Sen. Jim DeMint (R., S.C.), in an interview with National Review Online, ratcheted up his criticism of the Obama administration’s labor policy.
DeMint remains infuriated with the National Labor Relations Board for bullying Boeing. “This situation borders on tyranny,” he says. “If an unelected, unaccountable, unconfirmed bureaucrat can threaten thousands of jobs and a billion-dollar investment, after the facility is virtually complete, it smacks of a Third World–type dictatorship.”
The NLRB, a federal agency, has attempted to block the aircraft manufacturer from building a production facility near Charleston. The NLRB claims that Boeing moved away from its Puget Sound base in order to retaliate against aerospace-industry unions.
“I have seen a lot of absurd things come out of this administration,” DeMint sighs. “But the absurdity here is pretty amazing. This involves the right of a company to decide where to locate its business. I cannot believe that the president has not spoken out about it. This kind of thing should not happen in America.”
“This is not about South Carolina,” DeMint notes. “This is about every American company and every state, and not just right-to-work states. This will also hurt the forced-union states. Why would a company, like BMW for example, locate in a union state if they know that they could not move or expand?”
DeMint tells me that he will continue to push this issue in coming weeks. Around the upper chamber, he is promoting his office’s new report on economic freedom, as well as the Job Protection Act, which has numerous cosponsors.
“The NLRB will not win this, at least not directly,” DeMint predicts. “Regardless, however, if this stands, Boeing will have to spend millions of dollars, over several years, fighting this and appealing it. During this process, it is going to send a chilling message to any company in a union state that is thinking about growing its business.”
“In that sense,” DeMint laments, “the board will achieve its objectives even if they don’t win.”
I think a hold on authorizing the NLRB's pay is in order.
Reply to this commentLinkReport AbuseThere are people who are so knee-jerk anti-corporate that they can't for the life of them see the fundamental unfairness and broader implications of this. No, the big evil company must be wrong, and the noble government and unions must be right.
Reply to this commentLinkReport AbuseNotice how he doesn't actually dispute the facts of the case (that the move to South Carolina was retaliation against unions).
I'm not particularly pro-union. But the law authorizing the NLRB is on the books. The laws saying when you can or can't move your operations to retaliate against a labor union are on the books.
IF YOU DISLIKE THOSE LAWS, CHANGE THOSE LAWS. Claiming that their logical enforcement is 'tyranny' is silly.
Reply to this commentLinkReport Abuse@DavidJ
I'm not so sure anyone who thinks that way would be a conservative.
The Dictator is President Obama. The NLRB is just doing marching orders of the Administration. Stranger things have happened, look at the unions owning 40% of GM, and the shareholders took a total loss. That is dictatorship all the way.
Reply to this commentLinkReport Abuse@Televangelist
Any decision that Boeing makes that doesn't increase the number of union workers can be seen as a threat, or a retaliation, against the union by the NLRB (by the way, I haven't heard the NLRB say what it is that Boeing is retaliating for). And under that reasoning then the move to a right to work state for any reason could be judged as action against a union. You say that there are laws protecting unions from retaltation, which I suppose is good; if there HAVE to be unions then I guess they have as much of a right to protection as anyone else, but what about laws that protect bussinesses from unions? If the NLRB is able to stretch the meaning of protecting unions to meaning any decision made by a business that doesn't increase union membership then that's not only grossly unfair for capitol but thats a very slippery slope to go down and a dangerous precident to set. What the article and Sen. DeMint fail mention, and I don't know why it isn't a part of their arguement in this article, is that not a single union position is going to be elimenated from the Puget Sound plant by the move.
Reply to this commentLinkReport AbuseAgain, none of the union members who struck in the past have been retaliated against. Their plant is still open and they still have their jobs.
And yet once again, workers in right to work states CAN unionize if they want to. They just cannot make union membership a prerequisite for working at the factory.
If the NLRB wants to argue that individual choice and freedom of association are "retaliatory" themes against organized labor, then let them do their worst.
Reply to this commentLinkReport AbuseTelevangelist - Boeing didn't move their operations from Washington to SC, they enlarged their operations by building another facility in SC.
They also enlarged their union workforce in WA by 2000 workers, they did not downsize the operation.
I don't believe it is against any law that a US company cannot expand - even to another state.
This administration - bought and paid for by the Unions.
Reply to this commentLinkReport AbuseBoeing is not moving jobs from Washington to South Carolina. This new production facility is an expansion. If NLRB won't let Boeing do business in South Carolina, I guess Boeing will just have to move the operation overseas.
Reply to this commentLinkReport AbuseThis is yet another example of Obama "punishing your enemies". Obama in this case is punishing states that have right to work laws. He is punishing Texas by refusing disaster releif for the fires. He is punishing Arizona by suing them on multiple fronts. He punished Louisiana by completely ignoring the oil spill other than extorting $20 billion from BP, who is another enemy.
Obama is president of the "blue States of AmeriCA". THE REST OF THE STATES ARE HIS ENEMIES WHO NEED TO BE PUNISHED
Reply to this commentLinkReport AbuseExtortion is extortion, no matter how small, and government enforced extortion is Tyranny.
Reply to this commentLinkReport AbuseEnd of story.
If there is anyone in the current Administration who does not belong in jail, I've not yet read of them.
Reply to this commentLinkReport AbuseSo what?
The NLRB decision is a blatant attack by the most socialist president ever elected to be president. FDR and LBJ are but pale imitations.
Where is the outcry? Where is a concerted, daily message from the GOP, the so-called party of limited government and free enterprise teaching the public about this issue? AWOL.
Trumps gone. Too bad. At least someone had the spine to take the fight to the enemy, instead of sipping latte and throwing nerf balls at Obama on NRO.
Reply to this commentLinkReport AbuseThe only reason you say "the board will achieve its objectives even if they don’t win", is because you are not willing to fight. Man up, or see your next re-election attempt fail.
Reply to this commentLinkReport AbuseThe folks in South Carolina aren't happy about this. This time it's about different kind of slavery, and it's the NLRB, and big government in general, that is the oppressor.
Reply to this commentLinkReport AbuseProgressives are having a tough time with this one.
From the way it reads in the Washington Times, the NLRB overstepped its bounds. Boeing has every right to open a facility in the state of their choosing. Whether or not there have been strains to the labor relations up in Washington State is irrelevant to the expansion of the company. As stated, the Puget Sound area is not losing one, single job with this new facility being built. So, what is the problem?
I'm neither a Republican, nor a Democrat (nor any thing else for that matter). As much as it saddens me to say this: I believe it is time for the unions to be abolished. They served their purpose in the past because the workers had no one to speak up for them. But in this day and age of Internet technology, the American worker has at their disposal a tool that allows them to voice their concerns collectively and powerfully without the need to pay a lesser politician to "protect" their interests. It's time to move on.
Reply to this commentLinkReport AbuseYet again more blather from a Republican senator who will do nothing to stop this blatant abuse of regulatory power. This kind of action should force a complete shut down of the senate until the NRLB reneges or the people responsible are removed (preferably both).
Reply to this commentLinkReport AbuseDeMint can't be serious when he says "I cannot believe that the president has not spoken out about it." Can he? When the President put the longtime general counsel for the SEIU, the most rabid, aggressive and regressive union in America, on the NLRB, he pretty much signaled which way he intended to move that body. The President's penchant for rule by regulatory diktat is now well-established. Nonetheless, DeMint thinks he's going to step up and protect a right-to-work state full of people who will vote against him in the next election? The Stupid Party marches on to oblivion . . .
Reply to this commentLinkReport AbuseTelevangelist: The problem is that there is no way a reasonable person can consider this act to be a retaliation against the union. For the first part, not a single union job was lost, in fact the union plant expanded as well.
By your logic, all a union has to do to guarentee that it will forever get its way, is strike. From then on, any time the company decides to not give the union everything they want, the union will just declare that this is retaliation for the strike.
Reply to this commentLinkReport Abusejohnqpublius: Actually it is very similar to one of the major causes of the last civil war. The North using it's electoral strength to protect northern factories from southern competition.
Reply to this commentLinkReport AbuseEricG: The only thing unions have EVER done, is transfer money from workers and consumers to the pockets of the union bosses.
Wages: Were rising long before unions came on the scene.
Working conditions: Had been improving since time began and did not accelerate due to anything done by unions.
The belief that unions had anything at all to do with improvements for workers, is just one of the big myths spread by unions and the mainstream media.
Workers have always had the right quit if they didn't have the wages and working conditions they wanted, and that is all the power they have ever needed to protect their rights.
Reply to this commentLinkReport Abuse