In April we exposed Obama’s overseer of union financial disclosure and his personal conflicts-of-interest.  Now we have well-sourced evidence that Director John Lund is telling union officials to bypass Department of Labor investigators and work with him personally.  Imagine if U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC) Chairman Mary Schapiro invited delinquent reporting corporate presidents and treasurers to deal with her directly and ignore SEC personnel. Lund is the Office of Labor-Management Standards Director who oversees investigations and audits of union financial records and union officials’ conflicts-of-interest reporting, and he is using his new position to benefit his old clients form Big Labor. From the previous BigGovernment post:

John Lund’s Conflicts-of-Interest

The Obama Ethics Executive Order requires appointees to pledge that they will refrain from involvement in matters involving their former employer or clients.  The AFL-CIO and other unions are former clients of John Lund , and these unions remain clients of his former and current employer, the University of Wisconsin School for Workers (Lund is currently on unpaid leave while at DOL).  The Wisconsin School for Workers’ primary mission is to train union officials; the very officials that Lund now purportedly investigates for corruption.

Lund currently attends conferences and union training meetings like he did while he was the School for Workers director — a U.S. Government employee on the taxpayers’ dime.  While at the conferences and meetings, he hands out business cards like candy to those he has federally-granted power over.  He tells these Big Labor bosses “If you have a problem come to me, and ignore the field investigators.” Why?  Because by going to Lund, union bosses can work out deals to avoid jail time or criminal charges.  He can personally advise them how to “clean up” their reports to avoid consequences.  On the other hand, if pesky Department of Labor investigators get involved, then government investigative records will be made, facts will be verified, and falsehoods will be documented.

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The Labor-Management Disclosure and Reporting Act (LMRDA) requires labor union officials to report potential or certain conflict-of-interests they might encounter if they receive gifts or cash payments from employers. Service Employees International Union (SEIU) President Andrew Stern may be in violation of that requirement since he has not filed a report disclosing $140,000 in advance payments from publisher and service industry employer Simon & Schuster.

In addition to this, documents made public during an intra-union California lawsuit and obtained by a “BigGovernment researcher” (posted on NRTWC.org’s Scribd, seen below) reveal that SEIU Treasurer Anna Burger recommended that the union use general treasury money, much collected from employees as a condition of employment, to promote Stern’s book, A Country that Works.

It’s not as if Stern has never filed a conflict-of-interest disclosure report; in fact, he has filed two in 2004 and one in 2005. But, why has he not filed any reports related to his special book deal?

SEIU President Andy Stern’s Book Advance and Past Conflict of Interest Reports (LM-30s)

Unfortunately for rank and file workers forced to pay dues or fees to the SEIU, rather than spending its resources investigating potential LMRDA violations, the Obama Labor Department (DOL) is busy rescinding conflict-of-interest and other union financial reporting requirements.

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