Free Republic

There’s absolutely incomprehensible black-hearted rotten-souled evil. And then a step beneath that, there’s SEIU. Melissa and Kevin Haynes were born with hypertonic cerebral palsy, a severe disability that impaired their cognitive development, leaving them functioning as infants. For more than 30 years, their devoted parents, Robert and Patricia, have cared for them in their home in Macomb Township, Mich. The two disabled adults received Medicaid checks each month, money that went toward their care. But in 2006, the Service Employees International Union (SEIU) began collecting 2.75 percent from each of these checks, claiming that Robert and Patricia were employees — not only...

Having won the right to decide for themselves whether to join unions, Michigan workers are opting to desert an organization that many never wanted to join in the first place: the SEIU. Michigan voters put an end to forced unionization by approving right-to-work in the 2012 election. Republican Gov. Rick Snyder also signed a bill that ended a fraudulent dues-skimming scheme, perpetrated by the SEIU, which had allowed the union to collect $34 million in mandatory dues out of the Medicaid checks of unknowing home-based caregivers. No longer obligated to pay money to the SEIU, 80 percent of home-based caregivers...

Media Matters employees are furious that their bosses are trying to keep them from unionizing. A union-organizing committee at the liberal group released a statement Monday slamming their employers for “the unexpected and unexplained path our leadership has taken in response to our efforts to unionize,” adding that “the actions of Media Matters executives have placed employees in the impossible position of continuing to produce content espousing pro-labor values for an employer who is challenging our right to unionize.”

Democratic Congressman Mike Honda, (D-CA), from the high-tech 17th congressional district in Silicon Valley, has a rather curious place for his campaign headquarters, the San Francisco Chronicle reports: inside the headquarters of Service Employees International Union (SEIU) Local 521. That address, 2302 Zanker Road, San Jose, is not listed as the campaign’s address on Honda’s campaign website; instead, 2050 Gateway Suite 100, San Jose, is listed. Honda is running for reelection in the "jungle" primary June 3 against Democrat challenger Ro Khanna and Republicans Vanila Singh and Joel Vanlandingham. The reason that the false address came to light is that...

Democratic Congressman Mike Honda, now engaged in a contentious fight for re-election in a Silicon Valley House race, has made the unusual move of locating his 2014 campaign office inside the headquarters of a major South Bay labor organization — the Service Employees International Union Local 521. The details about Honda’s campaign office emerged after the Chronicle reported last week that Honda can’t vote for himself in the 2014 election because his home is located outside the 17th Congressional District he represents.

Mayor Ed Murray’s minimum wage advisory committee is “deadlocked,” Seattle City Council member Kshama Sawant said Friday, with the socialist officeholder pledging she will now work to “build a strong coalition in the streets.” Sawant and two other left-leaning City Council members sit on the panel, which is co-chaired by business leader Howard S. Wright III, CEO of Seattle Hospitality Group, and Service Employees Union leader David Rolf, the city’s most able labor leader. The statement by Sawant comes amids increasing indications that Seattle voters will have the final say on on the minimum wage issue. And, like Washington voters...

One for the hypocrisy hall of fame: Media Matters for America is apparently resisting an effort by Service Employees International Union Local 500 to unionize its staff.Last week, the union filed a representation petition with the National Labor Relations Board, indicating that the nonprofit media watchdog organization rejected an effort by the union to organize MMFA’s staff through a Card Check election.A filing with the NLRB does not necessarily mean that the union and management are in direct confrontation. For example, although Volkswagen tacitly backed the United Auto Workers’ recent effort to organize its Chattanooga, Tenn., plant, the company still...

The hypocrisy could not be more evident as reports indicate Media Matters for America is resisting efforts by Service Employees International Union Local 500 to unionize its employees. Heck, next thing you know, they'll be asking them for a higher minimum wage. "...Last week, the union filed a representation petition with the National Labor Relations Board, indicating that the nonprofit media watchdog organization rejected an effort by the union to organize MMFA's staff through a Card Check election..."

Media Matters for America is apparently resisting an effort by Service Employees International Union Local 500 to unionize its staff. Last week, the union filed a representation petition with the National Labor Relations Board, indicating that the nonprofit media watchdog organization rejected an effort by the union to organize MMFA’s staff through a Card Check election. […] MMFA has regularly presented itself as a supporter of organized labor. It has argued that “economists point to declining union participation as one cause of the growing economic rift in America” and claimed it was a fact that “unions increase productivity [and] do...

Get your popcorn… The SEIU is petitioning the National Labor Relations Board to unionize the employees the employees at Media Matters. In response, Media Matters has hired a high priced law firm to represent the company. And, here we thought they supported unions? Weird, huh?

The San Francisco Chamber of Commerce is “outraged” over a ballot measure to raise San Francisco’s minimum wage to $15 an hour, saying in a statement on Monday that it “flies in the face of collaboration and partnership.” The measure would lift base pay about 40 percent from its current $10.74, making San Francisco’s minimum wage the highest in the country. Activists were expected to file papers on Monday for the November ballot. The measure, designed by SEIU Local 1021, the Alliance of Californians for Community Empowerment, and other activist groups, would give companies with fewer than 100 employees until...

Two weeks ago, a video that I filmed of a radical guest lecture in a required sociology course at the University of Wisconsin-Whitewater went viral. In it, intolerant SEIU member Eyon Biddle claimed that “politics is fueled by white rage” and that Republican success in 2010 was helped by racism. Appalled by what I was hearing, I took out my phone and began to record. Based off of how quickly the video spread, becoming national news in less than three days, as well as from the reaction I have gotten from people nationwide, it is clear to me that people...

Democrats and many in the media routinely complain about money spent in politics, and they regularly lash out at conservatives and big business. Turns out, unions are the top spenders in politics. Twelve of the top 20 political donors from 1989 to 2014 have been unions, which overwhelmingly support Democratic causes, according to an analysis done by OpenSecrets.org's Center for Responsive Politics. Seven of the top 10 donors overall give almost exclusively to politicians or groups on the left. ActBlue, a political action committee that raises money for Democrats and progressive causes and features Michigan Democratic gubernatorial candidate Mark Schauer...

SEIU and other labor unions can accompany the government inspectors on site visits due to a quiet and contested Obama administration rule clarification issued last year in response to a request from a union representative. Maurice Baskin, an attorney representing the Associated Builders and Contractors and the National Association of Manufacturers, said in testimony before the House Subcommittee on Workforce Protections that OSHA’s clarification letter violates the OSH Act and the National Labor Relations Act. Section 9 of the National Labor Relations Act holds that an “authorized representative” must be an agent from a union that a majority of the...

The Service Employees International Union, the labor group behind the home health care dues skim, has been fined $199,000 for concealing that it bankrolled Proposal 4 in 2012, which would have locked a forced unionization scheme into the state constitution. The fine for campaign finance violations is the second-largest ever levied in Michigan, according to a press release from the secretary of state's office. Between 2006 and when the dues skim finally ended in early 2013, the SEIU took more than $34 million from home-based caregivers, most of whom were taking care of family and friends. Secretary of State Ruth...

The Service Employees International Union will have to pay the second-highest fine in Michigan history for its failed 2012 campaign to preserve forced union dues among home care workers. Michigan Secretary of State Ruth Johnson said that the politically powerful union agreed to pay the state nearly $200,000 for failing to properly disclose donors and file timely campaign reports. The union funneled more than $9 million into two 501(c)(4) non-profit groups, Home Care First Inc. and Citizens for Affordable Quality Home Care, which served as the public face of a ballot initiative. “These organizations cannot be used as a means...

Gov. Scott Walker’s public sector collective bargaining reforms of 2011 have not prevented union officials from making hefty six-figure salaries even as some of their organizations struggle to retain members. A review of U.S. Department of Labor filings shows that at least 159 union officials in Wisconsin made six-figure salaries in fiscal year 2012. ... The SEIU has used its political clout to recently push for a minimum wage hike for some Milwaukee County employees and government contractors. While decrying the current minimum wage, the SEIU conveniently lobbied for a carve-out that exempted employers from the requirement if they joined...

LANSING -- The Service Employees International Union will pay almost $200,000 to settle alleged campaign finance violations from a failed 2012 ballot proposal seeking collective bargaining rights for home health workers. The settlement was announced Monday by Secretary of State Ruth Johnson, whose office investigated a complaint that the union skirted campaign finance laws. The complaint was filed by political advocacy group Michigan Freedom Fund The complaint accused the principals behind Home Care First and Citizens for Affordable Quality Home Care of intentionally delaying required filings with Johnson's office to conceal that SEIU had made substantial contributions to support the...

Bill Clinton accepted a $225,000 speaking fee from the nonprofit Washington Hospital Center smack in the middle of two big rounds of layoffs in 2012 — one of a number of tax-exempt organizations that have paid big money to hear the former president talk. The $225,000 payment wasn’t made public by the hospital on its annual Internal Revenue Service forms, but rather appeared among dozens of lucrative speeches by Mr. Clinton reported on his wife’s final ethics filing as secretary of state. “No disrespect to Bill Clinton, but that money could’ve gone a long way and been put to better...

PITTSBURGH--An estimated 300 workers and bused-in labor activists tied up Pittsburgh traffic when they marched downtown to rally outside the corporate offices of the University of Pittsburgh Medical Center. Monday's rally follows demonstrations outside the same building last week when police cited nine demonstrators for trespassing. The activists from the Service Employees International Union, which is trying to organize some of the hospital network's workers, and others were also pressing for higher wages for cooks, custodians and other blue-collar health workers.