Posts tagged Mark Mix
Wisconsin Spartek Workers Successfully Force Out UE Union Officials as Labor Board’s Policy Shift Looms
September 14, 2023 // The repeal of the Election Protection Rule will also let union officials shut down worker attempts to obtain a secret ballot decertification vote for a year after union officials install themselves in a workplace via the so-called “card check” process. This move will be particularly dangerous to workers’ rights now that the Biden-appointed majority on the NLRB has voted to mandate card check recognition. Under the abuse-prone card check process, union officials bypass the NLRB’s traditional secret ballot vote procedures and instead use cards collected directly from workers – often through coercive or intimidating tactics – as “votes” for unionization. “Workers across the country are successfully exercising their right to kick out unwanted union officials, especially with Foundation aid,” commented National Right to Work Foundation President Mark Mix. “This trend is a threat to the Biden Administration’s union boss political allies, and the Administration has been pursuing a radical agenda to trap workers under unions’ so-called ‘representation’ and increase the influence and dues revenue of its favorite special interest.”
Passaic, NJ, Woodworking Employees Win Two-Year Legal Battle to Oust Unwanted Carpenters Union Officials
September 11, 2023 // Following the third attempt by employees of Passaic-based woodworking firm Patella to obtain a vote to remove them, Carpenters Local 252 union officials have backed down and abandoned the facility. The union’s disclaimer of interest, received last week by National Labor Relations Board (NLRB) Region 22, caps off a years-long legal battle between Patella employees and recalcitrant Carpenters union officials. The workers ousted the union with free legal aid from staff attorneys at the National Right to Work Legal Defense Foundation.
NLRB restores Obama-era rule speeding up union election process
August 25, 2023 // The U.S. National Labor Relations Board (NLRB) on Thursday finalized procedural changes that will speed up the union election process, which have been criticized by business groups for favoring organized labor. The Democrat-led board's rule restores changes to the election process that were adopted during the Obama administration and largely eliminated in 2019 when appointees of Republican former President Donald Trump led the board. Among the key provisions of the new rule are a requirement that elections be held before related litigation is resolved. Under the Trump-era regulation, the board had to rule on issues such as workers' eligibility to vote and alleged unlawful conduct by employers before holding an election.
Greenville, SC Starbucks Employees Latest to Demand Vote to Remove SBWU Union from Workplace
August 15, 2023 // Bory and her coworkers’ effort is the latest in a chain of SBWU decertification pushes across the country. In just the past few months, Starbucks employees in Manhattan, NY, Buffalo, NY, Pittsburgh, PA, Bloomington, MN, and Salt Lake City, UT, have all sought free Foundation legal aid in pursuing their decertification petitions at the NLRB. The flurry of decertification attempts is occurring roughly one year after SBWU union agents engaged in an aggressive unionization campaign against the coffee chain’s employees. Federal labor law forbids workers from decertifying a union for a year after a union’s installation, meaning many workers are seizing on the earliest possible opportunity to rid themselves of the SBWU union’s “representation.”
New Flyer Employee Slams CWA Union with Federal Charges, Claims Union Lied to Employees to Attain “Majority Status”
August 10, 2023 // Mabrey’s charges explain that CWA union officials gained power in his workplace through a process called “card check,” which bypasses the NLRB’s standard secret ballot election process for installing a union. Under card check, employees are denied the right to vote in private on whether they want the union in the workplace, and union officials can instead claim majority status by demanding union authorization cards directly from workers. The card check scheme’s lack of privacy exposes workers to a variety of coercive behaviors from union officials who are seeking to collect cards from a majority of employees in a work unit. Workers often report being told signing the card only requests “more information” about the union or serves some other purpose, even though the card will be equivalent to a “vote” in favor of union representation. Workers have also experienced threats and unwanted home visits during card check campaigns.
Federal judge sanctions Southwest Airlines, holds in civil contempt
August 9, 2023 // The Center Square also acquired copies of emails sent by a union representative referring to Carter as a “cancerous tumor” that needed to be “eradicated when ever [sic] possible or it spreads.” The member also said she was “incredibly dangerous” and that he was “all about targeted assassinations.” TWU didn’t respond to a request for comment when asked if it supported what appears to be an incitement to violence against or targeted harassment of employees. Carter initially sued, receiving free legal aid from the National Right to Work Foundation, after she was fired for opposing union dues being used for causes that violated her conscience related to promoting abortion. She alleged that Southwest Airlines discriminated against her religious beliefs, violating Title VII of the Civil Right Act of 1964 and the Local 556 violated the Railway Labor Act. The jury unanimously agreed and awarded her over $5 million.
After unionizing last summer, some Utah Starbucks workers now want out
August 4, 2023 // Before a petition can be filed, federal labor law says a year must pass after a successful union vote and 30% of a location’s workers need to support decertification. The National Right to Work Foundation, which is providing free legal representation to the workers who support the petition, said a contingent of the store’s workers don’t want the union to have “monopoly representation powers” when negotiating with the company. “They called us,” said foundation president Mark Mix. “They walked through this process and we [are helping] them get an election. That's the goal, not to put our thumb on the scale one way or the other, but just get the election so that their voices can be heard in the workplace.”
It’s Official: Oregon Masami Foods Workers’ Vote to Oust UFCW Union Officials is Certified
August 4, 2023 // Despite union legal tactics delaying the certification of an NLRB decertification election, Masami Foods workers are free of unwanted union The case is an example of how the NLRB’s union decertification process is prone to union boss-created roadblocks. Foundation-backed reforms the NLRB adopted in 2020 made it somewhat easier for workers to remove unwanted union officials. However, the Biden NLRB is attempting to roll back these protections and make it much harder to decertify a union. For example, the 2020 reforms blocked union officials from resubmitting overlapping charges, which often contain unverified and unrelated allegations of employer actions and delay the process further. Had these reforms not been in place, the three-month delay for these workers could have been extended much longer, possibly effectively indefinitely.
Trump Makes Appeal to Unions Emboldened Under Biden Administration
July 28, 2023 // F. Vincent Vernuccio, senior fellow at the Mackinac Center for Public Policy and the Center’s director of labor policy between 2012 and 2017, said that some of the UAW jobs could be going away because of the president’s push for electric vehicles. He pointed to a recent report estimating that the new electric vehicle targets could eliminate 117,000 manufacturing jobs. “You’re seeing it reflected in jobs moving down south to right-to-work states,” he said, referring to states that make forced unionization illegal. Employees who want to cross the picket line and work when unions have issued a strike have to do it legally, else face fines or other disciplinary action from the unions. He said that large, industrialized unions tend to have one-size-fits-all contracts that benefit some but not all workers, making the administration’s push for unionization where there was none before a net negative. He advocates instead for term flexibility for workers, unionized or not.
Salt Lake City-Area Starbucks Workers Latest Seeking Vote to Remove SBWU
July 28, 2023 // Employees at the Cottonwood Heights Starbucks in Utah have just submitted a petition to the National Labor Relations Board (NLRB), asking the federal agency to hold a vote to end the Chicago and Midwest Joint Regional Board Workers United/SEIU, also known as Starbucks Workers United (SBWU), officials’ monopoly “representation” powers at their workplace. Indya Fiessinger, who filed the petition on behalf of a group of her coworkers, is receiving free legal representation from National Right to Work Foundation staff attorneys. With the petition filed, the NLRB should now promptly schedule a secret ballot election to determine whether a majority of workers want to end union officials’ power to impose a contract on the workers.