SEIU Staffer Reinvents Himself after Harassment Firing

Do you remember Caleb “the Creepy Bathroom Monitor” Jennings?

Last October, SEIU fired Jennings amidst a widening harassment scandal kicked off by revelations about former SEIU Executive Vice President Scott Courtney.

Jennings, a director of SEIU’s “Fight for $15” campaign in Detroit, was fired following allegations he operated as a “mini-Scott Courtney” who “relished bullying people and trying to intimidate them (especially women),” according to an anonymous source.

In 2017, a female SEIU organizer won more than $20,000 in back pay and a reinstatement order from an NLRB judge after Jennings wrongfully terminated her as an organizer in the “Fight for $15” campaign. According to BuzzFeed, Jennings “became violent, ripping [the female organizer’s] work phone out of her hands and subsequently shoving her against a door frame.”

So what’s Jennings doing now?

Here’s a clue:

That’s right. Jennings has become an “expert” in helping to gentrify Chicago by converting multi-unit apartment buildings into AirBnb hotels.

Hey Caleb, that’s super helpful… especially for fast food workers struggling to pay rent.

Not unsurprisingly, Jennings has already raised the ire of Chicago community leaders and anti-displacement advocates.

The contradictions in Caleb's career path are not unusual for SEIU officials. You could say he’s had a lot of "entrepreneurial" role models at SEIU like Andy Stern (who’s been busy padding his pockets as a high-paid consultant for Uber, Airbnb, Handy and other tech companies) and Tyrone Freeman (who's now running a consulting firm to help homecare companies make more profit).

Stay tuned for news of the next SEIU entrepreneur.

SEIU’s David Rolf Joins Andy Stern in Pimping for Uber

Andy Stern and Andy's "Mini-Me" David Rolf

Remember when SEIU President Emeritus Andy Stern began working as a consultant for Airbnb, Handy, and other tech firms to help them try to undermine gig-economy workers’ right to be treated as regular employees?

Well, another SEIU official is now following “Handy” Andy’s lead.

Last month, SEIU Local 775 President David Rolf (a.k.a. Andy Stern’s “Mini-Me”) signed an open letter with Uber CEO Dara Khosrowshahi and venture capitalist Nick Hanauer. 

The letter calls on “business, labor and government in Washington state to join us” in an effort to push state legislation that reportedly would consign gig workers to a second-class status as independent contractors without the right to overtime pay, unemployment insurance, disability insurance, Social Security, meal and rest breaks, etc.

For years, Uber drivers and other gig-economy workers have been fighting to force tech companies to treat them as regular employees. They’ve filed class-action action lawsuits seeking millions of dollars in back pay. And in Seattle, Uber drivers and Teamsters Local 117 successfully passed a law allowing Uber drivers to unionize.

Uber executives have been aggressively fighting workers’ organizing efforts in the courts as well as by launching an anti-union campaign in Seattle consisting of TV ads, online ads, text and e-mail blasts to drivers, anti-union meetings, and even an anti-union podcast.

And, in case workers are successful, Uber is also trying to do an end-run around workers’ efforts by trying to pass state laws that would permanently legislate gig workers into “independent contractor” status and create a second tier of so-called “portable benefits” for them.

That’s where Stern and Rolf come into the story.

In 2016, the tech companies hired Andy Stern as a lobbyist to help them try to pass such a bill in the New York legislature. Fortunately, that effort stalled due to opposition.

Following their failure in New York, the tech companies are now trying their luck in Washington State… with the help of David Rolf and Andy Stern. According to Uber’s website:

Last year, Uber approached David Rolf with SEIU 775 and entrepreneur Nick Hanauer about working together on the creation of a portable benefits system in Washington state… Following several productive discussions, we developed a joint letter calling on business, labor, and government to work together to address this important problem.

On January 23, 2018, Uber published a letter signed by Uber’s CEO, SEIU’s Rolf, and the venture capitalist. At the top of the letter is Uber’s logo alongside SEIU’s.

So, how are people responding to Rolf’s so-called “innovative” deal with Uber?

Here’s a sample, according to Bloomberg. (Josh Eidelson, “Uber-Union Proposal on Benefits Met With Skepticism From Labor,” Bloomberg, January 25, 2018).

New York Taxi Workers Alliance Director Bhairavi Desai told Bloomberg: “Selling out to the bosses is not innovative—it’s as old as capitalism."

Desai continued: “This type of bogus agreement only gives them [tech companies] cover for exploitation.”

Damn right!

In fact, Rolf has even been criticized by an official inside his own union, according to Bloomberg:

“This is just a facelift by Uber to be able to look like they actually care about the people who they hire for the services they provide,” said Hector Figueroa, who is president of SEIU’s East Coast property services affiliate and serves with Rolf on the international union’s executive board. “I just cannot comprehend how today, as a labor leader, I would be encouraging the spread of ‘independent’ work.”

Interesting, right?

Why is Rolf’s help so important to Uber?

First, Rolf’s union is one of the largest in Washington state and he's developed lots of relationships with politicians. If Uber is successful in passing its legislation in one state, it can then push similar legislation nationally, says Bloomberg’s Eidelson.

Uber hopes working with Rolf and Hanauer to pass legislation in Washington will change the national conversation on these issues, showing how benefits can be decoupled from traditional employee-employer status, and opening a less adversarial phase in the debate over how laws should treat gig-economy workers, a spokesperson said.

The trio, and whichever additional allies they can muster, will try to get a first-of-its-kind system passed into law in Washington state, which is Rolf and Hanauer’s home as well as one of the few places where Democrats have unified control of government and legislation on the issue is already being debated.

While the letter is light on details, the spokesperson said Uber wants to gather additional stakeholders and formulate a proposal that could be introduced in next year’s legislative session. Among the things a bill should do, the spokesperson said, is make clear that workers like Uber drivers are not employees.

Uber drivers protesting low pay

Meanwhile, Stern is working other channels to help Uber and tech companies permanently relegate their workers to independent-contractor status.

In December 2016, Stern co-authored a proposal with Eli Lehrer (President of the right-wing “R Street Institute” in Washington DC) calling on the Republican-controlled U.S. Congress and White House to grant “waivers” to states to allow them to escape the requirements of federal labor laws. The waivers would be a boon to tech companies, which Stern calls “sharing-economy companies” with “innovative business models.”

Stern, a master of deception and disinformation, entitled his proposal: “How to Modernize Labor Law.”

Does SEIU have no shame?

Critic Slams SEIU’s Andy Stern for Selling Out Workers

Andy Stern and David Cote, CEO of Honeywell

Jay Youngdahl, a labor and civil rights lawyer, is part of a growing chorus of voices attacking Andy Stern for his latest sellout of US workers.

Youngdahl’s piece, entitled “In the Fantasy Land of Labor Theorists: Andy Stern’s Latest Contribution,” was published by In These Times on January 19, 2017. 

In it, Youngdahl describes Stern’s proposal to allow states to replace federal labor laws with rules of their own choosing as “outlandish,” “ridiculous,” “make-believe,” and “anti-union.”

The article was published a day before protesters barricaded the San Francisco headquarters of one of Stern’s newest corporate patrons, Uber. 

Protesters targeted the tech company due to the Uber CEO’s decision to serve on Donald Trump’s Strategic and Policy Forum along with Jamie Dimon of JP Morgan Chase, Stephen Schwarzman of the Blackstone Group, and other corporate fatcats. One protester told USA Today: "We came out today to tell the CEO of Uber that we don't agree with him collaborating with the Trump Administration on labor practices."

S,F, protested Uber's collaboration with Trump

Youngdahl’s article was published the same day that Uber agreed to pay a “$20 million to settle allegations that it duped people into driving for its ride-hailing service with false promises about how much they would earn,” according to the Associated Press.

Bloomberg recently reported that Stern is working as a highly paid consultant for Handy, Airbnb, Uber, and other tech companies to help them pass new laws to fend off workers’ class-action lawsuits and to loosen labor laws and government oversight.

Here are some excerpts from Youngdahl’s piece. The full text is available here.

Stern, the former president of the Service Employees International Union (SEIU), now works for gig economy “platform” companies and is lobbying for a New York law to refuse employee protections for workers at Handy and other such companies. He recently penned an article in National Affairs, along with right-wing think tanker Eli Lehrer of the R Street Institute.

Stern has been talking about the future of the labor movement for years, with a dazzling variety of solutions and approaches. Remember his claim, and $14 million of SEIU money, that call centers were essential to “high-quality member representation?”

It is important to note that Stern’s ideas are similar to those of anti-union think tanks like the Mackinac Center for Public Policy, which produced F. Vincent Vernuccio, now a member of Trump’s transition team at the Department of Labor. Vernuccio co-wrote a piece entitled “Right-to-Work Strengthens Unions.” In their article, Stern and Lehrer similarly embrace right-to-work, as it is, in their words, “unfair to force representation on workers who don’t want it.”

…[T]hose in Stern’s make-believe world preach that all can be harmonious between labor and capital, ignoring American history and the explosive growth of income inequality. Collective bargaining and workers’ struggle are not only discounted; they are often ridiculed.

No one disputes that unions are in deep, deep trouble. But the advice of those who profit off their “expert” opinions… suffers from a separation from the actual lives of workers. New ideas arise out of struggle, not from foundations, corporate shills or right-wing think tanks… As inequality and its consequences mount, even more struggles and progressive formations will emerge. They are likely to be imperfect and messy, but from them useful ideas as to the future of collective worker action will become clearer. One thing is sure, though: Such a vision will not come from Stern.

Andy Stern’s Newest Gig: High-Paid Consultant for Billion-Dollar Tech Companies

Andy Stern, SEIU President Emeritus

SEIU President Emeritus Andy Stern has once again revealed his true colors.

Stern is working as a highly paid consultant for Airbnb, Handy, and other billion-dollar tech businesses, according to a January 10, 2017 article (Josh Eidelson, “It’s a New Game for Uber Drivers If New York Passes This Law,” Bloomberg Businessweek).

In New York, for example, Handy hired Stern to help push a bill through the state legislature that would allow Handy and other gig-economy companies like Uber, Instacart, and TaskRabbit to fend off lawsuits filed by workers who seek to be treated as employees rather than “independent contractors.” 

The bill is also backed by the trade group “Tech:NYC,” whose members include Uber, Facebook, Google, EBay, and Etsy.

The bill “would make it easier for gig-economy app makers to continue to treat their workers as contractors, loosening New York’s current standards,” according to Bloomberg. Handy, co-founded in 2012 by two Harvard Business School students, sends workers to people’s homes to clean up or make repairs.

Oh, and that's just the beginning of the pimping that "Handy Andy" has been doing for his billion-dollar tech patrons.

In a separate gig, Stern last month co-authored a proposal with a right-wing D.C. political operative calling on the Republican-controlled U.S. Congress and White House to grant “waivers” to states to allow them to do an end-run around federal labor laws. The waivers would be a boon to tech companies, which are facing dozens of class-action action lawsuits from workers alleging they are owed millions in back pay after being misclassified as “independent contractors.”

Stern’s proposal, which appeared in “National Affairs” (Andrew Stern and Eli Lehrer, “How to Modernize Labor Law,” National Affairs), is co-authored by Eli Lehrer, the President of the right-wing “R Street Institute” in Washington DC.

How do Stern and Lehrer propose to “modernize” labor law?

Here's a shocker. 

They propose a legislative agenda that’s virtually identical to the tech industry’s. BTW, Stern's article just so happens to praise Uber and Handy as “sharing-economy companies” with “innovative business models.”

In the article, Stern successfully commits a serious ethical violation by failing to inform readers that he’s actually a highly paid consultant for Uber, Handy, and other tech companies. The article conveniently leaves aside this inconvenient fact, and simply identifies Stern as the “former president of the Service Employees International Union and a senior fellow at Columbia University.”

What’s the skinny on Eli Lehrer and the “R Street Institute”?

The R Street Institute describes itself as “a free market think tank” that favors “limited government.” 

It was founded in 2012 by former members of the Heartland Institute and American Legislative Exchange Council (ALEC). It’s an associate member of the “State Policy Network,” which the Center for Media and Democracy describes as “a web of right-wing ‘think tanks’ in every state across the country” with deep ties to the billionaire Koch brothers and other conservative funders.

For example, the R Street Institute opposes raising the minimum wage and supports legislation to make it easier for companies to classify their workers as “independent contractors.”

Who is Lehrer?

He’s the president and co-founder of The R Street Institute. Formerly, he served as the senior editor of The American Enterprise magazine and was a fellow at the Heritage Foundation, according to his bio.

Handy CEO Oisin Hanrahan

It doesn’t take a rocket scientist to realize that Stern’s and Lehrer’s proposal would cause great harm to workers.

Think about it. 

If the federal government decides to “decentralize” labor law by granting “waivers” to states so they can “experiment” with alternative labor laws, what might they do?

Just consider the right-wing forces and Tea Party fanatics who now control many state legislatures.

In Kentucky, where Republicans control state government for the first time in nearly a century, legislators last weekend passed a right-to-work law that was promptly signed by the Republican governor. The new law also prohibits public employees from going on strike.

Next up? Kentucky legislators are considering a bill to eliminate prevailing wages for public works projects.

Meanwhile, state legislatures in Texas, Kentucky, Missouri, Minnesota, and Virginia offer another glimpse of the right-wing ideologues controlling many states. Each of these legislatures will be considering so-called “bathroom bills” like North Carolina’s, which would require transgender people to use restrooms in public schools, universities, and government buildings that correspond with the gender listed on their birth certificate. Many of the bills would also ban cities and counties from approving ordinances aimed at protecting transgender rights.

So… what a f*cking great idea, Andy. An absolutely perfect moment in history to give waivers to state legislatures so they can “experiment” with crazy-ass changes to laws governing workers’ minimum wages, overtime hours, anti-discrimination rules, pension rights, and rights to form unions.

Here are a few excerpts from Stern’s and Lehrer’s “bold” proposal to “modernize” US labor law:

It's time for a new path, one that takes advantage of one of the most successful public-policy innovations of the past 50 years: waivers from federal law to allow state experimentation… A system to allow state waivers from major labor laws similarly could give every interest group a chance to try bold reforms the federal framework doesn't currently allow.

The laws eligible for waivers should include, at minimum, the National Labor Relations Act, the Fair Labor Standards Act, the Labor-Management Reporting and Disclosure Act, the Employee Retirement Income Security Act, and the Taft-Hartley Act.

What sort of concrete innovations do Stern and Lehrer envision?

Here are a couple described in the article:

Overtime Pay: Instead of the current laws requiring companies to pay overtime wages after eight hours, “waivers might also allow averaging of overtime over several weeks or a month,” thereby allowing companies to reduce overtime pay to workers.

Wage Rates: Instead of current laws requiring companies and labor unions to collectively negotiate a system of pay rates covering all workers, waivers could “leave matters of wages or benefits or both to negotiations between managers and individual employees.”

Kentucky Gov. Matt Bevin

WTF is Stern doing?

Stern is a pimp without a shred of principles or moral grounding… just a lust for lining his pockets with as much cash as he can possibly stuff inside them. 

Just weeks after resigning as SEIU’s president in 2010, Stern began pocketing wads of stock options and cash from billionaire Ron Perelman, an employer of SEIU’s members whom Stern reportedly negotiated secret labor deals. SEIU officials, including Mary Kay Henry, took no action to stop Stern’s apparent ethics violations. In fact, SEIU continues to consider Stern its “President Emeritus.”

What’s next on Stern’s agenda?

Here’s an idea. 

Perhaps he might want to propose giving “waivers” to allow Republican-controlled state legislatures to “experiment” with “bold innovations” to the Civil Rights Act of 1964, the Voting Rights Act of 1965, and other federal statutes designed to protect people’s fundamental rights. 

Tasty is confident that if someone gives Handy Andy a thick wad of cash, he’d no-doubt oblige.

SEIU’s Fast-Buck Entrepreneurs

SEIU's Andy Stern

After SEIU officials’ backroom lap dance with Airbnb execs was abruptly interrupted, Randy Shaw of “Beyond Chron” penned a piece that examines the profiteering of former SEIU and Obama administration officials.

SEIU President Emeritus Andy Stern, for example, is involved in at least three for-profit ventures... including a biowarfare pharmaceutical company owned by his billionaire patron, Ron Perelman, the 78th richest person in the world. 

In addition, Stern recently became a high-paid consultant for Airbnb, which ostensibly hired him to grease the wheels inside the Purple Palace. Stern was reportedly helping Airbnb reach a deal with SEIU that critics say would have given the $25.5 billion company political cover for driving up housing costs, intensifying gentrification, and undercutting hotel workers' jobs.

Shaw’s article -- entitled “Key Obama Backers Shift to Private Profiting: Abandoning Fight for Change in Favor of Private Profits” -- begins this way:

What do Andy Stern, Jon Carson, David Plouffe, and Jim Messina all have in common? Each played key roles in Barack Obama’s campaigns promoting “Change We Can Believe In” and now work for for-profit corporations or conservative candidates. 

Why have these and others like former SEIU staffer Christopher Nulty (now at Airbnb) and former NextGen organizer Chris Lehane (also at Airbnb) shifted their energies from working for progressive change in the public sector to private pursuits?

SEIU's Christopher Nulty

Who’s Nulty? 

He was SEIU President Mary Kay Henry’s speechwriter and Chief Communications Aide, as described in this recent post. He left SEIU to take jobs at Yahoo and Airbnb, where he currently serves as Airbnb’s Public Affairs Lead for the eastern half of North America.

Shaw goes on to deliver a smackdown of Stern, whom he calls “the worst stereotype of the fast buck entrepreneur.”

Larry Cohen v Andy Stern

Let’s start with the most obvious contrast, that of the post-retirement actions of two leading union supporters of Obama in 2008: Larry Cohen, former head of the Communication Workers of America, and Andy Stern, who left SEIU in 2010. 

Since leaving CWA, Cohen has continued to work for progressive change. Cohen probably did more than anyone else to build labor support for the Bernie Sanders campaign, indirectly moving Clinton and the Democratic Party to the left on trade and other issues of concern to working people. 

Stern, in contrast, has gone from representing Big Pharma to his recent ill-conceived plan to forge a deal between SEIU and Airbnb on unionizing maids that bypassed UNITE HERE (and violated the jurisdictional agreement between the two unions). He’s become the worst stereotype of the fast buck entrepreneur… 

Stern was the labor official most passionate about Barack Obama in 2008. Yet today it almost seems unbelievable that he was even part of the labor movement.

Here’s a link to the full article.

SEIU Caught While Attempting to Ink Sweetheart Deal with Airbnb

SEIU's Stern and Henry

This week, journalists outed top SEIU officials as they tried to seal a backroom deal with Airbnb, a $25.5 billion company headquartered in San Francisco, Calif. 

By week’s end, the deal had exploded in flames after facing an “intense backlash” from housing advocates, elected officials, and unions, according to the London Guardian.

The week’s events were accompanied by jaw-dropping revelations including that SEIU President Emeritus Andy Stern is pulling down a fat paycheck as an Airbnb consultant. (Nice way to grease the wheels inside the Purple Palace, right?)

Meanwhile, it turns out that SEIU President Mary Kay Henry’s former speechwriter and Chief Communications Aide -- Christopher Nulty -- is now a corporate exec at Airbnb, where he played a role in the unsuccessful deal. This week, Nulty served as Airbnb’s main spokesperson regarding its negotiations with his former employer, SEIU.

Christopher Nulty of SEIU/Yahoo/Airbnb

(Who's Nulty? From 2010-2013, he worked inside the Purple Palace where he wrote hundreds of speeches and op-eds for Mary Kay Henry, according to his LinkedIn page. He left SEIU to work as the Senior Corporate Communications Manager for Yahoo’s CEO. Next, he jumped to Airbnb, where he serves as the Public Affairs Lead for the eastern half of North America.)

Here’s a quick sum-up of this week’s events:

On Monday, the London Guardian and the Washington Post broke the news that SEIU was trying to ink a secret deal with Airbnb. The news provoked an angry backlash from elected officials, housing organizations, and unions.

Airbnb CEO Brian Chesky: "I'm worth $3.3 billion."

Why?

As CNBC notes, critics say Airbnb “displaces long-term tenants as some people convert scarce rental property into essentially motels and hotels for travelers — all without paying local hotel taxes, or meeting regulations as required for the hospitality industry.” 

And as tenants are displaced and neighborhoods gentrified, Airbnb’s execs and its venture capital investors pocket billions.

Brian Chesky, Airbnb’s 34-year-old CEO, is worth $3.3 billion.

On Monday, UNITE HERE -- the union of hotel workers whose jobs are being undercut by Airbnb -- issued this statement to the press:

We are appalled by reports that SEIU is partnering with Airbnb, a company that has destroyed communities by driving up housing costs and killing good hotel jobs in urban markets across North America.

Airbnb has shown a blatant disregard for city and state laws, has refused to cooperate with government agencies, and turns a blind eye to the fact that its business model exacerbates the affordable housing crisis. A partnership with SEIU does little more than give political cover to Airbnb. It doesn’t strengthen workers, and in fact undercuts the standards we’ve fought so hard to build for housekeepers in the hospitality industry.

UNITE HERE is not SEIU’s only critic. According to the London Guardian:

The Manhattan borough president, Gale Brewer, 18 members of the New York state senate and assembly, three New York City council members and 20 local housing organizations sent a letter to the SEIU president expressing concern with the deal and requesting a meeting.

“We find it troubling that SEIU is exploring entering into an agreement with Airbnb – a company whose business model displaces the very people you are seeking to represent and protect from their homes and communities,” the letter states. “Such a partnership would lend credence to Airbnb’s illegal manipulation of the housing market, and give the worst actors … a legitimate platform to conduct their illegitimate and harmful business activities.”

Other critics took to Twitter, the media, and online petitions to attack SEIU. In a tweet, UNITE HERE called SEIU’s pact a “sweetheart deal.”

After SEIU 32BJ President Hector Figueroa tweeted support for SEIU’s backroom deal with Airbnb, UNITE HERE’s Hotel Trades Council responded with this tweet:

SEIU’s Andy Stern re-tweeted Figueroa’s message, which prompted the following hilarious tweet from the San Francisco Tenants Union: “Have you read a newspaper lately?”

SEIU’s action even spawned a hashtag (#DontSellOutSEIU), an online MoveOn petition, and a letter from the tenants' union to Mary Kay Henry and Figueroa with statements like this one (see complete letter below):

You cannot build a national movement to improve working conditions for low-wage workers by engaging in backroom deals with a law-flouting corporation and selling out your natural allies.

On Tuesday, SEIU and UNITE HERE met in Las Vegas “to resolve escalating tensions,” according to Politico. After the meeting, SEIU pulled the plug on its sweetheart deal with Airbnb.

UNITE HERE issued this statement:

Earlier this week, we had a productive meeting with SEIU representatives, and it is our clear understanding that SEIU will not have a deal with Airbnb to represent housekeeping services. We will continue to work with SEIU to ensure that workers across the hospitality industry have opportunities to have a voice at work and provide for their families. We are encouraged by their commitment to stand with us and coalition partners to advocate for affordable housing initiatives and better jobs in cities across North America. Unite Here will continue to vigorously oppose any efforts by Airbnb to expand and push for commonsense laws to mitigate the devastating impact this company has had on our communities.

Yesterday (April 21), SEIU issued a statement that read:

Tuesday, representatives from SEIU and Unite Here met and have agreed to find a common approach to protect and expand the stock of affordable housing in all communities across the country and to protect and preserve standards for workers in residential and hotel cleaning while also growing opportunities for these cleaners to improve their lives.

So what was Airbnb’s motive for cutting a deal with SEIU?

Just like Andy Stern’s embrace of Wal-Mart in 2007, an SEIU partnership with Airbnb would have helped Airbnb weather the political headwinds that are hindering its expansion across the nation. 

Here’s how the Washington Post describes it:

The deal would give San Francisco-based Airbnb, which has raised $2.3 billion and is privately valued at $25.5 billion by venture capitalists, new ammunition for its myriad political battles. In cities across the country, opponents of Airbnb have argued that the 8-year-old start-up is accelerating gentrification by reducing the supply of available housing units that would otherwise go to locals if they weren’t being rented out on Airbnb.

The agreement with SEIU allows the company to make the claim that it is creating good jobs for local residents. That’s one prong in a wider strategy to endear itself to local governments.

Earlier this year, the company’s policy chief, a former Bill Clinton aide named Chris Lehane, met with hundreds of mayors at the U.S. Conference of Mayors to make the argument that cities benefit from Airbnb homeowners’ tax contributions.

Finally, here’s a question that's still unanswered:

How much money is Andy Stern pocketing in exchange for pimping for Airbnb?

According to journalists, SEIU spokesperson Sahar Wali has declined to comment.