Posts tagged kickbacks
UAW watchdog faults Fain, portrays him as angry foul-mouthed leader who targeted underling
June 18, 2025 // United Auto Workers President Shawn Fain illegitimately retaliated against the second most-powerful leader of the union in stripping her of power after threatening to "slit" the "throats" of anyone who "messed" with his inner circle, a government watchdog said late Tuesday. The watchdog, lawyer Neil Barofsky, leveled the allegation in a quarterly report delivered to U.S. District Judge David Lawson, who gained broad control of a deal to oversee the UAW in 2020 following a years-long public corruption scandal. The scandal sent two former union presidents, Gary Jones and Dennis Williams, to federal prison along with several others convicted of breaking labor laws, stealing union funds and receiving bribes, kickbacks and illegal benefits from contractors and auto executives.
FRANK RICCI: Fire Fighters’ Union Betraying Its Members
May 13, 2025 // Such dealings include collecting millions from muscular dystrophy charities—funds many members thought were going to sick kids stricken with a debilitating disease. Instead, these yearly collected funds from the “Fill the Boot Campaign” were funneled back from the charity to the union’s coffers. The practice was curtailed only after eliciting member outrage when it was finally exposed. The federal court’s recent ruling to deny the IAFF-FC’s motions to dismiss validates the seriousness of Hughes’ claims, allowing the case to proceed and exposing the union’s alleged misconduct to greater scrutiny.
Port strike longshoremen union boss linked to murdered mobster in ‘farce’ racketeering case he beat at trial
October 8, 2024 // George Daggett, the attorney, said the case began after his cousin asked a Catholic priest for financial advice and had $18 million in union funds placed under the supervision of the same money manager who worked with Our Lady of the Lake Church in Sparta, New Jersey. "So at the trial, every time a mobster’s name was mentioned, the government had a big board, and they made a circle, [and] every time a mobster was mentioned, they put his picture up on this big board," he said. "The government’s case ended, and I took Father Cassidy’s picture and I put it in the middle of all those mobsters. So that's the kind of trial it was."
How the Mafia Infiltrated American Labor Unions
August 12, 2024 // While law enforcement agencies continue to monitor Mafia infiltration of labor unions, labor racketeering has become less prevalent than it was decades ago. In part, that’s because union membership plummeted after the McClellan Committee exposed the extent of labor racketeering. At its zenith in the mid-1950s, union membership comprised one-third of the labor force, but now union members only represent approximately 10 percent of American workers.
Parity in Labor Transparency
April 24, 2024 // The institutional left has sought to reward Big Labor by making union organizing campaigns shorter, or bypassing them with “card check.” Big Labor knows that the dynamics of union organizing rely on labor unions being able to make their pitches to workers from trusted positions without skeptical responses from other workers or employer representatives. And they only need to win the vote once to start collecting dues and engaging in compulsory bargaining. As long as government-recognized and government-empowered compulsory union bargaining exists, the government require workers be given all the information before deciding whether to form a union and bargain collectively. The SALT Act would accomplish this needed reform.
Has a Firefighters’ Union Burned Its Members?
April 17, 2023 // New information from a federal court case against the International Association of Fire Fighters-Financial Corporation (IAFF-FC) reveals alleged backroom deals, “kickbacks,” coercion, and greed by IAFF union leaders. The IAFF-FC was chartered as a nonprofit with a fiduciary duty to safeguard firefighters’ finances by offering a plethora of financial services, ranging from auto insurance to retirement with a focus on wealth management. But a recent federal lawsuit filed by John F. Hughes describes a much different reality.
Judge orders ex-jail union boss to be freed in bribery case
February 27, 2023 // Norman Seabrook originally was sentenced to 58 months in prison on his federal conviction for taking bribes to put $20 million in union pension money into a risky hedge fund. The union lost $19 million. But U.S. District Judge Alvin K. Hellerstein said Seabrook's sentence is now unfair — because a co-defendant appealed and got his own prison term reduced to just over a year. “There is now an unjust disparity” between the defendants' sentences, Hellerstein wrote in an opinion Thursday. Hellerstein himself originally sentenced both defendants.
The Nation’s Largest Teachers’ Union Is Bleeding Members With a Shady Investment Scheme
January 18, 2023 // For more than 17 years, the National Education Association (NEA) has been siphoning off millions in kickbacks for exploiting its members’ trust and convincing them to invest in annuities and other investment vehicles that charge outrageous fees and underperform compared to similar plans available on the open market.
Op-ed: Corruption in the Labor Movement: Labor Rackets
November 17, 2022 // Corruption by labor union officials, whether in service to themselves, political allies, or organized crime syndicates, has been a fixture of American labor history since the labor movement first began to organize in the late 19th century. While the extent of criminal influence in organized labor has declined thanks to extensive federal law enforcement activity and judicial oversight, major corruption scandals continue to dog the union movement. From the recent kickback scheme at the United Auto Workers to the downfall of Philadelphia union boss and political fixer Johnny Doc Dougherty to the confession of former Teamsters boss John Coli, who was well connected to Chicago politicos, systemic corruption persists.