CEI Urges Supreme Court to Hear Lawsuit Against Exclusive Union Representation Mandate

The Competitive Enterprise Institute (CEI) in an amicus brief asked the Supreme Court to hear a lawsuit arguing that exclusive labor union representation violates the First Amendment rights of workers who declined to join the union.

The petitioner, Kathleen Uradnik, is a professor of political science at St. Cloud State University in Minnesota. Under state law, she is forced to have the Inter Faculty Organization represent her and speak on her behalf, even after the Supreme Court recognized in Janus v. AFSCME (2018) that this requirement “substantially restricts the [First Amendment] rights of individual employees.”

“Many of the activities conducted by the union and documented in CEI’s brief are explicitly political,” said CEI attorney Devin Watkins. “For example, union activities include advocacy on increased education spending (including tuition-free collage) and opposition to tax cuts or tax breaks, among other political issues.”

“Many union members never had the opportunity to vote for the union that represents them, because it was certified long before they became employees,” said Trey Kovacs, a labor policy expert with CEI.

CEI hopes the Supreme Court will review an adverse ruling by the Eight Circuit Court of Appeals that Ms. Uradnik is not likely to succeed in her case.

View the CEI brief in Uradnik v. Inter Faculty Organization, et al. cei.org.