To: Center for Individual Rights

Center for Individual Rights: Stop Attacking Working People

Enough is enough! It’s time to stop attacking working people, including teachers like me and other public service workers who work to make our communities better.

Corporate CEOs and the wealthy special interests cannot stop us from banding together and forming unions to make our lives better.

Why is this important?

The Koch brothers are once again attacking our freedom to join together in unions to improve the lives of all working people, and we want them to stop!

In my over 20 years of teaching, I’ve seen America’s economy swing out of balance in favor of corporate CEOs and wealthy special interests who manipulate the rules to benefit themselves at the expense of the rest of us. It’s already way too hard for many Americans to get by, let alone get ahead. Now there’s a new case before the U.S. Supreme Court that threatens to make things even worse.

A group called the Center for Individual Rights, which the American Prospect recently revealed has been funded by the Koch Brothers, other right-wing one-percenters, and even white supremacists, is trying to make it even harder for public service workers – teachers like me, as well as nurses, social workers, firefighters and others -- to band together at work in order fight for benefits and wages we can use to provide for our families

This Koch Brothers-backed group is asking the Supreme Court to impose the same kind of radical agenda we’ve seen hurt everyday people in states like Wisconsin and every state in the country. Worse yet, just like in Citizens United, this all-out attack on everyday Americans would be enshrined in the Constitution.

When I began teaching at a California community college in 1992, it never even crossed my mind not to join a union, and it’s a decision I’ve never regretted. We’ve all seen the research showing that strong unions benefit the middle class. Being a union member has allowed me to speak in one voice with my fellow teachers for things that matter and benefit the community – better training, smaller classes, and wages and benefits that can sustain families.

But if the groups behind this case get their way, it will be another major blow to the middle class.

Tell the Center for Individual Rights: Enough is enough! It’s time to stop attacking working people -- the teachers like me and other public service workers who work to make our communities better.

Sign this petition and join us as we tell the Center for Individual Rights that we will not let corporate CEOs and the wealthy special interests stop us from banding together and forming unions to make our lives better.

Lacy Barnes, College Instructor, California Federation of Teachers, Local 1533