Freedom Foundation CEO, Aaron Withe, released the following statement regarding U.S. Rep. Eric Burlison’s (MO-07) introduction Friday of the Paycheck Protection Act:

“The Freedom Foundation commends Rep. Burlison for his leadership in introducing the Paycheck Protection Act. Taxpayers shouldn’t have to pay for government payroll systems to fundraise for politically partisan labor unions. Through our interactions with thousands of union-represented government workers around the country, the Freedom Foundation has seen how unions use their unrivaled access to employees’ paychecks to coerce them into membership and lock them into nearly irrevocable dues payments. By forcing unions to collect their own dues, this important legislation would make unions more accountable to their members and give federal workers greater control over their financial relationship with unions.

Especially with the Biden administration actively working to make it easier for unions to take money from federal workers’ paychecks and unreasonably difficult for employees to cancel such deductions, getting government out of the union dues collection business, as the Paycheck Protection Act proposes, is more important than ever. State governments are increasingly moving away from government-administered union dues collection, with Florida, Arkansas, Kentucky and Tennessee all passing legislation limiting the payroll deduction of union dues for public employees just this year. It’s time the federal government followed suit.”