Janus is just one of many arrows that see unions as the target

It’s a pity that George Orwell wasn’t alive to see last week’s Supreme Court decision in Janus v. AFSCME. He might have considered updating a passage from his book 1984 to read, “War is peace. Freedom is slavery. Ignorance is strength — and, suppressing the voices of workers equals free speech.”

The Supreme Court’s 5-4 decision, along party lines, was based on a bogus free-speech argument. This politically motivated court case, brought by an Illinois state employee Mark Janus, clearly was designed to undercut the bargaining power of those employed in local and state government. This wasn’t about free speech, this was about silencing workers’ voices. The five justices who supported this slap in the face to public employees and their families, reversing four decades of settled law, telegraphed that they are little better than political hacks.

Janus is just one arrow being shot at a union target. Attacks on working people and their unions are unprecedented this year — across the nation and here in Florida.

In May, President Trump signed three anti-union executive orders that take away not just the rights given to federal workers by law but that also restrict the Congress’ ability to make the laws protecting federal employees’ rights to have union representation.

Members of the U.S. House are pushing back. In a letter to Trump, Rep. Elijah E. Cummings, D-Maryland, said that the orders “are the most direct and systematic attack on whistleblower protections in a generation. They strip federal employees of procedures that were put in place to protect them against retaliation by their superiors — and they deny whistleblowers assistance from their union representatives when they are punished for speaking the truth. Your executive orders also degrade existing protections against undue partisanship in the federal workforce, allowing political appointees to terminate employees arbitrarily and without the checks assured through meaningful collective bargaining.”

Across the aisle, 21 members of the House GOP stood up to Trump and signed a letter stating, “The recent executive orders embark upon a path that will undo many of the long-standing principles protected by law, which establish checks and balances not only in the federal workplace, but for the American public.”

The union-busting attacks for purely political reasons are even worse in Florida. Like in the federal sector, employees are not required to join unions if a union has won the right to represent a workplace through a vote by the workers. Unlike in the federal sector, and unlike the rules for any other profession in Florida, this year the state Legislature passed HB7055 with provisions to strip teachers and their unions of the right to bargain if their dues-paying membership falls below 50 percent. Some teacher unions, principally because they have high numbers of substitute teachers or high turnover, have trouble meeting this threshold, even though they would easily win an election to determine representation. This law was passed to tie up teachers unions with annual recertification and strip some teachers of their right to collectively bargain altogether.

Many of the Legislature’s leaders have resented teachers and their unions for calling out giveaways to their charter school cronies, stripping accountability provisions from charters and underfunding traditional public schools. They resent teachers who are strong advocates for students, teachers who think that their union empowers them to challenge school administrators and legislators about decisions that are not in the best interests of their classroom or are poorly-conceived education “reforms.”

In the short run, the Janus decision, the president’s executive orders, and the regressive and unfair anti-teacher legislation in Florida may hurt the labor movement, but legislation and executive orders that are so clearly politically motivated will create a backlash.

In the long run, it will serve to make unions and their members more assertive and force a stronger culture of internal organizing. Membership in unions in the federal sector is surging, and here in Florida, my local union, the United Teachers of Dade, has picked up thousands of new members since the spring. And they’re not alone.

We will not be silenced. If union members and their representatives cannot calmly negotiate across the bargaining table or advocate for students in committee rooms, we will raise our voices. The recent statewide teacher strikes in West Virginia, Oklahoma and Arizona demonstrate that when public-sector workers face limitations on their bargaining rights they take their case to the streets.

Fedrick Ingram is vice president of the Florida Education Association. He is the former president of the United Teachers of Dade and Miami-Dade County’s Teacher of the Year. He is currently running for FEA President.