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Speaker 2: Eight oh five, the fifty five KRCD Talk station Havepy
Speaker 2: Friday Eve looking forward to the bottom. They are as
Speaker 2: always I heard. Media aviation expert Jay Ratlis joins the
Speaker 2: program on Thursdays at e thirty. In the meantime, I'm
Speaker 2: always happy to talk to folks from the Buck Eye Institute.
Speaker 2: You can find them online at Buckeyeinstitute dot org. Join
Speaker 2: me this morning, Jay Carson, senior litigator for the Buckeye
Speaker 2: Institute with a really troubling case he's working on, and
Speaker 2: let me start. Jay Carson, welcome back to the fifty
Speaker 2: five KRC Morning Show to thank you and the Buckeye
Speaker 2: Institute for doing well helping out the little guys. Really,
Speaker 2: what this boils down to having been in litigation for
Speaker 2: sixteen years and it's been a while. I've been eighteen
Speaker 2: years out of practice, but still keep my license. I
Speaker 2: know how expensive it is, and folks like Nicole Little
Speaker 2: John there is no way in God's green Earth she
Speaker 2: could afford to go out in independently higher tain counsel
Speaker 2: and fight against her former union who continues to take
Speaker 2: money out of her paycheck for union dues for a
Speaker 2: union that she doesn't belong with. Jay Carson, Welcome to
Speaker 2: the Morning Show. It's great having you on.
Speaker 1: Thank you happy to be here.
Speaker 2: Just you know, God bless the work you do, because
Speaker 2: you know, let me ask you real quick, just a
Speaker 2: parenthetical question. I know the hourly rate for lawyers is
Speaker 2: way across the spectrum. I mean, you may hire somebody
Speaker 2: for two hundred bucks an hour, and then there are
Speaker 2: lawyers out there in the world that charge more than
Speaker 2: one thousand dollars an hour. And I just want to see,
Speaker 2: what's the largest hourly rate you've ever run across in
Speaker 2: your in your work with the buck Anstitute or elsewhere
Speaker 2: in your legal practice.
Speaker 1: Jay, Oh, the largest that I've run across. I guess
Speaker 1: you know we do running the folks more of the
Speaker 1: big city on the coast. Yeah, we charged those nine
Speaker 1: hundred thousand dollars an hour rates. But what we do
Speaker 1: with buck guy is we take these cases pro bono
Speaker 1: pro bono, so folks who want to challenge them are
Speaker 1: out of pending.
Speaker 2: And that's what's so damn important about the Bucker Institute
Speaker 2: and other similar organizations who will fight the good fight
Speaker 2: on behalf of these outrageous factual scenarios. Let's start with
Speaker 2: the background on this. When you represent Nicole little John,
Speaker 2: my understanding is in June twenty twenty two, she quit
Speaker 2: the afl CIO union that she belonged to. She's a
Speaker 2: hospital employee. She notified them and they accepted her resignation,
Speaker 2: but they keep taking dues out of her paycheck.
Speaker 1: Yeah, so what happens actually this is this is the
Speaker 1: second time around she distractor break the union. She said, listen,
Speaker 1: no thanks, I'm this is not for me and I
Speaker 1: don't want to pay dues anymore. And look, you've got
Speaker 1: an absolute constitutional rate not to join a union. Screenpoint
Speaker 1: said that decades ago. And then in twenty eighteen, in
Speaker 1: a case called Aganis the Screamport said, you know what,
Speaker 1: and the union can't make you pay if you're a
Speaker 1: public union member, the union can't make you pay what
Speaker 1: they call association for these fair share fees whatever you
Speaker 1: want to call them, which were essentially the same thing
Speaker 1: as union dus. What happened after Janice was a whole
Speaker 1: lot of folks said, yeah, I've had it with this.
Speaker 1: I don't support what the union's doing with my money.
Speaker 1: I want to and keep this in my own paycheck
Speaker 1: because I'm not seeing any services coming from the union.
Speaker 1: And a case out of the Ninth Circuit in California
Speaker 1: came out said, well, yeah, they'll go up. Belk out
Speaker 1: can apply if you were already out of the union
Speaker 1: and if you never joined it in the first place.
Speaker 1: But you know, if you signed up and signed a
Speaker 1: contract that says I'm going to be a member for
Speaker 1: so many years, then you have to still keep paying
Speaker 1: even though you can you can quit for constitutional purposes,
Speaker 1: right the union won't send you the newsletter or whatever
Speaker 1: services they will get over bucket, but you're still going
Speaker 1: to keep paying dues. And it's like it's like the
Speaker 1: gym membership that you can't get out of. Right, Yeah,
Speaker 1: that's that's really sort of what this is.
Speaker 2: Well, I immediately thought the word that came to my
Speaker 2: mind is is theft? Like this you could make an
Speaker 2: argument to a prosecutor that this is actual theft. I mean,
Speaker 2: you have a civil case involving this little John, and
Speaker 2: you see the American Federation of State counting in thisbal employees.
Speaker 2: I get that, but I mean seriously, if they went
Speaker 2: over and they just pulled money out of her purses,
Speaker 2: it sat on her desk, you could get them in
Speaker 2: front of a judge on theft grounds.
Speaker 1: Well, so the tath we've taken on this right because
Speaker 1: the federal court said, Hey, this is a contract issue.
Speaker 1: That's that's what this case out of the Ninth Circuit
Speaker 1: said a couple of years ago and said, look, this
Speaker 1: is this is not about free speech anymore like Janice was.
Speaker 1: This is just about a contract. And you know, somebody
Speaker 1: could waive their their constitutional rights through a contract, happening
Speaker 1: every day. But this is not a job for the
Speaker 1: federal courts to be looking at from a First Amendment perspective.
Speaker 1: So what we did with with miss Littlegog's case in
Speaker 1: another case uh in Ohio Darling that we've got depending
Speaker 1: for the High Supreme Court right now, as we said, okay, uh,
Speaker 1: then let's take a look at is this a valid contract? Right?
Speaker 1: Let's go back to basic Ohio contract law. What's the
Speaker 1: federal courts are saying? That's what we ought to do
Speaker 1: and say, look, this isn't a valid contract because one
Speaker 1: you didn't tell me what I was signing up for.
Speaker 1: U two, I'm not getting anything in return. Uh three.
Speaker 1: I you know, I was sort of forced into this.
Speaker 1: Or there's a what's what's called uh you know, a
Speaker 1: liquidated damages that are that are unfairly unrelated to the
Speaker 1: actual damage that someone might get. Right, So we raised
Speaker 1: all these these contractual claims and defenses, and the first
Speaker 1: thing that had happened because of this Darling case was so,
Speaker 1: well you got to go first to the State Employee
Speaker 1: Relations fort.
Speaker 2: So so that's like that is that like the court
Speaker 2: of original jurisdiction for these labor issues.
Speaker 1: Well, you know, so this is this is again I
Speaker 1: don't want to get too much into the weeds, but
Speaker 1: but there's this jurisdictional fight of so you know, federally,
Speaker 1: you tried to bring the cases in federal court. They
Speaker 1: said no, no, this is state contract actor. Right. We
Speaker 1: brought a contract case in that Darland case I mentioned,
Speaker 1: and that court said no, no, you got to go
Speaker 1: to this board first because it might be an unfair
Speaker 1: labor practice. And you know, again it's not it's contract No,
Speaker 1: I know, it says right there, you know, And so
Speaker 1: we go to the State Employment Relations Board and they
Speaker 1: say this is not an unfair labor practice Act, which
Speaker 1: we knew all alonge. Uh So now we said, okay, finally,
Speaker 1: now we're going to go to uh Common Police Court
Speaker 1: and say please rule this contract. And so that's that's
Speaker 1: sort of the games that we've been playing, right, It's
Speaker 1: kind of this whack a mole of where can you
Speaker 1: even bring this this claim?
Speaker 2: You illustrate my am, I pointed at the outset wonderfully.
Speaker 2: If they're trying to wage a battle of attrition, it's
Speaker 2: like law fair and I've been involved in this. I
Speaker 2: practice in Chicago Salt Earth litigation was by directive. Some
Speaker 2: of the type of litigation we practice make their lives
Speaker 2: miserable and see if we can push them into a
Speaker 2: financial situation where they aren't going to want to keep
Speaker 2: throwing money at the case. That's a fair play in litigation.
Speaker 2: It sucks, but that's one of the reasons it's so
Speaker 2: damn expensive. That's what they're doing them, is Little John.
Speaker 2: That's the importance of the Buckeye Institute, because okay, we
Speaker 2: got to play this game. You will play this game
Speaker 2: on behalf of someone who could never afford to play it,
Speaker 2: so they make you go through the hoop of going
Speaker 2: in front of SERB. Fine, they throw it out and
Speaker 2: say it's not a this isn't a labor practice, it
Speaker 2: is a contractual issue. You're kind of back to square
Speaker 2: wo when you find your suit in Hamilton County Common
Speaker 2: Police Court.
Speaker 1: Yep, exactly. And look the other thing that's that's troubling
Speaker 1: about the nature of these cases and the big scheme
Speaker 1: of things. They're kind of nickel on dime, right. You
Speaker 1: know the total that miss little John is seeking in
Speaker 1: compensation of money that she got to be paid back
Speaker 1: at after she west to union, it's about two thousand bucks.
Speaker 1: And again and for the hire a lawyer to go
Speaker 1: after two thousand bucks, there's just no way that makes
Speaker 1: sense economically, especially in these cases where I think the
Speaker 1: unions tend to uh for the just the purpose. You
Speaker 1: know again they're they're they're well funded, uh and keep
Speaker 1: establishing the principle that you know they they're not gonna
Speaker 1: pay and you're gonna be stuck in this contract for
Speaker 1: another uh. You know, in most cases, right, you have
Speaker 1: this opt out date and it can be depending on
Speaker 1: your your collective Barney agreement a year or a couple
Speaker 1: of years in the future where you're still stuck paying
Speaker 1: those dues. So I think they mostly look at, Okay, look,
Speaker 1: we'll keep everybody in and people aren't going to fight
Speaker 1: this because we'll figure out what's what's the point for
Speaker 1: a couple hundred bucks, a couple of thousand bucks for
Speaker 1: another another year, another two years. Uh, it's not worth
Speaker 1: me spending the money to do it. But but the
Speaker 1: thing is, you know, while they're doing that, they're they're
Speaker 1: taking your money and using it for purposes that that
Speaker 1: you don't want it used for. And that's a that's
Speaker 1: a problem under a constitution.
Speaker 2: But the consideration for the contractual relationship, she pays money
Speaker 2: and gets union representation along with the materials and the
Speaker 2: emails and whatever. They accepted her resignation. They didn't say, no,
Speaker 2: you have a contract that lasts for X number of time,
Speaker 2: we will not accept your resignation. Wait for the contract
Speaker 2: to expire and don't renew it, and then a relationship
Speaker 2: is over. But the if they accepted her resignation and
Speaker 2: she's no longer in the loop anymore than the consideration
Speaker 2: that formed the basis for the contract has disappeared exactly.
Speaker 1: Yep, that's yeah, you got it. You could you could
Speaker 1: come back to practice, right, Yeah, that's exactly an argument.
Speaker 1: It's one thing if you say, Okay, you're stuck with this,
Speaker 1: but you're still going to begin in the magazine or
Speaker 1: the Benefits or whatever you'd subscribe to. But no, in
Speaker 1: this case, you got she received the letter from the
Speaker 1: and saying, uh, sorry to see you go. We'll please
Speaker 1: consider coming back. UH. And you know you can't vote
Speaker 1: in union elections and you can't do this. You can't
Speaker 1: do this, You've lost all these rates. Uh. And in
Speaker 1: the meantime, we're going to keep collecting the money.
Speaker 2: How pervasive is.
Speaker 1: That's that's that's the thing that's just sort of ludicrous.
Speaker 2: That absolutely is How pervasive is this practice? I mean,
Speaker 2: is it just the A f l C, I O
Speaker 2: or other unions doing the unions doing the same thing.
Speaker 1: Are there?
Speaker 2: Is she been being treated exactly like everyone else in
Speaker 2: her situation?
Speaker 1: I would I would tend to say, you know, it
Speaker 1: varies from from UH union to union. I would say,
Speaker 1: most of the public again, this this applies just to
Speaker 1: public sector unions, right, UH have adopted these same type practices. Now,
Speaker 1: in my experience in liigating for buck Eye, we've had
Speaker 1: a number of cases where we've been able to either
Speaker 1: before filing suit or after filing suit, reach out to
Speaker 1: the union uh, and they will be reasonable and say, yeah, look,
Speaker 1: because you know the warriors who are representing them saying
Speaker 1: the amount of money that's worth a year, it's just
Speaker 1: not worth the fight. Plus there's the chance that they
Speaker 1: might get unfavorable precedent. Right. So we've been able to
Speaker 1: settle a good number of these cases. But sometimes we
Speaker 1: get ones that the union is digging the heals in
Speaker 1: and you know, is not willing to settle. And this
Speaker 1: is one of those cases.
Speaker 2: Well, since you're now in Hamilton County Common Police Court
Speaker 2: and of course they continue to fight this all the
Speaker 2: way up potentially the Hio Supreme Court, where I think
Speaker 2: the odds, given the makeup of the court are pretty
Speaker 2: substantial that you're going to win. Ultimately, you think this
Speaker 2: will also settle, settle in the final analysis or refunder
Speaker 2: money and maybe even pay you your attorney's fees.
Speaker 1: Jay, We'll see, we'll see. My sense is on the
Speaker 1: attorney s fee, this is sort of downside, right if
Speaker 1: we were making the constitutional claim in federal court. You know,
Speaker 1: we would have a a stechered rate to play in
Speaker 1: the attorney sees under just a plain old greach of contract.
Speaker 1: In case you dealt right, you know we'll running up
Speaker 1: the flag pole.
Speaker 2: Got to give it a shot. Jay Carson, Senior litigator
Speaker 2: with the Buck Eye Institute. Help them out. I mean,
Speaker 2: you can donate and help these wonderful organizations out. I
Speaker 2: see it right there red donate button on your website
Speaker 2: Buckeyeinstitute dot org. Jay Carson, thank you on behalf of
Speaker 2: I know Ms. Little John probably really truly appreciates what
Speaker 2: you're doing for her, But you're doing this for all
Speaker 2: the union members out our former union members out there,
Speaker 2: fighting this good fight and hopefully getting some established precedent
Speaker 2: that is in favor of those who quit and letting
Speaker 2: them keep the damn money that they're entitled to keep.
Speaker 2: Keep it up, Jake, Thanks very much for the time
Speaker 2: you spent today bringing my listeners up to speed on
Speaker 2: this and what you were doing at the Buckeye Institute.
Speaker 2: Thanks for having me my pleasure, my friend eighteen for
Speaker 2: you bu Kcity Talks. They to stick around. We've got
Speaker 2: Jay Ratliffe coming up just a few minutes. First word
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