From the very beginning, the New York Civil Service Employees Association — CSEA, AFSCME Local 1000 — took singular offense to our work. As the largest AFSCME local in the nation, its leaders couldn’t stand the idea of their members hearing the truth.
They lashed out, smeared us and even built a website dedicated to spreading misinformation about the Freedom Foundation in a desperate bid to scare their members away from us. But none of it worked.
Since we launched in the fall of 2022, the number of public employees in New York canceling their union dues has grown by 335%.
What began as a handful of workers here and there has swelled into a movement of thousands walking away — saying goodbye to union politics and reclaiming their paychecks.
July shattered the all-time record for opt outs in New York. August immediately followed as the strongest August ever — and the second-best month in state history.
Back-to-back historic highs don’t happen by chance. They mark a movement that union leaders can’t stop.
And now, the fight has reached New York City. Specifically,
- DC 37 — the largest public-sector union in NYC — accounted for the biggest share of August opt outs;
- CSEA, despite all its propaganda, still lost more than a quarter of the total; and,
- Teamsters Local 237, another NYC powerhouse, saw one of its strongest waves of members saying goodbye yet.
When upstate workers began opting out in 2022, union bosses brushed it off. By 2023, they called it a fluke.
In 2024, as the numbers climbed, they doubled down on fear tactics. But 2025 has blown their excuses apart.
With New York City unions bleeding members alongside their upstate counterparts, the sky is the limit.
Every percentage increase tells the same story: New Yorkers are rejecting union politics and keeping their paychecks where they belong.
CSEA may have taken the greatest offense to our presence, but their anger hasn’t slowed the exodus. If anything, their smear campaigns have only made the choice clearer.
This summer proved it once and for all: New York isn’t union territory anymore.
It’s freedom territory.
Thousands of your coworkers have already left.
You can, too. Visit OptOutToday.com and make the choice for yourself.
