The Freedom Foundation is considering the advantages and disadvantages of a possible lawsuit to challenge Senate Bill 189.
Enacted on June 30, SB 189 establishes a tax credit that subsidizing some costs of union membership.
“We’re obviously paying very close attention to the discussions in the legislature about the tax credit,” said Maxford Nelsen, director of labor policy at the Freedom Foundation. “We would definitely be evaluating potential legal challenges, at least conceptually, and we'll continue to assist people who have well-founded and sincerely held objections to union membership, want to resign their membership and no longer paying dues.”
Approving SB 189 is just the first step, according to media reports. More legislation and appropriation is required before the program can start.
“At the end of the day, the money will come out of the state's treasury, which means state taxpayers, just like they fund other programs that the state of California operates,” Nelsen told the Southern California Record. “If this is implemented, they will be paying people to pay union dues essentially using the state's tax revenue.”
The new law comes at a time when the Freedom Foundation has been documenting declining union membership.
“This is a political move,” Nelsen said. “It is simply the state of California using force of government to fund the political groups that keep the majority in power.”
As previously reported in the Southern California Record, some 4,000 teachers have opted out of United Teachers of Los Angeles (UTLA), California Teachers Association, American Federation of Teachers, California School Employees Association, and some other smaller local teacher unions since the start of the pandemic in March 2020.
“The goal here for lawmakers is to make it as attractive as possible to be a union member and to fund through union membership the candidates and ideologies that currently run the state of California,” Nelsen added.