NEWS
B Y H E N RY H O U S TO N
KNOCK, KNOCK,
WHO’S THERE?
Freedom Foundation starts
opt-out campaign in Oregon
I
t’s only been a few weeks since the U.S. Supreme
Court ruled 5-4 in Janus v. AFSCME that it’s uncon-
stitutional to require non-members to pay union dues,
but the conservative Freedom Foundation has mobi-
lized its campaign on the West Coast to notify every
government employee of their right to opt-out from paying
dues to unions.
Aaron Withe, director of the Oregon region for the
Freedom Foundation, says the organization, a nonprofit
based in Olympia, Wash., knew what the outcome of the
Janus ruling would be. So for the past year they had been
aggressively collecting contact information of government
employees who are represented by public unions.
The organization obtained names and contact informa-
tion thanks to their policy staff, who are experts in public
records law, Withe adds.
Withe says they had to get the district attorney involved
for some cities — notably Portland — to give employees’
contact information to the nonprofit. However, Eugene dis-
tributed the names easily, he adds.
“Public workers should be concerned that this orga-
nization has their personal information,” says Peter Star-
zynski, executive director of Northwest Accountability
Project (NWAP), a nonprofit that monitors groups like
Freedom Foundation. “They have no requirement to keep
it secure.”
Melissa Unger, executive director at Service Employ-
ees International Union (SEIU) 503, one of the unions
Freedom Foundation has targeted for their Oregon cam-
paign, is concerned about the organization’s possession of
the records and what that could mean.
Anyone can access public employees’ contact informa-
tion, and that such information could be used for commer-
cial reasons, Unger says.
“The state system allows anyone to email 50,000 state
workers during their workday,” she says. “I don’t think any
employer would think that that was a good system.”
However, going door-to-door to the houses of public
employees will be the “bread and butter” of the campaign,
Withe says. The organization will also spend money in
their campaign to send out mailers, conduct social media
campaigning and put up billboard advertising.
The canvassers will be paid slightly above minimum
wage, Withe adds.
Withe tweeted on July 6 that 1,500 people represented
UNION SUPPORTER WITH CANVASSER IN SALEM
PHOTO COURTESY JILL BAKKEN/SEIU 503
by unions in Oregon have opted out since the Janus ruling
with the assistance of Freedom Foundation.
That number doesn’t add up, according to Starzynski
and Unger. Starzynski says that might be the number of
fair share dues-paying members who were automatically
opted-out. Unger thinks it could be how much traffic the
organization has received on their website.
Freedom Foundation also reported that their campaign
has resulted in confrontations between SEIU and Freedom
Foundation canvassers. The conservative nonprofit reports
on their website that a “gaggle of purple-clad counter-pro-
testers awaited” their arrival at 7 am. It goes on to say the
“hacks only drew more workers to our station, allowing us
to reach more people with important fact-based informa-
tion.”
“I don’t know what they would’ve expected when they
walk into a worksite with tons of SEIU leaders and then tell
them to drop their union,” Unger says.
She wouldn’t call it a protest. Members of the SEIU
were just holding signs that showed their solidarity with
the union, she says.
“They use fake numbers. They just kind of give out
misinformation,” Unger says. “Their whole strategy is to
get in the media to raise more money.”
Starzynski says he was at the organization’s canvass in
Salem, and the canvassers were just standing there. The
point of their canvassing is to show potential funders that
they’re making an impact, he says.
Murdock Charitable Trust, a nonprofit based in Wash-
ington state, has contributed more than $1 million to Free-
dom Foundation, according to the nonprofit’s tax forms.
Murdock Charitable Trust also funds Portland Fellowship's
gay conversion therapy centers in Portland, according to
NWAP.
The end goal for Withe, he says, is that with the Janus
ruling, unions should be like the internet company Netflix:
The union should benefit the member in order to request
membership dues, and employees should be able to negoti-
ate their own contracts as well.
He adds that unions spend a “massive amount of mon-
ey” on political campaigns, and that a lot of the members
don’t agree with the politics.
NWAP acquired a video from 2014 of Tom McCabe,
the nonprofit’s CEO, saying their goal is to limit the in-
fluence of unions and allow the conservative voice to be
heard.
“To this point it’s been an epic failure,” Starzynski says.
“Because they have deep pockets and people’s personal in-
formation, people are taking it seriously because there’s a
level of threat.” ■
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