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1. Weingarten’s War on Reform Slams Pennsylvania Kids

   Posted on Feb 27, 2014 by LaborPains.org Team

   The American Federation of Teachers and its boss, Randi Weingarten, have waged a national war on public school reform that spans decades. Driven by the maxim, “Nice political career you have, shame if anything were to happen to it,” the nation’s most militant teachers union fights advocates for better public schools from New York to Los Angeles.

   Today’s target is Pennsylvania, where the AFT is running ads attacking Gov. Tom Corbett’s education reforms. You see, Philadelphia school officials (which are controlled by a state-appointed School Reform Commission) are currently in negotiations with the Philadelphia Federation of Teachers  which is an AFT local. And the new chair of the School Reform Commission, former Democratic City Councilman Bill Green, wants concessions from the union so the district can do more, even as the district closes its budget deficit.

   Republicans who control the state legislature even expressed a willingness to offer the district more state support if the proposed work rule changes went forward. Of course, money for children is nothing to Randi and her minions if it comes with strings that might lead to accountability: Another AFT local is endangering a $40 million grant to Pittsburgh schools by its obstinacy in implementing reforms that it agreed to in negotiations.

   

   And the AFT has the bold-faced effrontery to lay blame for money flying away at the feet of Pennsylvania Gov. Corbett, in the accompanying ad (which ran in the Patriot-News, a Pennsylvania newspaper).

   In reality, Corbett’s proposed 2014 budget includes a $400 million boost to Pennsylvania schools funding. If anything, it’s the AFT (for the reasons above) that is standing in the way of money going to Pennsylvania’s students.

   This is a sorry position for teachers—not their union leaders, like Weingarten—to find themselves in. While the state looks to shore up school budgets, their union is standing in the way, trying to protect bad teachers in the process.

   Interestingly, a proposed piece of state legislation would protect public school teachers from having to subsidize political attacks like the AFT’s. A bill is pending that would require public-sector unions in Pennsylvania to solicit affirmative contributions rather than use a publicly funded check-off to fund their political operations. It resembles the “paycheck protection” provision of the federal Employee Rights Act, a bill which would allow private-sector employees to refrain from supporting unions’ political operations. (Most federal labor laws don’t affect public-sector unions, which are governed by state law.)

   And like its federal cousin, which is supported by 83 percent of union households, a recent Susquehanna poll found that a majority of union households favor the Pennsylvania proposal. If Randi, her Pennsylvania minions, and the AFT continue to put keeping bad teachers in the classroom ahead of reform, teacher quality, and money for children, expect that support to rise.

   Categories: AFTCenter for Union FactsPolitical MoneyTeachers Unions

2. Randi Rolls into Newark

   Posted on Feb 26, 2014 by LaborPains.org Team

   Newark Public Schools face a serious problem: Enrollment in the struggling state-administered district is projected to plummet in the coming years, and with that revenues will decline. The state and the city both are unable to cover the shortfall, so some teachers will need to be let go.

   And that creates another problem, especially since the American Federation of Teachers, through its local the Newark Teachers Union, is involved. School administrators have petitioned the state of New Jersey for a waiver to that state’s “LIFO”—Last In First Out—teacher seniority law, which requires districts to make layoffs purely based on quantity of time served. And while administrators want to keep effective teachers young and old in the classroom, Randi Weingarten’s policy keeps bad teachers in the classroom.

   According to NJ Spotlight, administrators hope that a waiver from the state’s union-backed law would allow them to spare all teachers rated “highly effective” from fiscally necessary layoffs. Needless to say, Randi—she who “would protect a dead body in the classroom”—isn’t happy. She said in a statement:

   It will enable [administrators] to mass-fire Newark’s teachers […] This isn’t what students need or teachers deserve, and it creates more distrust in a community already laden with it.”

   But that isn’t true, as Education Week’s Stephen Sawchuk notes. In fact, allowing performance evaluations to save lower-paid, less-tenured, but highly effective teachers while high-paid, tenured, but poor teachers get terminated actually reduces the number of teachers who have to be laid off.

   Randi’s wrath therefore looks like yet another union power gambit aimed at Newark’s schools chief, Cami Anderson. Similar efforts by Randi and her minions have unmade reform efforts in New York City and Washington, D.C. Will Newark be next?

   Categories: AFTCenter for Union FactsTeachers Unions

3. UAW Flops in Tennessee

   Posted on Feb 25, 2014 by LaborPains.org Team

   Big news in the labor world: The United Auto Workers lost a secret-ballot vote to organize workers at the Volkswagen assembly plant in Chattanooga, Tennessee. The UAW and its parent federation, the AFL-CIO, aren’t taking the defeat lying down, as The Wall Street Journal reports:

   So far, the unions’ reaction to the defeat has been to fight back. AFL-CIO President Richard Trumka said in a statement that, “the ferocity of the anti-union forces only reinforces the fact that there is a powerful new form of organizing emerging.” The Communications Workers of America issued a statement Sunday saying “Chattanooga is the new Madison, Wisconsin,” referring to the bruising battle in that state with Republican Gov. Scott Walker a few years ago that led to the loss of collective-bargaining rights for many public employees there.

   The UAW has also filed claims with the recently re-constituted National Labor Relations Board (NLRB), trying to get the vote overturned. The UAW claims that since third parties offered their input on how employees should vote, the vote shouldn’t count. It’s a questionable theory, but the NLRB—now legally stacked with union-friendly Obama appointees—has vitiated legal precedents before.

   Indeed, the peculiar circumstances of the UAW’s Volkswagen campaign suggest the union should have done better than in so-called “laboratory” conditions. The UAW had the tacit support of management — about the only thing VW did to make UAW’s job harder was permitting a secret-ballot vote rather than UAW’s desired card-check — and promoted the legally dubious European “works council” model. As the Journal’s Holman Jenkins observes:

   Workers were told a vote for the UAW wasn’t really a vote for the UAW—merely necessary under U.S. law to establish a German-style works council. Workers wouldn’t even have to pay dues under Tennessee’s right-to-work law.

   So what went wrong? One worker told the Dallas Morning News that the UAW’s political program—pilloried by union opponents as the “United Obama Workers”—was one thing he wouldn’t abide: “I’m a Christian and a conservative and I refuse to give my (union dues) to things I oppose, like Planned Parenthood, gun control and the Democratic Party.” Unions like the UAW spend over 90 percent of their political funds electing Democrats and supporting liberals, even though 40 percent of union households consistently vote Republican.

   So we get two lessons from the “Battle of Chattanooga.” First, secret ballot votes are crucial for allowing employees to have their voices heard, especially when management is “neutral” or tacitly supporting the organization effort. Second, unions’ highly partisan political programs can hurt their efforts to do their primary job of representing employees.

   Both these lessons could be codified by a proposed piece of federal legislation, the Employee Rights Act (ERA). The bill would require secret ballot votes to certify unions, a position supported by over 80 percent of registered voters. Unions would also be required to get affirmative consent before using dues money for political purposes, a position also supported by over 80 percent of registered voters. With employee rights likely to be at the fore in the November election campaigns, shouldn’t employees not as fortunate as Volkswagen’s—over 90 percent of unionized workers didn’t get the chance to vote on whether their workplace would be unionized—get their say through the ERA?

   Categories: Center for Union FactsEmployee Rights ActUAW

4. New Times Square Billboard Blames AFT President Randi Weingarten for America’s Education Decline

   Posted on Feb 24, 2014 by LaborPains.org Team

   Washington, D.C. – As part of its ongoing campaign against the toxic effects of teacher unions on U.S. education, the Center for Union Facts has placed a billboard just off Times Square calling out American Federation of Teachers (AFT) President Randi Weingarten for contributing to America’s education decline. The recently released results of the OECD’s triennial Program for International Student Assessment showed that American students slipped again relative to their international peers in the subjects of math, science, and reading.

   The billboard (viewable here) is located on 42^nd Street between 7^th and 8^th Avenues.

   The billboard features two pictures of children who are struggling in the classroom with a larger image of Weingarten beside them. The headline asks, “Who’s to blame for kids who can’t count or read?” It then prompts viewers to “Ask Randi Weingarten and the teachers union,” before directing them to visit AskRandiWhy.com.

   “Randi Weingarten and the teacher unions have for decades now placed their interests before those of America’s children, and the effects are on full display,” said Richard Berman, executive director of the Center for Union Facts. “Children in the United States continue falling further behind their international peers in the critical subjects of math, reading, and science, a trend that will continue without fundamental reform.”

   Berman concluded, “Weingarten and the AFT have plagued America’s schools long enough. It’s time for them to go.”

   More information is available online at AskRandiWhy.com.

   Categories: AFTPress ReleaseTeachers Unions

5. Union THUGs Face the Fuzz

   Posted on Feb 19, 2014 by LaborPains.org Team

   Last year, we reported on a concerning story out of Philadelphia. A Quaker meetinghouse that was being built by non-union labor was burned down, and local police found that it was “absolutely” related to a union labor dispute.

   Today, the federal Department of Justice announced it agreed. The U.S. Attorney for the Eastern District of Pennsylvania won indictments and federal agents made arrests of ten members, including several officials, of Ironworkers Union Local 401 for alleged racketeering and related offenses that include the Quaker meetinghouse arson. The Justice Department release reads:

   Eight of the 10 individuals named in the indictment are charged with conspiring to use Ironworkers Local 401 as an enterprise to commit criminal acts. […] The indictment details incidents in which the defendants threatened or assaulted contractors or their employees and damaged construction equipment and job sites as part of a concerted effort to force contractors to hire and pay Local 401 workers, even when those workers performed no function. Among the criminal acts set forth in the indictment is the December 2012 arson of a Quaker Meetinghouse under construction in Philadelphia.

   And despite the best efforts of the AFL-CIO and other labor unions to soften the “union thug” image, Local 401 was allegedly all too happy to live it out in reality. The release continues:

   The defendants relied on a reputation for violence and sabotage, which had been built up in the community over many years, in order to force contractors to hire union members. It is alleged that the defendants created “goon” squads, composed of union members and associates, to commit assaults, arsons, and destruction of property. One such squad referred to itself as the “The Helpful Union Guys,” or THUGs.

   You read that right. One Local 401 “goon squad” allegedly called itself the THUGs.

   Ironworkers 401 may have crossed the line from “reputation” to actual violence, but other union leaders actively wax nostalgic about the reputation. We recently noted American Federation of Teachers Local 1 (a.k.a. Chicago Teachers Union) President Karen Lewis recalled fondly days when unions were more militant: “The labor leaders of that time, though, were ready to kill. They were. They were just–off with their heads. They were seriously talking about that.”

   If convicted, the THUGs of Ironworkers 401 and their alleged accomplices face sentences of up to 130 years. With unions still facing charges for violence, is it any surprise that over 90 percent of American voters believe that violent union threats must be criminalized at the federal level? The Employee Rights Act would do just that.

   Categories: AFL-CIOCenter for Union FactsCrime & CorruptionEmployee Rights ActLegalViolence

6. Meet the Latest Union-Front Spokesperson: “WORKER”

   Posted on Feb 17, 2014 by LaborPains.org Team

   Over the weekend, a union-backed coalition in Michigan made an elementary mistake. “RAISE Michigan,” a front group for a conglomerate of liberal groups, worker centers, and labor unions, put out a statement announcing the beginning of a campaign to raise the Michigan state minimum wage and betrayed an unspoken truth about the new labor movement. The Detroit News reports:

   The first press release sent out by Raise Michigan — a coalition of groups including Michigan United and the Restaurant Opportunities Center-Michigan — included a poignant, if canned quote.

   Said Raise Michigan’s statement: “My family can’t survive on $7.40 an hour,” said WORKER, “It’s not fair that I work full-time, and be living in poverty. Everyone who is working full-time deserves to live with dignity.”

   Oh boy. Far from grassroots organizations, union and worker center front coalitions are more of the same top-down left-wing agitation that drove the labor movement into its current predicament — sending out a statement in the name of “WORKER” is just an embarrassing revelation of that. It got worse—the News called the coalition’s decision to fix its release by putting the words in the name of a minister rather than a worker “surprising,” but our research into how little support worker centers really get from grassroots employees suggests it shouldn’t have surprised anybody.

   We’ve noted that worker centers — of which the Restaurant Opportunities Center (ROC) is one of the most notable — are much closer to labor unions in goals, financing, and tactics than they might like to admit. We looked into the backers of the “Raise Michigan” effort and found a dizzying web of Big Labor, liberal front groups, and prominent local Democrats.

   Two open backers are obvious labor hands: ROC — founded by the Hotel Employees-Restaurant Employees union that is now the “HERE” in UNITE-HERE — and AAUP-AFT Local 6075, an affiliate of the American Federation of Teachers representing Wayne State University academic staff. Other supporters include various liberal groups akin to those funded by labor unions to carry their message. One, the Center for Progressive Leadership, received $23,650 from the United Food and Commercial Workers Phoenix Local 99 for its Arizona office.

   From there, all roads lead to political opportunism. The Raise Michigan website, RaiseMichigan.com, is registered to Dave Woodward, a Democratic Party member of the Oakland County Council who received a United Auto Workers PAC contribution in his most recent re-election campaign. The Treasurer of the campaign is the Chair of the Oakland County Democratic Party (who is also a consultant to ROC’s Michigan office), and his wife is the leader of “Mothering Justice,” one of the allegedly “grassroots” supporting organizations.

   This shouldn’t be surprising. Unions like the AFL-CIO (the AFT’s parent federation) are pushing for a minimum wage increase, at least in part because it benefits them. Our research has shown that AFL-CIO member unions including the UFCW and UNITE HERE stand to benefit from minimum wage hikes.

   Their allies in the Democratic Party are eager to oblige, not just to provide unions the “payback” that the bipartisan defeat of the “card check” bill denied, but also to boost their partisan political prospects. Democrats have openly spoken about using the minimum wage as a “wedge issue” for the November elections against Republican governors in states including Michigan.

   Categories: AFL-CIOAFTCenter for Union FactsPolitical MoneyTeachers UnionsWorkers Center

7. UFCW Playing Coy in Reno?

   Posted on Feb 14, 2014 by LaborPains.org Team

   The United Food and Commercial Workers (UFCW) union recently conducted a series of protests against Wal-Mart organized through its in-house “worker center,” OUR Walmart. Concurrently to that, the UFCW conducts standard union anti-corporate campaigns to try to unionize or intimidate the world’s largest retailer.

   One such tactic is stalling city approval processes for Wal-Mart stores, and the Reno Gazette-Journal reports that somebody is doing just that in Sparks, Nevada. Michael Russow has sued to stop the approval granted by the city for a new Wal-Mart. And who is Mr. Russow? The Gazette-Journal, citing CUF’s comprehensive database of union federal disclosures, thinks it knows:

   The Center for Union Facts website lists Russow as an assistant to a regional director for the United Food and Commercial Workers union, which has supported protests against Walmart in the past and has tried to unionize some company workers, according to Associated Press and Gazette-Journal reports.

   The newspaper then asked Reno’s Russow if he was the same Michael Russow. Russow’s response is almost straight from a spy novel’s “can neither confirm nor deny” phrasing:

   Russow wouldn’t confirm whether he worked for the union Thursday.

    

   “The issue is not what I do or what I’ve done,” he said. “The story is that this Walmart is not good for our community.”

   Uh huh. That isn’t a denial, and knowing that the UFCW has gone all the way into the grey area of labor law to try to organize Wal-Mart employees, we know where the preponderance of the evidence lies.

   Categories: Anti-Corporate CampaignsCenter for Union FactsUFCWWorkers Center

8. Full-Page Ad in National Journal Daily Calls Out Organized Labor’s Policy Hypocrisy

   Posted on Feb 12, 2014 by LaborPains.org Team

   Washington, D.C. – Today, the Center for Union Facts (CUF) is running a full-page ad in the National Journal Daily supporting the Employee Rights Act (ERA), pro-employee legislation that increases employee protections against labor union abuses. Introduced into their respective chambers by Sen. Orrin Hatch (R-Ut.) and Rep. Tom Price (R-Ga.), the ERA has 27 Senate co-sponsors – including Sen. Mitch McConnell (R-Ky.) and Sen. Lamar Alexander (R-Tn.), ranking member of the Committee on Health, Education, Labor, & Pensions – and 80 co-sponsors in the House.

   The ad illustrates the hypocrisy of organized labor in supporting a minimum wage increase but not the ERA. Its headline reads, “Richard Trumka and the AFL-CIO support the minimum wage, but not the Employee Rights Act,” then cites recent polling data showing that while 66 of Americans support a raise in the minimum wage, a full 83 percent support the ERA.

   The ad then asks, “Why are union leaders and Democratic politicians talking out of both sides of their mouths?” explaining, “Trumka uses polling data to justify a minimum wage hike; however, 83% of Americans support the Employee Rights Act, a law that would protect employees from union abuses. Hypocritically, those same union bosses and politicians refuse to support the ERA.”

   The ERA is composed of eight straightforward principles, including such basic democratic principles as the right to secret ballot voting in unionization elections and requiring that unions receive the express consent of their members before spending union dues on political activities, aka, paycheck protection.

   “Every day Trumka and the unions bemoan inequality of income, but the inequality of employee rights relative to the power of labor unions deserves similar attention,” said Richard Berman, executive director of the Center for Union Facts. “Ironically, this is one issue over which the AFL-CIO has enormous control yet refuses to address. Perhaps they should deal with their own inequities before weighing in on others.”

   More information on the ERA is available online at EmployeeRightsAct.com.

   To schedule an interview, or to comment on this release, please contact Banks Woodruff at [email protected] or (202) 463-7106.

   The Center for Union Facts is a non-profit organization supported by foundations, businesses, union members, and the general public. We are dedicated to showing Americans the facts about today’s union leadership.

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   Categories: AFL-CIOEmployee Rights ActPress Release