southwest airlines

Charlene Carter was a Southwest Airlines flight attendant.

She joined the Transportation Workers Union of America (TWU) Local 556.

She quit the union in 2013 upon learning that her union dues were being spent to promote social causes that violated her conscience and religious beliefs.

She was still required to pay fees in lieu of union dues as a condition of her employment.

The federal Railway Labor Act (RLA) permits union officials to have a worker fired for refusing to pay union dues or fees, but she kept paying. The RLA protects the rights of employees to remain nonmembers of the union, to criticize the union and its leadership, and to advocate for changing the union’s current leadership.

When Charlene discovered in 2017 that TWU local President Audrey Stone and other union officials used union dues to attend a pro-abortion event in the nation’s capital and that the company had accommodated local members wishing to attend by rearranging their work schedules, she took to social media to challenge Stone’s leadership.

The airline demanded a meeting with Charlene and informed her that Stone felt ‘harassed’ by Charlene’s activism.

A week later, the airline fired Charlene.

Charlene has sued.
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[summary of a story from Michael Vadum of The Epoch Times, dated May 15, 2022]

​I have a friend who works for United Airlines. He was furloughed without pay for something similar but is back to work.