Free Republic

Supreme Court's Janus ruling finally gives a voice to 5M workers The government can no longer force its employees to pay a union as a condition of their employment. That’s what the Supreme Court decided on Wednesday in the case Janus v. American Federation of State, County and Municipal Employees. This decision is life-changing for about 5 million government workers in 22 states, who have been forced to give part of every paycheck to a government union just to do their jobs. Workers who chose not to join a union in those states were still required to pay agency fees,...

On heels of high-profile walkouts, new organizing and spiking approval for unions, union leaders see decision as rallying point to unrig economy and put workers first WASHINGTON - June 27, 2018 - The following statement was issued by leaders and members of NEA, AFSCME, SEIU and AFT following the decision by the U.S. Supreme Court to rule against working people and in favor of billionaire CEOs and corporate interests in Janus v. AFSCME Council 31, holding that requiring fair-share fees in the public sector violates the First Amendment of the Constitution. As millions of American workers recommit to their...

The U.S. Supreme Court’s decision in Janus v. AFSCME Council 31 is a ruthless and brazen attack on the freedom of working people. It caps off a shocking Supreme Court term, which saw the justices threaten the rights of women, LGBTQ people, Muslims, and now public service workers. The 1.6 million members of AFSCME keep American communities safe and strong through their selfless service. We are social workers, EMTs, corrections officers, school custodians and more. We plow the roads, drive the school buses and pick up the trash. But that is apparently not enough to get a fair hearing before...

From an email: Dear SEIU Local 1000 Members: Today the Supreme Court issued the long-awaited decision in the case of Janus vs. AFSCME. As expected, we witnessed the highest legal authority in the United States disregard 40 years of their own legal precedents protecting workers’ rights and instead choose to continue to erode unions. The Janus vs. AFSCME case was argued by the National Right to Work Legal Defense Foundation – a group whose sole purpose is to break unions. This case, like many others, is supported and funded by billionaires and corporations who began the “Right to Work” movement....

Plaintiff Mark Janus passes in front of the U.S. Supreme Court after a hearing on February 26, 2018 in Washington, DC. The court is scheduled to hear the case, Janus v. AFSCME, to determine whether states violate their employees' First Amendment rights to require them to join public sector unions which they may not want to associate with. Alex Wong | Getty Images News | Getty Images Plaintiff Mark Janus passes in front of the U.S. Supreme Court after a hearing on February 26, 2018 in Washington, DC. The court is scheduled to hear the case, Janus v. AFSCME, to...

The Supreme Court ruled Wednesday that pubic sector unions for state and local employees can’t force non-members to pay a “fair-share” union fee. In a 5-4 ruling Tuesday, the court said the extraction of agency fees from non-consenting public sector employees violates the First Amendment. The case centers on an Illinois law, similar to those in 22 other states, that allow public-sector unions to collect a “fair-share fee” from employees for non-political activities like collective bargaining, regardless of whether those employees belong to the union or not. Mark Janus, a state child support specialist at the center of the case,...

JUSTICE ALITO delivered the opinion of the Court. Under Illinois law, public employees are forced to subsi­ dize a union, even if they choose not to join and strongly object to the positions the union takes in collective bar­ gaining and related activities. We conclude that this arrangement violates the free speech rights of nonmem­ bers by compelling them to subsidize private speech on matters of substantial public concern. We upheld a similar law in Abood v. Detroit Bd. of Ed., 431 U. S. 209 (1977), and we recognize the importance of following precedent unless there are strong reasons for...

White House directives aim to strip federal workers of right to representation WASHINGTON – President Trump is attempting to silence the voice of veterans, law enforcement officers, and other frontline federal workers through a series of executive orders intended to strip federal employees of their decades-old right to representation at the worksite, the American Federation of Government Employees said today.“This is more than union busting – it’s democracy busting,” AFGE National President J. David Cox Sr. said. “These executive orders are a direct assault on the legal rights and protections that Congress has specifically guaranteed to the 2 million public-sector employees...

President Trump on Friday signed a series of executive orders making it easier to fire federal government workers and rolling back the prerogatives of unions that represent them. Andrew Bremberg, the head of the White House Domestic Policy Council, said the president was “fulfilling his promise to promote more efficient government by reforming our Civil Service rules.” But the push also reflects conservatives’ long-running suspicion of the federal bureaucracy, one that the president’s advisers have been outspoken in channeling. Shortly after Mr. Trump took office, Stephen K. Bannon, then his chief strategist, called for “the deconstruction of the administrative state.”...

Sen. Kamala Harris (D-CA) announced Monday she will boycott the UC Berkeley graduation ceremony, where she was scheduled to deliver the keynote speech, due to a massive union-backed labor strike that forced the rescheduling of over 12,000 surgeries, cancer treatments, and appointments. Harris tweeted, “If we are going to live up to our ideals as a nation, it’s critical we focus on economic equality and economic justice. One key is making sure everyone has access to a good job, with fair wages, and safe working conditions.” According to the San Francisco Chronicle, campus chancellor Carol Christ will address the nearly...

When I started out in education, the teachers union reps would tell me, “We are here to protect you.” However, what I learned on the job—and after leaving the profession altogether—is that unions protect unions, not the individual workers, and definitely not the kids. In many states, first-year teachers pay the union dues, even if they do not formally join the union, but get no protection. The classic phrase among veteran teachers is “you can be fired for the cut of your hair.” As for the core interests of these public sector legal mobs, teachers’ union strikes have erupted all...

While the Supreme Court heard oral argument, last week, in Janus v. American Federation of State, County and Municipal Employees (AFSCME), the court of public opinion focused not so much on the constitutionality of the law in question, i.e. justice, but instead on the partisan impact of the decision, i.e. politics. The case concerns Mark Janus, a child-care specialist for the Illinois Department of Healthcare and Family Services, who refuses to join the union. Nonetheless, by state law, Janus is forced to pay “agency fees” to AFSCME. Those agency fees are 78 percent of what a union member pays in...

Working people rallied in cities across the country over the weekend to call for an end to policies that attack union members and rig the economy and political system against working families, as the Supreme Court began hearing arguments yesterday in a case that threatens to overturn a decades-old precedent and undercut public workers. AFL-CIO President Richard Trumka spoke at the Day of Action in Philadelphia: We’re all fighting back. Public and private. We are one union family and no one, I mean no one, pushes us around. Our freedoms rise from the Constitution of the United States, which was signed...

The Supreme Court hears arguments Monday in the case of Mark Janus, a child support specialist from Illinois, who is suing AFSCME because he has no interest in financially supporting the union’s political activities. Since Janus is not a member of the union, he doesn’t pay the same amount in dues as union members. But thanks to a Supreme Court decision in 1977, he is forced to pay the union “agency fees,” feeding the coffers of an organization he wants nothing to do with. The high court will determine whether these agency fees are unconstitutional. Since freedom of association is...

The effort to expand cynically named "right to work" laws says a lot about what is wrong with politics in our country. Disguised as protecting workers, the real goal is to silence workers’ voice, reduce our bargaining power and make our jobs more precarious. It’s about power—social, political and economic power.

Bringing guns into schools ‘does nothing to protect’ our students, educators from gun violence Washington, DC - February 21, 2018 - In a listening session at the White House today, Donald Trump proposed to arm teachers and school staff in an attempt to prevent mass shootings.The following can be attributed to NEA President Lily Eskelsen García:“Bringing more guns into our schools does nothing to protect our students and educators from gun violence. Our students need more books, art and music programs, nurses and school counselors; they do not need more guns in their classrooms. Parents and educators overwhelmingly reject the...

FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE January 30,2018WASHINGTON – Defying staffing mandates and the need for increased hiring to safeguard prisons, this week the Bureau of Prisons (BOP) made public it is initiating a process of eliminating jobs within the agency. The mandate will slash roughly 14 percent of positions from correctional facilities. The proposed cuts are coming at a time of severe understaffing in most of its prisons.  BOP has left thousands of authorized correctional workers’ positions vacant all year, endangering inmates in its custody, control, and care.  “President Trump came into office preaching about the need for a safer America, but instead he is...

The Democrats want open borders, since their future election chances depend on massive demographic shifts through mass third-world immigration. To their consternation, the #SchumerShutdown fight whimpered out because the public doesn’t want more immigration. That avenue for increasing their voter base is closing on them. Democrats are ignoring another declining base of support to their hurt: organized labor. For decades, labor unions ensured victory. Minority Leader Chuck Schumer won his Senate Seat because labor unions held him crushed his Republican opponent in 1998. Unfortunately, despite two major opportunities for long-term pro-labor reforms, unions have seen Democrats taking them for granted....

Strong unions help to create strong schools for students and even stronger communities that benefit all of us. This, we know.For generations, unions have been the best path to the middle class for working people, especially people of color and women. But in this rigged economy, unions are under attack, and those attacks are coming not just from the White House and Capitol Hill. They’re happening at the ballot box and at the Supreme Court with cases like Janus.Today, the National Education Association and the American Association of University Professors submitted an amicus brief today with the Supreme Court in...

AFGE union president also warns against steep cuts to non-defense programs WASHINGTON – Federal government programs and services benefiting millions of Americans are in jeopardy due to a potential government shutdown and steep cuts in non-defense spending, the head of the largest union representing federal government workers told Congress. American Federation of Government Employees National President J. David Cox Sr. urged lawmakers in a Jan. 18 letter to keep the government running beyond Jan. 19, when current funding expires.“It is very clear that a federal government shutdown could inflict serious pain on everyday working people,” Cox said in the...