The effort conflicts with the Teamsters-backed Biden-Harris Labor Board rule aimed at disenfranchising workers
California and Georgia (December 9, 2024) – Two groups of trucking employees have filed petitions seeking elections to remove International Brotherhood of Teamsters (Teamsters) union officials from power in their workplaces. Stockton, Calif.-based PepsiCo driver Edward Kilgore and Georgia-based BFI Waste Services driver James Shiflett filed decertification petitions with the National Labor Relations Board (NLRB) and received free legal assistance from National Right to Work attorneys Legal Defense Foundation.
Edward Kilgore, a truck driver for PepsiCo Beverages North America in Stockton, California, filed a petition in December in which a majority of his colleagues urged the National Labor Relations Board (NLRB) to hold a vote to remove Teamsters Local 439- deter union bosses. Shortly thereafter, a group of Georgia area BFI Waste Services, LLC truckers led by James Shiflett also filed a petition calling for the same type of NLRB election to oust Teamsters Local 728. The NLRB is the federal agency responsible for enforcing federal labor law. This includes conducting elections to form (or “certify”) and dissolve (or “decertify”) unions.
Both Kilgore's and Shiflett's decertification petitions contain employee signatures well above the threshold required to trigger a decertification vote under the National Labor Relations Act (NLRA). If a majority of Kilgore and Shiflett's colleagues vote against retaining Teamsters union officials, they will lose their monopoly bargaining power in the workplace.
For California workers, their continued commitment is particularly important because they reside in a state with no right-to-work protections. In such states, union officials can enforce union contracts that require employees to pay dues or fees as a condition of getting or keeping a job. In contrast, in “Right to Work” states like Georgia, union membership and dues payment are strictly voluntary.
However, union bosses in both right-to-work jurisdictions and non-right-to-work jurisdictions can use their monopoly bargaining privileges to subject all workers in a unionized entity to uniform contracts – even those workers those who voted against the union or otherwise should be against it. A successful decertification election ends union officials' forced dues and monopoly bargaining power in the workplace.
“My colleagues and I not only oppose the so-called 'representation' of Teamsters officials, but are particularly offended that the union currently has the power to enter into a contract that forces us to fund the very union that we reject it,” said Edward Kilgore, who filed the petition against Teamsters Local 439. “This is about giving workers the power to make their own decisions.”
Pro-union bosses' changes to NLRB policy disenfranchise workers
Although the number of decertification applications filed annually has increased by over 50% over the past four years, Biden-Harris NLRB bureaucrats recently repealed key reforms (collectively known as the “Election Protection Rule”) that made it easier for workers to apply for decertification elections . Under the Teamsters-backed change, union officials can manipulate often unproven allegations against management (also known as “obstruction allegations”) to prevent workers from exercising their right to vote out of a union, and they can also prevent workers from voting in elections to seek decertification to challenge a union's rise to power through “card check,” an uncertain process that bypasses the traditional secret ballot process.
“Workers across the country are rejecting the top-down agenda of union leaders both inside and outside the workplace,” commented Mark Mix, president of the National Right to Work Foundation. “As Teamsters bosses like Sean O'Brien push for more power over rank-and-file workers by, among other things, abolishing right-to-work laws nationwide, America's working men and women are increasingly trying to vote out union officials who do this.” do not serve their interests.”
The National Right to Work Legal Defense Foundation is a nonprofit charitable organization that provides free legal assistance to employees whose human or civil rights have been violated by forced union violations. The foundation, which can be reached toll-free at 1-800-336-3600, supports thousands of employees annually in approximately 200 cases across the country.
