Patricia Whittaker, a 911 operator for the City of Chicago, has triumphed in her legal fight to halt union dues payments to the International Brotherhood of Electrical Workers (IBEW) Local 21 after union officials misled her about her rights and obstructed her attempts to stop the deductions. With help from the National Right to Work Legal Defense Foundation, Whittaker filed charges with the Illinois Public Employment Relations Board (PERB) to assert her rights.
Whittaker sent multiple requests to IBEW union officials to end union deductions, as is her First Amendment right under the Foundation-won Janus v. AFSCME Supreme Court decision. In Janus , the Supreme Court declared that union officials could not force public sector employees to pay union dues as a condition of employment, and that union officials must obtain affirmative employee consent before deducting union dues from any public worker’s paycheck. […]
“The behavior of IBEW Local 21 union officials highlight just how crucial it is for public employees to be aware of and assert their Janus rights,” said National Right to Work Legal Defense Foundation President Mark Mix. “While we are pleased to see IBEW officials back down once again, it is unacceptable that it takes aggressive legal action just to force union officials to respect workers’ constitutional rights.”
NATIONAL RIGHT TO WORK LEGAL DEFENSE FOUNDATION
All contents from this article were originally published on the National Right to Work Legal Defense Foundation Website.
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