Posts tagged Maxford Nelsen
Trump Faces Federal Employee Unions in Government Efficiency Battle
January 3, 2025 // “For President-elect Trump to succeed at making the federal bureaucracy more efficient and accountable to the American people, he’ll have to once again do battle with federal unions,” Max Nelsen, a labor policy expert at the Freedom Foundation, told The Center Square.
Teacher’s Union Accused Of Laundering $1.5 Million To Bankroll Josh Shapiro’s Campaign
July 25, 2024 // The Freedom Foundation filed three complaints that allege the Pennsylvania State Education Association (PSEA) illegally laundered and sent $1.5 million to fund Shapiro’s campaign, according to a press release by Freedom Foundation. The complaints were filed with various parties in Pennsylvania, including the FBI and IRS, as Shapiro has emerged as a contender to become Vice President Kamala Harris’ running mate. “PSEA’s scheme to secretly launder nearly $1.5 million in members’ dues through the Democratic Governors Association to support Josh Shapiro’s 2022 candidacy appears to have violated both an array of Pennsylvania laws and the Internal Revenue Code,” Freedom Foundation Director of Research and Government Affairs Maxford Nelsen said in the press release.
Biden administration defends decision to nix union accountability effort
March 29, 2024 // Now, in its letter to lawmakers, OPM points out it has moved the official time data to an “agency reports” webpage. However, the last official time report on the site is from fiscal year 2019, meaning none have been completed since Biden took office. No other official time reports are listed on the OPM reports page. “Most tellingly, Director [Kiran] Ahuja offered no apology for the removal of the official time webpage, made no commitment to restoring it, and declined to commit OPM to producing any additional estimates of taxpayer-funded union time use and costs in the future…” Maxford Nelsen, a labor policy expert at the Freedom Foundation, told The Center Square.
HHS Appears To Forget To Redact Email Calling For Expanded COVID-19 Mandates For Students
September 13, 2023 // “It’s concerning … [if] the CDC was even seriously considering imposing COVID vaccine mandates on students nationwide,” Nelsen said. “But if they weren’t seriously considering it, then they shouldn’t have redacted or attempted to redact disclosure of the contents of that email.” A CDC spokesperson told the DCNF that Lubar “obviously was not referring to vaccines for children” but was instead referencing the testing requirement. “At the time, the vaccine was not authorized or recommended for kids under 12 years of age,” the spokesperson said. “That recommendation did not come until November 2021. She was commenting on the testing of school children to keep classrooms open and safe. Her comment came on the heels of CDC funding totaling $10 billion to make testing widely available to school districts and was concerned that not enough attention was being focused on testing of students.”
Commentary: To Unions, Organizing Time Is Fine When It’s on the Taxpayers’ Dime
June 29, 2023 // Despite public sector unions, and particularly teachers’ unions like Weingarten’s American Federation for Teachers, facing mounting scrutiny for their role in school closures and broader left-wing political activism, the practice of release time has garnered little attention.
AFT president Randi Weingarten scores $15K annual teacher’s pension in deal with union and NYC
May 16, 2023 // “The New York Post has refused to provide us with the supposed analysis this story is based on. Regardless, it’s pure speculation because Ms. Weingarten is not retired,” AFT spokesman Andrew Crook said. “Ms. Weingarten has worked on behalf of UFT members—including teaching in NYC public schools—for nearly 40 years.” Weingarten began serving as a legal counsel at UFT in 1986 before becoming a teacher. Other records obtained by the Freedom Foundation show she worked about two hours a day as a substitute from September 1991 to August 1994, amounting to about a year of service in her retirement account.
Opinion: Newsom, Like Biden, Believes Selling out to Unions Is His Path to the Presidency
August 5, 2022 // Newsom’s resume is littered with union sellouts — which goes a long way toward explaining how he’s managed to turn the Golden State into an open cesspool — but the most recent was his approval on June 27 of a state budget that has the potential to force taxpayers to subsidize union dues while handing California’s labor unions an unprecedented handout to shore up their Janus-depleted finances. The so-called “Workers’ Fairness Tax Credit” would convert union dues from a tax deduction to a tax credit. The budget earmarks $200 million to “begin” a policy of paying union members for paying union dues John Moorlach, Jon Coupal, Howard Jarvis Taxpayers’ Association, Dan Walters, CalMatters, California Labor Federation, Lorena Gonzalez Fletcher, House of Representatives,
Gavin Newsom Is Praised For Nation’s First Union Dues Tax Credit, But It’s Not A Done Deal
July 14, 2022 // “Ever since the U.S. Supreme Court’s 2018 decision in Janus v. AFSC SC +3.2%ME struck down as unconstitutional state laws requiring public employees to pay union dues or fees, unions and allied state lawmakers have sought to compensate for the resulting, and ongoing, loss of revenue and political influence,” said Maxford Nelsen, director of labor policy at the Freedom Foundation, of the motivation behind the union dues tax credit. “A lot of bad, coercive policies have been enacted by union-dominated states seeking to undermine Janus, but California’s proposal to create a tax credit for union dues could be the worst yet.”
Freedom Foundation: ‘Education union spent more money on political activities than worker representation’
June 15, 2022 // “It includes lobbying government officials, get-out-the-vote activities, and even internal targeting or messaging towards union members in getting them to try to vote a particular way,” said Maxford Nelsen, director of labor policy at the Freedom Foundation. “It’s a fairly broad range of activity that falls under the heading of political activities and lobbying and it is broader than just writing checks to candidates for office.” The tax form also revealed that the NEA spent more than $55 million on benefits for union officers. “By the time you get to the NEA headquarters, salaries for full-time staff working in the NEA headquarters are definitely far higher than most teachers are getting,” Nelsen told Legal Newsline. Juliette Fairley, Legal Newsline, Rebecca Pringle,
Op-Ed: County collective bargaining bill rewards unions, harms employees and taxpayers
May 17, 2022 // Buoyed by taxpayer support and armed with coercively inflated dues revenue, unions will plow resources into electing county commissioners more favorably disposed to union demands at the bargaining table, thus further increasing their power.