ALBANY — Shortly after the U.S. Supreme Court handed down its Janus v. AFSCME Council 31 decision in favor of wealthy corporate interests, anti-union groups began contacting our members.
These anti-labor groups, including New Choice NY, contacted many of you repeatedly, including at your workplaces, to urge you to quit our union.
This is yet another scheme to get hardworking union members to quit our union, and lose the benefits and protections of our union membership.
“It is an outrage that anti-union groups funded by corporate CEOs and the wealthy have been contacting public employees using their work email addresses to promote their own agenda to defund and bust unions. These groups are exploiting and harassing our members,” CSEA President Danny Donohue said. “This latest attack on working people is a clear violation of employer policy, as well as a violation of workers’ privacy.”
Members are angry over New Choice NY’s blatant attempts at destroying our union.
“Who are these people, anyway? Why do they want me to quit my union? They need to leave me alone,” said state Taxation and Finance (Albany) Local President Kim Wallace-Russo.” I’ve made my decision, and I’m sticking with our union.”
Hours after the court handed down the Janus decision, the governor signed an executive order preserving public employees’ privacy by ensuring that their personal information is not released to any unauthorized individual or organization. Names, titles and salaries are still available by FOIL.
In recent weeks, several local government entities have signed similar executive orders.
“Our members are angry at this latest attempt to exploit working people and we will not be fooled into giving up everything unions have fought so hard for,” Donohue said. “CSEA has been around for 108 years and we’re not going anywhere. Stay Union. Stay Strong!”
How to help fight back
We all need to stand together and fight back, and you can help.
If you receive an email:
- Contact your Local or Unit President and let them know ASAP using your personal email account. DO NOT respond to the sender from your work account email.
- Warn your co-workers and tell them to respond the same way.
