Court ruling lets union reps attack Freedom Foundation in unionization pitch

The Freedom Foundation has lost a case before the United States Court of Appeals for the Ninth Circuit in Seattle, to defend the Foundation’s right to offer a counterbalance to union practices during new employee orientations.

State laws and unions’ collective bargaining agreements allow union officers exclusive access to newly hired employees.

In those meetings, new hires learn about union benefits and procedures, but the Foundation argued they often turn into high-pressure sales pitches for union membership.

In March 2021, during an orientation for new hires with the Washington’s State Department of Labor and Industry, the Washington Federation of State Employees’ (WFSE) presentation included a series of attacks directed at the Freedom Foundation.

“The union was not using the meeting just to inform employees about union related matters, they were using it to attack the Freedom Foundation,” said foundation attorney Tim Snowball in a Friday interview with The Center Square.

“By allowing the union to come in and use this as a platform to attack a political enemy, the Foundation then had an interest to come in and set the record straight,” said Snowball.

A recording obtained by Freedom Foundation revealed WFSE characterized the Foundation as “dark forces aligned against us,” eager to “defund” WFSE’s contract, “lay off employees,” and “reduce benefits.”

Freedom Foundation requested the opportunity to offer a 15-minute rebuttal to union orientation presentations but was denied and subsequently filed a lawsuit last December.

In last week’s arguments, Marsha Chen, a representative of the Department of Labor and Industries, argued that the First Amendment “does not require the Freedom Foundation be able to present at a new employee orientation.”

“The union was not exceeding the boundaries of the CBA (collective bargaining act) or state law, the union was talking about wages, talking about pensions, talking about healthcare and those are all squarely within the confines of the CBA,” said Chen.

The union’s anti-Freedom Foundation rant was permissible, explained Chen, “because the Freedom Foundation has opposed union priorities, opposed pensions, opposed health care benefits.”

Washington State Labor Council representative Scott Kronland agreed: arguing the union’s speech was “clearly within the scope of the union’s mandate.”

“I think there are facts that we presented in the case that should persuade judges to at least consider what we were saying,” said Snowball.

“We lost, but we’re going to be petitioning the Ninth Circuit for an en banc review and that means the panel goes against you and you’re basically telling the whole court this is important enough we need all of you to step in and look at this.”

Snowball told The Center Square, the court’s ruling against them consisted of a page-and-a-half.

“They didn’t even engage with my arguments,” said Snowball. “They took the government’s position and just rubber stamped it.”

Snowball says the Foundation also has the option of asking the US Supreme Court to hear the case.