The SEIU’s Insidious Tentacles continue to infiltrate government and politics at the expense of its own rank and file without attracting national media attention. Interestingly enough the mainstream media will not peek beneath the covers and investigate reports by employees and employers, such as those detailed in The Devil at My Doorstep, who have been abused by the SEIU’s ruthless tactics and/or the reports of corrupt political connections , government infiltration and pay-to-play ties to the current administration. Several interesting stories have surfaced during the past month, yet not one has received the national attention it deserves through investigative journalism by the national mainstream media.

Among the events:

1. )  On November 10, 2011 a Washington Examiner article reported on SEIU activities in Michigan, a state desperately attempting to pass a RTW bill to stop big labor from usurping employee rights and money, involving the SEIU’s infiltration of state government and how the SEIU Siphons ‘Dues’ from Mich. Medicaid Payments.

2. )  On November 16, Michelle Malkin revealed that  former SEIU President Andy Stern utilized his membership on the board for a California pharmaceutical company to facilitate a half billion dollar drug deal for the company.  See the article: Obama’s Half-Million-Dollar Crony Drug Deal; Related non-shocker: SEIU endorses Obama.

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Connecticut’s union-bought governor, Daniel Malloy, is apparently scheming with the SEIU to unionize his state’s daycare providers and personal care attendants through a secret plan using the flawed method of card-check unionization.

By stripping individuals of their right to vote on whether or not to unionize, Malloy is virtually guaranteeing money (paid by taxpayers) will go into his SEIU cronies’ pockets.

According to Raising Hale’s Zach Janowski, Malloy has  created “working groups” through executive order that will “guide the unionization” over the next year.

The two working groups will meet Friday morning. The Personal Care Attendant Working Group will meet at 10 a.m. and the Family Child Care Working Group will meet at 11 a.m., both in Room 410 of the Capitol.

Malloy created the working groups with executive orders nine and 10. Adding daycare providers alone to the union roles could increase dues revenue by $1 million.

The executive orders also include a card check provision that takes away the ability of daycare owners and PCAs to vote by secret ballot. (more…)

Desperation is setting in at the White House and the white knight attempting to rescue Obama from himself is the NLRB, guided by a pair of Obama recess appointees Craig Becker and Mark Pierce (see National Labor Relations Board or NBLR – National Big Labor Resuscitation ). Becker and Pierce are taking steps to achieve Big Labor’s most coveted prize, card check (see Card Check through Regulation vs. Legislation).

The NLRB has scheduled a vote this Wednesday, November 30, 2011 where they Plan to Ease Way for Unions to rapidly organize employers through quickie elections. This vote is no more than “Card Check” in disguise (see the Board published a Notice of Proposed Rulemaking here). Why is this pair in such a hurry? Member Becker’s term expires at the end of December 2011, and this is the last time the rogue NLRB is guaranteed to have a democratic majority to combat the pending legislation to reign in the NLRB and to pass regulations that favor Big Labor (see Workplace Fairness Act Set to Move to the House Floor).

Just as important, the timeline referred to above is obviously a blatant move to provide big labor with the tools to rapidly force unionize unsuspecting businesses in order to provide Obama and the Democratic party a huge campaign fund source derived from the new influx of membership dues just in time for the 2012 elections. This is obviously a simple “pay to play” maneuver that will be A Death Penalty for Employees and Employers.

This is a classic case of Political Aspirations & Payback Ahead of American Jobs, because this President and the rogue NLRB are intent on Overwhelming the System in order to achieve their labor agenda, first pronounced in the Employee Free Choice Act (see EFCA Through the Backdoor). (more…)

Over the last year, the Obama Administration, through its regulatory agencies, has been conducting a quiet war on American business—those enterprises that are the nation’s job creators. Earlier this week, the union extremists in Obama’s Department of Labor and the “independent” National Labor Relations Board (the same agency that may cause 1,000 Boeing employees in South Carolina to lose their jobs) launched an all-out offensive designed to maximize unions’ ability to unionize the 93.1% of America’s private-sector employees who are union free.

The Department of Labor writes its own DISCLOSE Act.

On Monday, using retread and biased psuedo-studies, the Department of Labor issued an expansive 160-page notice for proposed rule-making; request for comments. It is, in sum, a radical overhaul of the reporting requirements for employers who wish to remain union free and the consultants, lawyers, and firms that provide human resources, employee and labor relations services.

Since 1959, under a little known law called the Labor-Management Reporting and Disclosure Act, labor relations consultants who ‘persuade’ employees in the exercise of their Section Seven Rights (the right to unionize or not) have been required to file financial disclosure statements, as do the employers who hire labor relations consultants.

Now, the Department of Labor wants any person who is contracted to directly or indirectly persuades employees to file be required to file reports. To the union zealots at the Department of Labor, any person, lawyer or firm who trains supervisors on how to lawfully communicate with employees about unions, any company that produces videos, conducts seminars, or vulnerability audits (like employee opinion surveys) would be required to file and disclose their earnings which then become made public. (more…)

There was BIG news in Washington yesterday:

Senate Republicans, led by Sen. Jim DeMint (R-SC), have introduced the Secret Ballot Protection Act.

Today, U.S. Senator Jim DeMint (R-South Carolina) introduced the Secret Ballot Protection Act (SBPA), legislation that will guarantee the right of every American worker to have a secret ballot election on whether to unionize. The bill would guarantee workers the opportunity to cast a secret ballot before a union can be organized.

Seventeen cosponsors have joined DeMint to introduce the bill including Senators Lamar Alexander (R-Tennessee), John Barrasso (R-Wyoming), Richard Burr (R-North Carolina), Saxby Chambliss (R-Georgia), Thad Cochran (R-Mississippi), Mike Enzi (R-Wyoming), Lindsey Graham (R-South Carolina), James Inhofe (R-Oklahoma), Jon Kyl (R-Arizona), John McCain (R-Arizona), Jerry Moran (R-Kansas), Rand Paul (R-Kentucky), James Risch (R-Idaho), Richard Shelby (R-Alabama), John Thune (R-South Dakota), David Vitter (R-Louisiana), and Roger Wicker (R-Mississippi).

“Last Congress, union bosses and their Democrat allies tried their best to deny workers their basic American right to a guaranteed secret ballot election,” said Senator DeMint. “Secret ballot voting is a basic American value that we must protect. This bill ensures every American worker gets to cast a secret ballot vote without pressure and fear of retribution from union organizers and coworkers looking over their shoulder. No American should be forced to join or pay dues to a union just to have the opportunity to work and provide for their family.”

Why the Secret Ballot Protection Act?

For the last five years, unions have spent hundreds of millions of dollars, taken from their members’ dues, to pass a bill that effectively eliminates employees’ right to a secret-ballot election on the question of unionization. Through the delusionally-dubbed Employee Free Choice Act’s ’card check’ provision, unions have sought to mandate that employees would automatically become unionized once a union secured 50% + 1 of employees’ signatures on authorization cards (or other form). However, after the Employee Free ANTI Choice Act passed the House in 2007 (it was later stalled in the Senate), more people began to take notice of the union threat to their right to choose (or not choose) unionization in the workplace.

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With the United Auto Workers’ membership at a third of its former size, and the job-destroying card-check bill (the misleadingly-named Employee Free Choice Act) dead for now, UAW President Bob King and the rest of his Detroit henchmen have had to come up with an inventive way in which to save their dying union by getting new members.

In July, the UAW hooked up with Jesse Jackson’s Rainbow/PUSH coalition and vowed to target the employees of foreign-owned automakers.  In August, the United Auto Workers’ Bob King declared his intent to “shame” companies that do not accept his “Principles for Fair Union Elections.” While eyes rolled throughout the labor relations community, most withheld comment, opting to wait and see what King had up his festooned sleeve. Well, the wait is over.

Because King’s “principles” were unilaterally conjured up in some back office at the UAW’s HQ (or on one of the UAW’s fairways), and given the hints of doom and gloom if an employer did not comply, many never really expected the UAW’s principles to be necessarily fair or principled. As a result, when the UAW officially issued its “principles” on Monday, the Union of Ailing Workplaces UAW did not surprise anyone with its wrong-headedness. In fact, not only did Bob King keep the basic tenets of the failed Employee Free Choice Act in place, he’s taken it even further.

The UAW’s “Principles for Fair Union Elections” [view PDF here] is a series of 11 mostly one-sided and seemingly innocuous guidelines, a few of which are harmless, a few that are superfluous, and several which strike at the heart of an employer’s property and free speech rights. (more…)

Congressman John Kline [R-MN] has been one of the House of Representatives’ most vocal opponent of SEIU’s labor board appointee, Craig Becker, as well as a vocal defender of workers’ right to choose by secret-ballot whether or not to become unionized. In that role, he has stood strong against union bosses as they have worked to strip workers right to a secret-ballot through passage of the job-destroying (and delusionally dubbed) Employee Free Anti-Choice Act.

On Wednesday, showing the change in leadership that will begin in January, Republican named Kline to be the Chairman of the House Education & Labor Committee. The HEL committee is the House committee that must approve issues affecting union elections (like EFCA). Upon being stated for the committee, Kline stated:

“Job creation and American competitiveness are vital national priorities. As Chairman, I will ensure they are at the forefront of the Education and Labor Committee agenda.”

Given the five year push by union bosses to rid employees of their right to vote by secret-ballot, as well as this week’s NLRB decision institutionalizing card-check by collusion, Kline and his fellow Republicans are well suited to re-introduce the Secret Ballot Protection Act. (more…)

It’s truly fascinating, and not the least bit ironic, when union bosses treat their own workers as bad or worse than the employers they attack.

As union bosses clamor for enactment of so-called “card check,” (otherwise known as Employee Free Choice Act), it seems that when confronted with union issues among their own employees, they act every bit as barbaric as the robber barons of yore.

In a move of stunning hypocrisy, the United Federation of Teachers axed one of its longtime employees — for trying to unionize the powerful labor organization’s own workers, it was charged yesterday.

Jim Callaghan, a veteran writer for the teachers union, told The Post he was booted from his $100,000-a-year job just two months after he informed UFT President Michael Mulgrew that he was trying to unionize some of his co-workers.

“I was fired for trying to start a union at the UFT,” said a dumbfounded Callaghan, who worked for the union’s newsletter and as a speechwriter for union leaders for the past 13 years.

[snip]

Callaghan said that yesterday morning, he was hauled into a meeting with UFT officials, including CFO David Hickey, and told only that he was being fired from his job and had a half-hour to clear out of the office.

“They gave me no reason, no letter, no cause at all,” said Callaghan, who insisted that he has received no reprimands or notices about problems with his work. He noted that he wrote six stories in the most recent newsletter for teachers.

Callaghan said the union-busting bullying continued after he was told he was fired, when UFT leaders called in a detail of six uniformed cops to remove him from his office because he wasn’t leaving fast enough.

Callaghan said he decided to unionize the 12 UFT writers after a colleague was fired last year without cause.

“We have no protections and no disciplinary process,” he said.

While the UFT is an example of the hypocrisy that permeates the union movement, it is only one case out of many over the years.

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Somewhere lurking in the hot, putrid halls of Congress this summer is a union bailout bill of epic proportions and long-term ramifications.   Whether or not Democrats can ultimately push it (or something like it) into passage is yet to be determined. However, with rumors that Sen. Dick Durbin (D-IL) signed on as a co-sponsor on Thursday, it would appear that the union bailout is quietly creeping along.  If it passes, though, its ramifications surpass the mere $165 billion-plus price tag, as it will influence the political landscape for decades to come.  In sum, Democrats need the bailout desperately and Republicans should shun it like the plague.

Likely to surpass the touted $165 billion it is estimated to cost, Create Jobs and Save Benefits Act (S. 3157) was introduced on March 23rd by Sen. Bob Casey (D-PA) and is designed to bailout unions’ underfunded pension funds by transferring the liability of those funds onto the backs of the taxpayers.

Under these bills, the Pension Benefit Guaranty Corporation (PBGC) would, at the request of the plans, have the authority to take over the pension obligations of employers who have withdrawn from the plans, and pay the benefits out of taxpayer dollars, says Furchtgott-Roth:

• Once the PBGC shoulders that obligation, it would keep making payments until the last retiree or designated survivor dies.
• Since many multiemployer plans are in financial difficulty, this legislation, if enacted, could dramatically increase the federal deficit, putting even more pressure on the American taxpayer and the economy.
• Depending on events, it might add billions to government spending — current underfunding levels are estimated at $165 billion-bumping up future deficits.

According to a June 24th article published in the Bureau of National Affairs Construction Labor Report (subscription required):

If enacted into law, the bill would convert a private funding shortfall for collectively bargained multi-employer plans into a public obligation, said Brett McMahon, vice president of Miller and Long Concrete Construction and an ABC member.

The legislation would transfer a portion of multiemployer pension funding obligations to a new insurance program that would be operated by the PBGC and paid for with taxpayer dollars instead of employer-paid premiums, F. Vincent Vernuccio, a spokesman for the trade group’s advocacy organization, the Competitive Enterprise Institute, said during the call.

At the heart of the union pension problem are companies that, in many cases, agreed to put retirement money for union workers into “multi-employer plans” but have since gone out of business. As the unionized workers in multi-employer plans are still entitled to a pension, the remaining employers are left funding the pensions of workers who, in many cases, they never employed.

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As if Andy Stern and Anna Burger lobbying without being registered wasn’t enough for the Service Employee International Union (SEIU) to deal with, they are still trying desperately to pass the Employee Free Choice Act (EFCA). Unsuccessfully, I might add.

However, they have developed a new tool of misinformation — “Language Tips on Employee Free Choice.”

SEIU EFCA Tip Sheet_Page_2 PDF –

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The all-consuming debate over health care has effectively sucked all of the oxygen out of the policy world leaving little room for discussion, let alone action on other major elements of the progressive agenda—or so it would seem.

The mammoth bills winding their way through Congress will certainly upend our health care sector, if they are enacted. Little known, however, are several provisions that will provide an enormous pay-off to one of the Democrat parties most loyal constituency—Big Labor.

The Obama campaign spent much of 2008 writing checks to various left-leaning interest groups who saw the opportunity to cash in on long-standing priorities that would finally be achievable with a Democratic Congress and a liberal president.  Now, these groups are finding that no one is available to cash these checks as long as the administration is laser focused on reconfiguring one sixth of the American economy.

But organized labor has sought to turn this situation into a new opportunity. By throwing themselves into the health care debate and mobilizing their resources behind passage of the Democrat proposal, labor has been rewarded with the ability to shape the content of the health care legislation and to begin to collect on its political debt. (more…)