CA’s shady labor union puppet show politics
Reform California sheds light on the labor unions’ skeevy stranglehold on politics, with hundreds of millions in forced dues funneled into campaigns. Moreover, environmental law is wielded like a weapon, hurting home development. Future homebuyers in Silicon Valley cities like San Jose struggle under steep prices as a result.
California politicians and liberal media outlets claim big business dominates politics, but the evidence is overwhelming that labor unions actually run things in California. California politicians do the bidding of the state’s powerful labor union bosses even when it hurts the average citizen.
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“There’s a shocking pattern of corruption where labor union bosses demand policy changes that benefit them at the expense of the little guy and they payoff politicians in the form of massive campaign contributions,” DeMaio says. The California Globe recently reported that there are roughly a million labor union members being forced to fund over $500 million in campaign contributions to labor unions every two-year election cycle.
“California politicians have enacted laws to strip employees of secret balloting in union elections, provide union firms certain benefits and advantages in not complying with regulations and mandates imposed on non-union firms, discriminate against non-union firms in contracting, and even mandate that local governments use union-only staffing on projects,” State Assemblyman Carl DeMaio notes.
The continued debate over how to provide more affordable housing in California further illustrates DeMaio’s claims. Legislators from both political parties want to cut unnecessary red tape associated with the California Environmental Quality Act (CEQA) but labor unions want to keep CEQA in-tact because they use it as a weapon to block non-union projects from being approved.
“Labor union bosses are using CEQA as an extortion tool - and Democrat politicians are letting them get away with it even if it means struggling Californians will not get affordable housing,” DeMaio says.
DeMaio is leading a fight to rebalance California’s politics by organizing a movement to counter the corrupting influence of organized labor in Sacramento.
“First thing we are doing is encouraging union members to opt-out of paying any union dues,” DeMaio says. DeMaio and Reform California sponsor a Help Desk that facilitates the opt-out process.
Editor’s note: Recent CEQA reforms give San Jose the chance to spur development and remedy the city’s housing crunch as median prices near $1.5 million in 2025.
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