Texas Attorney General Greg Abbott filed brief on behalf of a 16-state, bipartisan coalition that opposes the National Labor Relations Board’s (NLRB) proposal to punish employers for creating new jobs in right-to-work states.
In Texas, as in other right-to-work states, workers cannot be forced to join a union or pay union dues as a condition of employment.
Workers in states that have not enacted right-to-work laws do not have a choice to join or not join a union. All employees at unionized facilities must join the local union and pay union dues – even if the employee prefers to not join a union – or risk losing their jobs.
The brief was authored by Abbott and South Carolina Attorney General Alan Wilson. They were joined by attorneys general from both right-to-work and unionized states. They maintain that this first-time ever action by the NLRB would choke job creation and economic opportunity in all states.
“At a time when 13.9 million Americans are unemployed, the NLRB is threatening to micromanage private sector investment decisions, punish states that protect their citizens from forced union membership, and discourage the creation of jobs that are desperately needed by families across the country,” Attorney General Abbott said.
Abbott said the coalition is “concerned about the detrimental impact of yet another job-threatening federal overreach.”
“Just last week, the Obama Administration revealed that the nation’s economic recovery is still struggling and that the unemployment rate is unacceptably high,” Abbott continued. “So, at this critical juncture, we took legal action to prevent the federal government from once again stifling economic opportunity in Texas and across the United States.”
The legal action was filed in response to a proposed NLRB enforcement action “that threatens job creation at a time when the nation’s unemployment rate is 9.1 percent and the country is still struggling to recover economically,” a release from Abbott’s office stated.
Recently the NLRB’s acting general counsel proposed an “enforcement action against The Boeing Company for building a new final production line for its Dreamliner 787 and creating 1,000 new jobs in South Carolina, which is a right-to-work state.”
“The NLRB incorrectly claims that Boeing ‘retaliated’ against its unionized employees in Washington State – which is not a right-to-work state – because the aircraft manufacturer exercised its business judgment to create new manufacturing capacity in South Carolina.”
In San Antonio, a Boeing facility performs maintenance and modification work on the 787 Dreamliner.
Other Texas Boeing (or its subsidiaries) facilities are located Richardson, El Paso, Killeen, Corpus Christi, Austin, Abilene, Wichita Falls, Del Rio and Kingsville.
“If the NLRB successfully prosecutes Boeing for establishing a new production facility and creating new jobs in a right-to-work state, the federal enforcement action could discourage the company from expanding its Texas operations,” Abbott’s released offered.
“Further, the NLRB is considering an enforcement action despite the fact that Boeing has created 2,000 new jobs in Washington, does not plan to eliminate any union jobs, and only proposes to create new jobs in South Carolina.”
“The NLRB has misconstrued federal law in its complaint,” Attorney General Wilson said. “In fact, the federal government’s actions contradict federal law, which allows states to enact right-to-work laws without fear of retaliation from the NLRB. Unless deterred, the NLRB’s unprecedented proceedings against a company’s private business decisions will cause irreparable harm to the business climate in every state and will undoubtedly create an exodus of jobs from our country.”
The brief was joined by Alabama, Arizona, Colorado, Florida, Georgia, Idaho, Kansas, Michigan, Nebraska, Oklahoma, South Dakota, Utah, Virginia and Wyoming.
They contend that the NLRB’s proposal violates federal labor law, ignores states’ discretion to enact right-to-work laws, and harms all states by discouraging employers from opening new manufacturing facilities anywhere in the U.S.
After Boeing invested hundreds of millions of dollars constructing its South Carolina facility, the NLRB filed the proposed enforcement action against Boeing. The coalition contends if this proposals survives Obama’s federal administrative process, “NLRB could be empowered to micromanage private sector business decisions and improperly force Boeing to close its South Carolina facility.”
Recently the federal Bureau of Labor Statistics announced that 13.9 million Americans are still unemployed placing it now at 9.1 percent.
According to The Boeing Co., the airline manufacturer has more than 5,000 Texas-based employees.
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