Trump Backs Union-Busting In SCOTUS Petition

The Washington Post reports:

The Trump administration on Wednesday asked the Supreme Court to overrule a 40-year-old precedent that allows compelling public employees to pay some fees to unions that represent them, an important tool for the U.S. labor movement.

It was another dramatic reversal in a high-profile case before the high court, and at least the third time since President Trump’s inauguration that the Justice Department has renounced its past positions, some held for decades.

It puts the administration squarely on the side of conservative legal activists, who have complained for years that the requirement violates the free-speech rights of those who don’t want to join the union or pay fees to it.

The Obama administration supported the unions in previous challenges, and when the issue was last before the court in January 2016. It appeared from oral arguments that challenge would be successful, but Justice Antonin Scalia died a month later, and the court announced that it had split, 4 to 4, on the issue.