More than six years after the historic Supreme Court win in Janus v. AFSCME, government workers are still fighting to defend their rights against public-sector unions. Yesterday, the Liberty Justice Center filed three lawsuits on behalf of government employees against their unions.
In Janus, the Supreme Court held that public-sector employees have a First Amendment right to choose whether they will join or financially support a union. Unless employees “affirmatively consent” to waiving that First Amendment right, unions cannot legally withhold dues or other fees from their paychecks.
Yet despite that victory, government employees continue to struggle against public-sector unions violating their rights.
The Liberty Justice Center filed a lawsuit on behalf of Andre Sneed, a laborer for the Cook County Department of Transportation and Highways, against Laborers’ International Union of North America (LiUNA), Local 1092 alleging that it violated his First Amendment rights set forth in Janus for requiring him to continue to pay union dues after he resigned his union membership.
The union asserts that the dues deductions authorization Mr. Sneed signed is “irrevocable for the duration of time that [he] remains in a bargaining unit represented by the Union.” That means, although Mr. Sneed is no longer a union member, he must continue to pay union dues for the duration of his employment.
That directly contradicts the Court’s decision in Janus that government employees cannot be compelled to pay money to a union as a condition of their employment.
Sneed v. Laborers’ International Union of North America was filed in the U.S. District Court for Northern District of Illinois on March 11, 2025.
The Liberty Justice Center also filed a lawsuit on behalf of Martine Uniatowski, a part-time employee for Bay Village City School District in Ohio, against the Ohio Association of Public School Employees (OAPSE) Local 579 for violating her First Amendment rights under Janus.
During a meeting between HR and Ms. Uniatowski, union representatives who were present supposedly to protect Ms. Uniatorwski’s interests instead strong-armed her into signing a union membership agreement. Although Ms. Uniatowski didn’t have her reading glasses and couldn’t read what she was signing, the union representative pressured her to sign the membership agreement, and she relied on his representation of what it said in doing so. After Ms. Uniatowski saw the amount she was required to pay in dues, she resigned from the union and attempted to stop dues deductions, but was denied at least three times in the year following her signing of the membership agreement.
Although Ms. Uniatowksi is no longer a union member, she has been forced to continue paying money to the union against her will for more than a year. The deduction of dues from her paychecks violates Ms. Uniatowksi’s First Amendment rights as protected by Janus since she has no provided affirmative consent to take dues.
Uniatowski v. OAPSE Local 579 was filed in the U.S. District Court for Northern District of Ohio, on March 11, 2025.
The third case the Liberty Justice Center filed yesterday was on behalf of three Chicago Transit Authority (CTA) bus operators, Nicole Williams, Christopher Williams, and Miguel Perez, who are members of the Amalgamated Transit Union (ATU) Local 241.
Although the union’s bylaws provide that it must conduct an annual financial audit and must draft semi-annual audit reports, which must be provided to the union’s members at its membership meetings, the union has failed to provide these audits and audit reports to the plaintiffs despite multiple requests.
The Liberty Justice Center filed the lawsuit to compel the union to release the audits and audit reports to plaintiffs, who, as dues-paying union members, have a right to review the financial records of the union. This follows on the heels of Weiss v. Chicago Teachers Union, a case filed by LJC in October 2024 that demands the CTU produce its missing audits.
Chicago Transit Authority v. Amalgamated Transit Union was filed in the Circuit Court for Cook County of Illinois, Chancery Division, on March 11, 2025.
“Public-sector unions continue to place barriers for government employees who wish to stop being union members and stop paying union dues in ways that violate the Supreme Court’s Janus decision.” said Jeffrey Schwab, Senior Counsel at the Liberty Justice Center. “And although those unions are supposed to only collect dues from members, these unions often refuse to be held accountable by their own members for how they spend those dues.”
The Liberty Justice Center’s legal filings in Sneed v. LiUNA are available here; Uniatowski v. OAPSE are available here; CTA v. ATU are available here.