I would like to thank the Huffington Post and the community of readers here for providing me an opportunity to share my point of view about SEIU's civil lawsuit against 26 union reformers.
They say every coin has two sides, well, so does every case in court.
To begin with, I want talk about the union I used to be an elected leader of before Andy Stern removed me and 85 other union members from office.
UHW was, by all measures, a successful union. We bargained strong, industry-leading contracts. We represented our members effectively. We organized non-union workers to join our union. We trained our stewards diligently. If you ask anyone in the labor movement who knows our history, they will tell you that we served our members well. In fact, our union was an example for the rest of the labor movement of the kind of power that a member-led union can win for its members.
All that has changed since SEIU took over UHW. While UHW was a member-led union, SEIU is an employer-friendly union.
In just one year of trusteeship, SEIU has given away the lump sum payout pension option for Kaiser employees without a vote, bargained away family health benefits at Alameda Hospital, forced Sutter employees into a substandard health plan and given away $10.5 million at the bargaining table to Daughters of Charity directly from union members' pockets. Those giveaways are the result of SEIU's employer-friendly approach to bargaining.
Directly out of our disagreement with SEIU and their takeover of our union, we have built a new, democratic union called NUHW, the National Union of Healthcare Workers. Since we took that step, however, SEIU has pursued what even Judge Alsup has called a "greedy" and "vastly overreaching" legal strategy against the union reformers who organized to prevent SEIU's takeover and went on to form NUHW.
That is the real background to SEIU's civil lawsuit.
When their lawsuit began, SEIU's lawyers were asking for $25 million in damages from the defendants. After one week in court, they have abandoned 80% of their claims. For example, over the last year SEIU has smeared the defendants with false claims of:
SEIU has backed down from every one of those claims when asked to prove them in court.
It is clear that SEIU's lawyers understand, and want to hide from the jury, that the vast majority of the members of our union disagreed with Andy Stern. It's also clear that SEIU knows full well that no funds from our former union were used to build NUHW. Every witness they have put on the stand including SEIU officials Eliseo Medina, Mary Kay Henry and Leon Chow have testified to that.
As SEIU has called each key witness in the trial, the judge has been perplexed as to what SEIU thought the testimony was proving. The judge has said over and over that it is completely appropriate to try to prevent the trusteeship of a local union.
As I sit in court and hear the testimony of the current SEIU-UHW staff members, I am also deeply struck and saddened by the gross incompetence and lack of even basic familiarity with the fundamentals of representing union members they demonstrate. The staff SEIU's trustees have hired to run my former union have shown themselves to be unfamiliar with the very basics of filing grievances and bargaining contracts. They have also demonstrated a glaring lack of common sense. I say this not only as a union steward but as someone who has trained stewards and bargained contracts for over two decades.
Finally, it has also struck me the manner in which SEIU's trustees personally attack the former elected leaders of SEIU-UHW like Sal Rosselli and John Borsos. I think I can offer a valuable perspective here, since I was a member and leader of the union before either of them arrived.
I have always known Sal and John to put the members first and to conduct themselves in a deeply ethical manner. That has been our tradition; and that's why we elected them. That commitment is the founding principle of the new union we are building together, NUHW.
To read more union member voices and get facts about the trial, please visit NUHW.org/trial.
Loading comments… 
I’m not sure which courtroom Mr. Finamore was sitting in last week, but I am reasonably sure that it is not the same one which I was in. In my courtroom, the defendants
Will we ever change our (labor) leaders? They seem when they get into power they do not use common judgdment, they become egotistica
Mother Jones
Nov 23, 1923
Washington
Instead, SEIU leadership denied retaliator
And shouldn't members determine the trajectory to their union?
http://www
It's a winner.
I see we got HST back on here, I am now sure he is a fake. He's posting the same bS, under a different username , either that or its 2 people out there laying out the same talking points.
As far as Rashida Davis testimony about a security guard laying on the floor in a fetal position, because people were kicking him in the head. However no charges were filed. Also the question I want to know, is this one of the security guards that SEIU was getting charged $110 per hour{24 \7}. That is union members dues money remember. Also as far as Rashida staying in a hotel, when she lived in the bay, that is a waste of dues money.Acco
http://doc
Each side in a struggle, each witness, has a narrative. Both are "slanted" or biased by definition
Looking forward to further accounts from ground zero in the battle for the soul of the labor movement!
At other times they proudly report developmen
SEIU is the perfect example.
And speaking of "employer friendly" unions, isn't Sal Rosselli the guy who was in charge when Kaiser Permenente announced their "partnersh
There is a good reason why a majority of union members are sticking with SEIU and not your revenge spinter group. SEIU represents a lot of people and you do not and that's simply a fact (that you don't like).
http://www
Wrong!
"have heard that recycled B.S. about bargaining from scratch."
You might want to tell that to the southern california workers that voted to join NUHW and were told by Kaiser that they no longer had a contract or any protection from the contract. They were also told that the couldn't use SEIU-UHW's contract and expand upon it when time for negotiatio
"Its funny that SEIU is the "leader" for EFCA, but when it comes to their own members, they can't have a free choice to leave."
SEIU is not trying to poach members, but NUHW is.
"You wanna see what UHW members have to deal with? "
You mean like Rasheda Davis who testified in court about a NUHW mob that over ran her office, became violent and stole a contact list? Then later at the hotel she was staying in because she feared for her family's safety, someone put a flyer under her door with a picture of a rat on it. This is from court testimony, so if you have proof this is wrong you need to tell the court so they can prosecute Ms.Davis for perjury.
Huh, I didn't know that; thanks for the article. It now makes sense why they support Obama so strongly. I was wondering about that.
Then Andy Stern and the SEIU moves in (not to help the Americans) and "organizes
No matter what the cause or where the struggle, you always find Andy Stern and the SEIU on the wrong side -- on the management side, the Republican side, the anti-worke
Shocker!