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.

New NLRB Made to Order For Big Labor

New NLRB Made to Order For Big Labor

'Recess' Appointee: Workers Shouldn't Be Allowed to Reject Unions (Source: April 2010 NRTWC Newsletter) On February 9, union lawyer Craig Becker, nominated by President Obama to fill one of three vacancies on the powerful National Labor Relations Board (NLRB), turned out to be too radical even for a number of normally pro-Big Labor U.S. senators. Because of several union-label senators' defections, union lobbyists and the White House fell eight Senate votes short that day of the 60 they needed to cut off Right to Work debate and bring the Becker nomination up for final consideration. This vote was a significant victory for National Right to Work Committee members and supporters, who had led the fight against Mr. Becker since his selection was first announced last spring, and their allies. However, top union bosses were furious that, because of well-mobilized Right to Work opposition, Big Labor Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid (D-Nev.) had failed to ram through the Becker nomination. Almost immediately, Richard Trumka, chief of the AFL-CIO union conglomerate, publicly demanded that the President circumvent the Senate and install Craig Becker on the NLRB temporarily through a "recess" appointment. Other union bigwigs like Andy Stern, czar of the massive Service Employees International Union (SEIU), were also cheerleading for Mr. Becker. For years, Mr. Becker has served as counsel for both the SEIU union and the AFL-CIO. Craig Becker: Union Monopoly Should Be Mandated, Even if Most Workers Don't Want It And on Saturday, March 27, President Obama did the bidding of the union hierarchy by recess appointing Mr. Becker, along with the other union lawyer he has nominated to the NLRB, New Yorker Mark Pearce.

Obama Team: More Forced Unionism ‘Needed’

Obama Team: More Forced Unionism ‘Needed’

Massive Union Job Losses Make Case For ‘Card-Check’ Legislation? (Source: February 2010 NRTWC Newsletter) On January 22, the U.S. Labor Department issued a report providing a snapshot, in numbers, of some of the latest damage wrought to employees, employers, and the economy as a whole by government-imposed union monopoly bargaining. The report shows that, in one major business sector after another, the jobs of workers who labor under forced unionism were far more likely to be destroyed during the 2008-2009 recession than were the jobs of union-free workers. In the hard-hit telecommunications sector, for example, the number of jobs subject to union monopoly bargaining plummeted by 20.7% last year, over four times the decline for union-free jobs. Unionized construction jobs plunged by 20.0%. Over the same period, union-free construction jobs fell by 12.4%. 'These Numbers Show a Need For Congress to Pass’ S.560/H.R.1409 The number of Big Labor-controlled manufacturing jobs declined by 14.3%, nearly four percentage points more than the decline for union-free jobs in manufacturing. Overall, unionized private-sector employment sank by 9.4% last year, a decline more than double the total private-sector job loss of 4.4%.