South Carolina Boeing Employee Files Retaliation Charge Against Machinist Union

Yesterday (6/15/2011) National Right To Work Legal Defense Foundation attorneys filed Unfair Labor Practice (ULP) charges against the Machinist union (IAM) for their client Dennis Murray, who previously led a successful effort to decertify the Machinist union at Boeing’s Charleston facility.

Murray claims that the union’s current charges against Boeing and the resulting Obama appointee National Labor Relations Board (NLRB) General Counsel Lafe Solomon’s complaint against Boeing that would eliminate over 1,000 existing jobs in South Carolina are the result of retaliation against him and the workers of South Carolina by the IAM for previously voting out the union.

Has the NLRB become a tool of Big Labor as many argue? It certainly is going to extraordinary measures in this Boeing case to ignore the rights of SC employees and past NLRB rulings.

For more, here’s a section from the National Right To Work’s press release:

The charge against the union points out that if the IAM union hierarchy still had a presence in the South Carolina plant, then the South Carolina workers’ jobs would not be at risk.

“Workers should be free to choose whether or not to affiliate with a union and not have to worry about their jobs as a result,” said Mark Mix, President of National Right to Work. “National Right to Work is proud to stand with the courageous employees as they fight to save their jobs and prevent the devastating effects the IAM union bosses’ and the NLRB’s actions will have on their community and workers across the country.”

National Right to Work Foundation attorneys filed the charge for Boeing employee Dennis Murray, who led the effort to remove the union from the Charleston plant. Foundation attorneys also represent Murray; Cynthia Ramaker, the former president of the IAM local union which was removed from the plant; and employee Meredith Going, Sr. with a motion to intervene in the NLRB’s case against Boeing. The employees’ motion is currently pending appeal with the NLRB in Washington, D.C.

For more information, visit http://www.nrtw.org/boeing.