In the past week alone, SEIU 503 has lost another 100 members from its already dwindling ranks among Oregon state employees.
When last reported, payroll data obtained from the state of Oregon indicated SEIU 503’s public employee membership had dropped by an astounding 33 percent since the U.S. Supreme Court’s decision in Janus v. AFSCME (2018).
The decline is primarily a result of the Freedom Foundation’s ongoing campaign to inform public employees about the Janus decision — something union leaders have desperately tried to prevent — and to assist those who wish to opt out.
A component of the Freedom Foundation’s outreach involves notifying public employees about how union leaders decide to spend their dues — and it appears SEIU 503’s radical spending priorities are not all that popular among members.
In an email sent to Oregon government employees last week, the Freedom Foundation highlighted SEIU 503 leaders’ decision to send more than $2.9 million of their members’ dues to Our Oregon, a group that is currently advocating to “defund the police.”
If that name sounds familiar, it’s because Our Oregon is responsible for most of the state’s progressive ballot measures in recent memory — and is currently being investigated by the Secretary of State and the Department of Justice for allegedly the single largest campaign finance violation in Oregon’s history.
SEIU, and government unions in general, have a bad habit of taking positions demanded by a very loud minority of their members. While appeasing a few, this almost always alienates the majority of rank-and-file members, causing them to reevaluate membership and ultimately leave it behind.
One would think that after losing over a third of its members, SEIU would reevaluate its PR strategy. However, with leaders like Melissa Unger, whose entire career has been as a talking head spending other people’s money with no accountability, we can expect more of the same.
And SEIU can expect to continue watching members leave.
