Union Spending against Right-to-Work Efforts

As Right to Work initiatives gain momentum, union bosses and their allies use forced dues to keep workers in chains.  Trey Kovacs has the story in workplacechoice.org.

States considering adopting right-to-work legislation include Missouri, Ohio, and Oregon. In those states, right-to-work could be on the statewide ballot as soon as 2014.

At the same time, labor unions are conducting expensive campaigns to sully the reputation of right-to-work laws, in hopes that unions can continue to force workers who do not want union representation to financially support unions.

One tactic unions have deployed in Missouri, Ohio, and Oregon is creating front groups, which conduct ad campaigns and generally disseminate misinformation about right-to-work laws.

Fortunately, Department of Labor records give some insight into how much money unions are spending to defeat right-to-work legislation.

In Ohio, the International Union of Operating Engineers and AFL-CIO headquarters fund Keep Ohio’s Heritage and We Are Ohio. In a Keep Ohio’s Heritage ad, right-to-work is described as a means “to kill unions and worker protections – just like what is done in communist countries.â€

In 2012, Keep Ohio’s Heritage received a total of $1,050,000. In 2013, We Are Ohio collected $49,297.