April 11th, 2010
In These Times: SEIU wins fraction of damages sought against NUHW, as both sides claim victory
By David Moberg
NUHW vice-president John Borsos said that the trial was a victory of sorts for NUHW despite the judgment, since the judge repeatedly affirmed in the trial and instructions to the jurors that UHW members and officers had the right to resist the trusteeship and to form a new union.
“They put democracy on trial,” he said, “and what rights workers had to resist trusteeship and create a new organization. All that was confirmed.” By contrast, he said, SEIU attorneys responded to a question from the judge by arguing that officers would not have the right to argue for disaffiliation of a local even if the international union were thoroughly corrupt.
Before the trial, SEIU offered to drop the lawsuit if NUHW disbanded, Borsos said. He argued that the suit was intended to chill opposition in the union. “They made it clear that they were doing everything they did to trample democracy in SEIU and to throw up any roadblocks they could to NUHW competing with SEIU,” he said.
April 11th, 2010
KPFA Evening News on SEIU lawsuit
Click the play button above to hear the KPFA Evening News report on the outcome of SEIU’s lawsuit against 28 union reformers and NUHW. Includes an interview with Michael Torres, a respiratory therapist at USC University Hospital and NUHW supporter. Source: KPFA
April 11th, 2010
Audio: KPFA Evening News on SEIU’s lawsuit
Click the play button above to hear the KPFA Evening News report on the outcome of SEIU’s lawsuit against 28 union reformers and NUHW. Michael Torres, a respiratory therapist at USC University Hospital and NUHW supporter, explains what really happened.
April 10th, 2010
New York Times: Union wins damages
By Steven Greenhouse A federal jury in San Francisco awarded more than $1.5 million in damages to the Service Employees International Union on Friday in a lawsuit that accused a breakaway union local and its leaders of illegally undermining the S.E.I.U. The jury ordered the breakaway unit, the National Union of Healthcare Workers, to pay […]
April 9th, 2010
Labor leaders and elected officials vow to appeal limited award in SEIU’s lawsuit against union reformers
“Tens of thousands of healthcare workers are organizing with NUHW for a real voice at work and a democratic voice in their union, and that will continue in spite of this verdict. These reformers stood up for workers’ right to vote when SEIU tried to take it away, and that’s the only thing they’re guilty […]