Coomer was forced to join the SEIU by the state of Washington because she receives Medicaid for caring for her severely disabled daughter. She then has to pay the union $95 every month in dues, money which she needs for her daughter. This sounds incredible, I know, but watch the video: It really is an outrage that Coomer and others like her are forced to join a union because she's considered to be a "health service provider" when she takes government money to care for her daughter.
Hot Air's Ed Morrissey writes:
Both Michigan and Minnesota tried to extend this forced-unionism into day-care operations as well as home-care situations. There is no reason to force parents who receive Medicaid to care for developmentally-disabled children into unions, except to pick their pockets for the benefit of union bosses and political parties. It’s positively ghoulish ... and only the efforts of Republican-controlled legislatures in both states kept them from forcing babysitters into unions.Why is it that when President Obama talks about "fairness" he never seems to get around to questioning the fairness of forcing people like Sally Coomer to belong to a union and then having that union take almost $100 dollars a month out of her pocket for the privilege of being a member and helping to pay for causes she opposes? Mr. Obama won't complain about injustices like these, of course, because the unions, particularly SEIU, are among his biggest supporters and make up a large segment of his party's base.
There are similar videos at the link - testimony of others who've been forced to join a union if they wish to keep their jobs and feed their families. Progressives tout the "freedom to choose" but they only support that freedom for women who want to choose to terminate the life of their unborn child. When it comes to giving poor women the choice of which schools their children will attend or the choice of whether or not to join a union the word freedom suddenly vanishes from the Progressives' lexicon.
Politicians can support compulsory union membership or they can stand for individual liberty, but they can't do both.