‘Given Teamsters union bosses’ well-deserved reputation for using violence to shut down dissent, it is critical that the NLRB quickly prosecute…’
(Ben Sellers, Liberty Headlines) Teamster thugs at an Alabama Sysco Foods plant got federal charges for attempting to snatch the petitions from anti-union activists.
According to the National Right to Work Foundation, Sysco employee Sulane Lowery filed a federal unfair labor practice charge with the National Labor Relations Board against the International Brotherhood of Teamsters and Teamsters Local 612.
“Sulane Lowery is simply exercising his right to oppose Teamsters monopoly unionization, but rather than seeking to convince workers to voluntarily affiliate with their union, Teamsters bullies have resorted to physical intimidation and coercion,” said NRTW Foundation President Mark Mix.
Lowery had been organizing a counter-drive as the union sought to press the Sysco employees to support giving it exclusive worker representation at the food-distribution plant south of Birmingham.
Lowery’s complaint said that he was gathering the petitions from coworkers when several Teamsters agents “ripped from his hands the petitions he was collecting.”
The union henchmen then proceeded to steal employee information from the petitions, although they never returned them.
“Given Teamsters union bosses’ well-deserved reputation for using violence to shut down dissent, it is critical that the NLRB quickly prosecute the Teamsters for this blatantly illegal behavior,” Mix said.
The attack is believed to be caught on tape by security cameras and will be investigated.
Despite its efforts to protect workers’ rights to be free from union coercion and intimidation practices, NRTW said its own ability to operate free from intimidation had also come under threat recently by a different sort of thugs.
In March, the partisan Democrats in the U.S. House of Representatives, led by Speaker Nancy Pelosi, railroaded through a highly contentious bill, HR 1, which it dubbed the “For the People” Act.
In reality, despite its rosy, Orwellian nomenclature, the bill, which cleared the House 228–197 was anything but “for the people.”
Among the bill’s lowlights:
- Expand ‘access’ to voter registration—by effectively limiting safeguards in place to prevent voter fraud
- Force presidents and vice presidents to release their tax returns
- Rewrite campaign finance laws, forcing nonprofit advocacy groups to submit reams of paperwork and disclose donors
“The clear, unconstitutional aim of HR 1 is to curtail the free speech of ordinary citizens,” said Greg Mourad, NRTW’s committee vice president, in a newsletter.
Like the petition-stealing teamsters, NRTW said it fears the disclosure of its supporters, in an era in which leaks and doxing have become common practices deployed by the Left, would be tantamount to an intimidation tactic.
“Effectively, Right to Work officers would either have to help thuggish politicians and union bosses track down and harass our supporters for daring to criticize them, or risk fines and, potentially, imprisonment,” Mourad said.