Tag: union busting

Weak disclosure rules have helped keep anti-union consulting and legal work out of sight.Every week, U.S. workers sit through mandatory meetings where paid consultants discourage them from unionizing. The consultants are supposed to promptly disclose their names and fees to the federal government so that workers understand who’s lobbying them. But this system aimed at transparency still leaves workers in the dark, a HuffPost series has found.Many consultants ― known legally as “persuaders” ― file their disclosure forms late, sometimes well after the union election has already ended. Or they provide incomplete information, withholding how much the employer is paying them. And although they’re supposed to make disclosures of their own, some employers fail to reveal how much money they spent...

“I’m a traitor, right?” said one former Teamster who became an anti-union consultant.Joe Brock gets a lot of calls from employers in distress. The 62-year-old works as a “union avoidance” consultant, so companies come to him when their workers are on the verge of organizing. He hears from employers of all stripes who want to stay union-free — hospitals, retailers, manufacturers. But it’s no coincidence that many who want Brock specifically are squaring off with the Teamsters.After all, Brock used to be an elected Teamsters official in Philadelphia. The son of a union leader, he served as president of Teamsters Local 830 before he lost a contentious election and was ousted from office. Since then, he has been working union campaigns from the other side. He belongs to a prolific subgroup of...

Documents reveal some of the tactics deployed specifically against immigrants during union campaigns.In the fall of 2020, a group of workers at a recycling company called United Scrap Metal were trying to form a union at their Philadelphia plant. The company hired a “union avoidance” firm called Chessboard Consulting in hopes of defeating the organizing campaign.The firm sent a bilingual consultant named Mike Rosado to give the workers, who were mostly immigrants, second thoughts about a union. United Scrap provided Rosado with detailed spreadsheets listing each worker’s name and address, as well as their fluency levels in both Spanish and English, according to documents obtained from the National Labor Relations Board. Many of the workers were deemed “completely illiterate.”Separate spre...

The Labor Relations Institute links employers up with the “persuaders” who thwart union organizing campaigns.TULSA, Okla. ― The nexus of the “union avoidance” consulting industry sits in a row of strip malls in the Tulsa suburb of Broken Arrow, between a dog-grooming service and a smoky bar. The blue sign above the door says “LRI,” short for the Labor Relations Institute, a lofty moniker that suggests an organization abuzz with researchers. But LRI is not an institute so much as a profitable business built on subcontracting.LRI acts as a clearinghouse that links up employers with the “persuaders” who help thwart union organizing campaigns ― work that labor groups call “union busting.” It is the firm that some of America’s most recognizable companies have turned to when their workers are c...

How a pair of “union avoidance” consultants using fake names turned a small Midwestern workplace upside down.Early last year, the president of a small manufacturing company in Missouri received a cold call from a man who went by the name of Jack Black. Workers at the company, called Motor Appliance Corp., or MAC, had just asked to hold a union election. Jack Black specialized in “union avoidance.” He wanted to offer his services.Jack Black’s firm has brought in millions of dollars over the years by providing employers with “persuaders,” or, to use unions’ less charitable term, “union busters” — consultants who try to convince workers not to organize. Persuader work is big business these days. The number of union elections in the U.S. has surged amid an organizing wave over the last two ye...