SEIU-UHW's Latest Election Fraud

Just when you thought they might've run out of scams, Tasty hears that SEIU officials have devised elaborate new tricks to cheat their members out of fair elections.

In an earlier post, Tasty described how SEIU rigged an internal union election at Kaiser Walnut Creek Medical Center in order to get John Cuddihy (an ally of Dave Regan) elected as a Shop Steward… despite the fact that Cuddihy is universally distrusted because of his back-room deals with management.

Here’s the latest chapter in this ugly story:

Last week, SEIU announced it would be holding membership elections at the Northern California hospital in order to “reconfirm” its Shop Stewards. In the Medicine Department, workers breathed a massive sigh of relief as they imagined they’d finally have a chance to remove Cuddihy as their fraudulently elected Steward. Whew!

On election day, 40 workers from the Medicine Department walked together to the cafeteria to cast their votes to remove Cuddihy from his union position. When they arrived in the cafeteria, workers were shocked to learn that SEIU officials had concocted an intricate scheme to keep Cuddihy in his position. Here’s what happened:

Instead of allowing the department’s workers to vote on Cuddihy, SEIU carefully divided the 40 workers into eight separate groups of voters. These eight groups were then assigned to vote for eight separate Shop Stewards (talk about "re-districting"!). Seven of the eight candidates were people that the workers had never even heard of -- people who work in distant parts of the hospital like the Urology Department. And (you guessed it) the eighth group of workers was assigned to vote for Cuddihy. But this group of voters had been hand-selected by SEIU so as to contain the only three people who would possibly vote for Cuddihy… including Cuddihy himself!

And that’s how SEIU executed its latest assault on union democracy... so they could "reconfirm" Cuddihy to his union position.

Apparently, the hospital’s workers are outraged at SEIU’s latest election swindle, and are terrified to imagine the ballot-box fraud that SEIU will undoubtedly commit when it’s time to “ratify” the massive health and pension concessions that SEIU has already inked with Kaiser executives.

Looks like SEIU has boundless creativity when it comes to committing election fraud, but zero energy or initiative when it comes to fighting the boss and defending its members!

SEIU-UHW Staffers Sit on Their Hands While Kaiser Permanente Fires 33-Year Worker

SEIU-UHW's Hortencia Armendariz

Check out this story about five SEIU-UHW staffers who refused to lift a finger to help a worker at Kaiser Walnut Creek Medical Center who’d been escorted into the boss’s office and was getting terminated from the job she’s worked for the past 33 years.

According to gritty emails from SEIU-UHW shop stewards (see below), workers pleaded for help with the five SEIU-UHW staffers who simply refused to interrupt their meeting to assist the worker in distress. In the words of one SEIU-UHW shop steward, “I clearly could see that she [SEIU-UHW Field Rep Stacy Manuel] did not care at all for this member that was getting fired.”

The steward writes: “I went home sad because Annette had 33 years of service and did her job very well… And I will hate to see this happening over and over in the future, only for one reason: we are only a number.”

Another shop steward writes:  “I received a call from this member after termination as she has worked on my floor for more than 20 years. I agree this is UNacceptable… this is not the 1^st time this has happened and apparently not the last...”

“Unacceptable”?   How about CRIMINAL!  As far as Tasty can tell, Dave Regan’s SEIU-UHW has plenty of time to rig fraudulent union elections for corrupt officials like John Cuddihy, but can’t exert an ounce of effort to defend a 33-year employee from getting fired unjustly.

So, who were the SEIU-UHW staffers who let SEIU’s corporate partner destroy the worker’s livelihood? Tasty knows the name of three of them:  Hortencia Armendariz, a DIRECTOR of SEIU-UHW’s Kaiser Division; Jonathan Hernandez, a Field Rep who formerly worked at Teamsters Local 601 in Stockton, California; and Stacy Manuel, a Field Rep who was outed for impersonating staffers of the California Nurses Association as part of an SEIU raid in 2009.

Here’s a link to the original version of the emails, with the text printed below [Tasty inserted a few words in brackets to help readers].

Email from an SEIU-UHW Shop Steward to other Shop Stewards (dated October 24, 2011):

Today was terminated a Kaiser employee that had worked 33 years for Kaiser. Stacey Manuel, who is the lead of field reps, did not want that the field rep Jonathon represent the member that was getting fired today at 4:00pm.

Stacey said to me and [SEIU-UHW Shop Steward] Maria Moon that its a shop stewards job to sit on all terminations and that [SEIU-UHW Kaiser Division Director] Hortencia Almendarez was on the same page as her. I tried calling Hortencia but I was not successful. We had to beg Stacy and make her understand it was more important to save a member with a last-chance agreement, and we tried to knock some sense out of her, and Stacey continue to say no.  They were 4 SEIU workers along with Stacey and they said they were having a meeting. After 10 [minutes] of arguing, I said that I was going to go home and the member can blame SEIU for letting us down so heartless. I clearly could see that she did not care at all for this member that was getting fired.

Please let’s address this issue, because they want to use the field rep for other things. they said from now on we have to do from coaching to termination. my night was ruined for the lack of care for our members.

This is a big issue, not that we have not had a good field rep, but in other words having one is like not having anything.

And here’s an email (dated October 25, 2011) from a second SEIU-UHW Shop Steward:

I received a call from this member after termination as she worked on my floor for over 20 years. I agree this is UNacceptable and needs to be discussed urgently and I feel Kaiser Walnut Creek Steward Council needs a emergency meeting to address this issue. this is not the 1^st time this has happened and apparently not the last per Kaiser and Oakland SEIU-UHW

And here’s another email from a Shop Steward (dated October 25, 2011):

I went home sad because Annette had 33 years of service and did her job very well… And I will hate to see this happening over and over in the future, only for one reason: we are only a number.

Fraudulently Elected Official Attempts Leap onto SEIU-UHW's Executive Board

Remember this post about a union election that was rigged by Regan and Co. so they could put John Cuddihy on the steward council at Kaiser Walnut Creek Medical Center?

Well… just as Tasty predicted, Cuddihy is now using his Shop Steward position to leap-frog into an open seat on SEIU-UHW’s Executive Board. In fact, the election is scheduled for Nov. 9.

Tasty hears that SEIU's latest move is creating some serious disgust among workers at the Kaiser Permanente hospital. Why? Let’s just say that Cuddihy is not exactly known for his integrity. Several years ago, workers actually caught Cuddihy making a secret deal with management to re-write the union's rules in a way that benefited only him.

But that’s not all. Cuddihy also has problems with women. Here's how a reader describes an incident that took place when Cuddihy was previously a Shop Steward:

A number of representatives from John [Cuddihy’s] department came to the steward council and requested that recall procedures be initiated. What they specifically cited was that John treated the women in the department with contempt and specifically, he had been informed that one of his constituents was being sexually harrassed by a male coworker in the dept (John's friend). Instead of giving his constituent the resources to report the harassment so that an investigation could be initiated, John did his "own" investigation and told her that the complaint had no merit. She continued to suffer sexual harrassment at the hands of his friend. When this young woman reported to the steward council, she was in tears and John did his best to attack, interrupt and intimidate her through the entire presentation.

The steward council launched a full investigation into Cuddihy and discovered that “there were several more incidents of discrimination based on race and gender reported by John's constituents and that he used his position as steward to harass and intimidate them,” according to the reader. Under the union’s old rules, workers were allowed to vote on whether to keep Cuddihy in his union position – and they removed him by a near unanimous vote.

Ahh… but those were the old days. Under the new system ushered in by Dave Regan, “democracy” means back-room deals with bosses, $300,000 salaries for union officials, and rigged votes.

That's how Cuddihy -- whose ethical transgressions sound eerily similar to Regan's -- got a position at SEIU-UHW even though workers overwhelmingly voted him down several weeks ago. Sounds like Cuddihy is destined for a bright future alongside Regan!

SEIU-UHW Rigs Union Vote at Kaiser Permanente Hospital

What happens when workers at a California hospital vote down SEIU’s candidate for an elected union position? Check out this story from the Adult Medicine Department at Kaiser Walnut Creek Medical Center in Northern California.

Recently, the department’s workers voted down SEIU’s candidate for Shop Steward by a vote of 40 to 3. Why? Apparently, he doesn’t fight for his co-workers and is super untrustworthy. 

In fact, several years before the trusteeship, workers caught him trying to permanently change the department’s seniority rules so he could be first in line for additional overtime hours. When workers uncovered the scheme, they used the union’s then-democratic procedures to remove him as a Shop Steward by a nearly unanimous vote. As one worker put it: “This guy is in it only for himself. He doesn’t fight for the members. It’s all about him.”

Soon after SEIU imposed its trusteeship in California, SEIU officials hooked up with the demoted steward, John Cuddihy, and began paying him to campaign for SEIU (check out his SEIU pay on top of his regular job). Cuddihy quickly became best buddies with SEIU’s trustees. That’s why SEIU wants him to be a Shop Steward, which SEIU hopes will be a stepping stone towards putting him on Dave Regan’s Executive Board.

SEIU Trustees' Payments to Cuddihy in 2009

So what happened when workers voted Cuddihy down in the recent election?  SEIU officials decided that if they couldn’t get him elected in his own department, they would hold an unannounced election for Cuddihy in a totally different department (Pediatrics) where Cuddihy doesn’t even work... even though this violates the union’s so-called rules.

As you can imagine, workers in the Adult Medicine Department were a bit surprised when SEIU announced that Cuddihy had become their Shop Steward. What happened to their earlier vote to reject Cuddihy by a 40 to 3 margin? Apparently, SEIU officials simply tossed it into the garbage. 

Ironically, the rigged vote at Kaiser Walnut Creek Medical Center took place as Dave Regan announced with great fanfare that he had convened a special “Representational Excellence Committee” to improve SEIU-UHW’s system of shop stewards and worksite representation. What a joke.

The recent rigged vote at Kaiser Walnut Creek is just the latest in a long line of such votes, including this famous contract ratification vote where SEIU deployed a 300 lb guard to block homecare workers from getting into the polling place. Check out the video.