unions besides the IUOE. 

Unions in which Big Labor nepotism seems to be a serious problem include the United Food and Commercial Workers, the International Brotherhood of Electrical Workers, and the International Association of Machinists. (All these unions are AFLCIO-affiliated.) 

“A key reason so many union bosses feel free to give six-figure union jobs that require little or no actual work to their siblings, spouses and kids is because they know federal law forces ordinary workers to fork over dues to Big Labor, even if the workers know their money isn’t being well spent,” said Mr. Mix. 

“That’s why passage of the National Right to Work Act would go a long way toward ending the array of pervasive union-boss abuses cited by Robert Schmad in his two recent articles highlighting Big Labor corruption. 

“National Right to Work legislation — which is expected to be introduced in the 2025-26 U.S. House and Senate by the time this Newsletter edition reaches its readers — would make it illegal in all 50 states to compel a worker to bankroll an unwanted union to get or keep a job. 

“And, as pro-Right to Work U.S. Sen. John McClellan said 60 years ago, ‘compulsory unionism and corruption go hand in hand.’”

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