Free Republic

A nonprofit group founded by ex-New York SEIU boss Dennis Rivera has received big contributions from corporations that do business with the Puerto Rican government, while employing the governor's brother as its only employee. This arrangement was reported today by Alana Goodman of the Washington Free Beacon, based on information provided by NLPC. The charity, now known as "Sociedad Económica De Amigos del Pais," was founded in New York in 1996 by Rivera and former New Mexico Governor Bill Richardson as the Hispanic Education and Legal Fund (HELF). Its name change, relocation to Puerto Rico and change of mission...

For the second year in a row, the Anti-Police Terror Project (APTP) put out a call for 96 Hours of Direct Action to reclaim Dr. Martin Luther King Jr's radical legacy and take a stand against anti-Black racism and terrorism. In a courageous display of solidarity and the spirit of MLK, Black.Seed, a Black, queer liberation collective, has shut down the Bay Bridge as a show of resistance to a system that continues to oppress Black, Queer, Brown, Indigenous and other marginalized people throughout the Bay Area.

WASHINGTON, Jan. 18, 2016 /PRNewswire-USNewswire/ -- Dozens of contracted airport workers and allies were arrested today at demonstrations in cities including New York City, Boston, Philadelphia, Newark, NJ, Washington, DC, Portland, Ore., Seattle, Chicago and Miami as part of a national airport workers' civil disobedience against the injustices and inequality that persist at airports across the country. The men and women who keep our airports running took action to commemorate MLK Day and to reclaim the dignity that should come with a hard day's work, a central tenet of Dr. King's vision for a just society.

Workers from nine U.S. airports are planning to block bridges, march through terminals and protest at airline headquarters during a day of civil disobedience on Martin Luther King Jr. Day. The workers - a mix of cleaners, baggage handlers, fuelers and wheelchair attendants - will risk arrest at airports and other locations including the Mall, to bring attention to their campaign for better wages, the Service Employees International Union said. The actions are the latest in the airport workers' campaign for a $15-per-hour minimum wage, a benefits package and job protections. They're also protesting threats against their efforts to unionize....

WASHINGTON - The Supreme Court seemed poised on Monday to deliver a severe blow to organized labor. The justices appeared divided along familiar lines during an extended argument over whether government workers who choose not to join unions may nonetheless be required to help pay for collective bargaining. The court's conservative majority appeared ready to say that such compelled financial support violates the First Amendment Collective bargaining, Justice Anthony M. Kennedy said, is inherently political when the government is the employer, and issues like merit pay, promotions and classroom size are subject to negotiation. The best hope for a victory...

New polling data from Reuters finds a nationwide toss-up 2016 contest between GOP frontrunner Donald Trump and Democrat frontrunner Hillary Clinton - but he's beating her by 20 points, 46 percent to 26 percent, among white working-class voters.

The far-left progressive leader of the huge SEIU union admits that many or most of her blue-collar members are sympathetic to Donald Trump's pro-American populist message. "I am deeply concerned about what is stirring, even in our membership... where our members are responding to Trump's message," she told David Axelrod, the chief campaign strategist for President Barack Obama's election in 2008.Can you see Trump winning the election? Axelrod asked. "Yea, I could, I could," said Mary Kay Henry, the international president of the Service Employees International Union."Sixty-four percent of our public members identify as conservative, and are much more...

Mary Kay Henry, the head of the Service Employees International Union is very nervous about the amount of popularity GOP front-runner Donald Trump has garnered. She recently said her organization is going into "hyperdrive" to stand up against Trump, because she saw him as a real threat. Henry was interviewed by David Axelrod for his podcast, "The Axe Files" on Thursday, when she admitted that her organization was worried about what Donald Trump was stirring up in the SEIU's 2.1 million members. She was worried because she believed Trump has the ability to win the White House in November. During...

Harlan Elrich is a high school teacher in California, and that means he must pay about $970 a year to a labor union. He teaches math, and he said the system did not add up. "I get to choose what movie I want to go see," Mr. Elrich said. "I get to choose what church I want to go to. I get to choose what gym I want to join." He should have the same choice, he said, about whether to support a union. Mr. Elrich and nine other California teachers have sued the union, saying that they are being...

More than 100 restaurant owners in the state of New York are begging Gov. Andrew Cuomo (D) not to force them to pay their waiters and waitresses $15 an hour. But it's doubtful he heard them over the roar of union workers at rallies Jan. 4 supporting Cuomo's call for a statewide $15 an hour minimum wage. Melissa Fleischut, president and CEO of the New York State Restaurant Association, can see the $15 an hour wage coming, but she's hoping for a five-year moratorium for people who make their livings on tips. She said her organization's members would be crushed...

The nearly 300 unarmed police officers patrolling Chicago’s O’Hare and Midway airports have been told to “run and hide” during active shootings. Internal aviation department documents obtained by CNN instruct officers not “to become part of the response” to an attack. “If evacuation is not possible, you should find a place to hide where the active shooter is less likely to find you. Block entry to your hiding place and lock the door,” but Matt Brandon, secretary-treasurer of the airport officers union, told CNN they have serious issues with the protocol. “These men and women are sent to the Chicago...

<p>Matt Brandon, secretary-treasurer of the Service Employees International Union Local 73, which represents the aviation police officers, said he doesn’t understand why the officers are prohibited from carrying guns.</p> <p>He said the union has been unable to get the aviation department to change the no gun policy, which dates to the early 1990s.</p>

Clark County's largest employee union is taking the county to court in effort to overturn an arbitrator's ruling that eliminates hundreds of millions of dollars in longevity pay for future hires. The Service Employees International Union Local 1107 filed a motion to vacate the arbitrator's contract award this week in Clark County District Court. To prevail, the union would need a judge to find that the arbitrator disregarded state law when issuing his final, binding decision. The arbitrator, Ross Runkel, also gave county employees 4.5 percent in retroactive pay increases in his Aug. 25 award. The key sticking point, however,...

Workers represented by Los Angeles County's largest employee union voted to approve a tentative agreement with county management that would give them a 10% raise over three years. Service Employees International Union Local 721, which represents more than 57,000 county employees, including nurses, social workers and clerical workers, tallied ballots Thursday after a month long voting process. Apart from the pay increase, the new contract would make Cesar Chavez Day an official county holiday starting in 2017, provide as much as an additional week of annual vacation every year and put some temporary workers on a path to full-time jobs....

From correctional, child support and security officers to program techs – about 900 members are trying to leave the Service Employees Union, but voter packets were inadvertently mailed out early two days early. (snip) We want to bring back the old way of representation which would just be for members wages and benefits, and get out of the Obama-care fight, the immigration fight, the Black Lives matter fight, the 15 fight – all these fights that are not associated with public sector employees.” – Eulalio Gomez, Fresno Sheriffs Correction Officer.

Under President Obama, federal agencies are doling out tens of millions of dollars to one of the Democratic Party’s most essential constituencies: big labor. The grants range from safety training to union membership recruitment to whipping up support for the president’s signature program called Obamacare, a Washington Times review of federal contracting records shows. Last week, for example, the Department of Energy awarded a $900,000-plus grant for the development of a safety regimen for workers facing hazardous duties in energy and waste jobs. It didn’t go to a safety firm or training school but rather to a labor union: Akron...

[picture of Robert Creamer] Looks like the Marxist architect of Obamacare also had a major say in putting forth the Iran Deal. Robert Creamer was convicted in 2005 for tax violations and bank fraud. He served time and was under house arrest. While in prison, he crafted the core underpinnings of Obamacare. Creamer is a political consultant who is very close to Barack Obama and is married to Jan Schakowsky, the Marxist Congresswoman from Illinois. While on the inside, he wrote, Listen to Your Mother: Stand Up Straight! How Progressives Can Win. Obamacare was only the first major step in...

Exclusive video from Brietbart News outside the GOP debate Wednesday shows a candid moment as union official Alejandra Valles, Secretary-Treasurer of the SEIU chapter United Service Workers West, directed a group of young protesters to “punch and kick” a photo of GOP Presidential candidate Donald Trump. “This is awesome! Awesome!” exclaimed the woman taking the photo, before jumping into the photo herself and saying, “I’m going to kick!” She then urged the group to make fists.

Powerful and well funded, 1199 SEIU has unprecedented reach into city and state government. ... Medicaid is one of the primary sources of funding for the hospitals employing workers from 1199 SEIU, the powerful hospital and nursing-home employees’ union. ... The union’s clout can be assessed by several measures: the sheer size of its membership, its spending on campaigns and lobbying, and the depth and breadth of its connections with New York’s ruling elite. With well over 300,000 members in Massachusetts, Maryland, Florida, Washington, D.C., and New York (where over half of that total resides), 1199SEIU is the largest union...

Black Lives Matter protestors wearing pink Planned Parenthood shirts shut down a recent rally by Republican presidential candidate Jeb Bush, providing further evidence that the #BlackLivesMatter movement is not a marginal political group, but an increasing vital part of the institutional left’s community organized shock troop coalition.WATCH:(video at link)The YouTube video’s description makes it clear that the angry free speech haters came from a cross section of the left’s current flavors of special interest groups: illegal aliens, union members and the sexually confused. The description says: #BlackLivesMatter shut down a Jeb Bush presidential town hall in Las Vegas. Standing alongside...