NYC Jewish Public Defenders Sue Over Union’s Pro-Hamas Activism
“I shouldn’t have to financially support an organization that adopts antisemitic resolutions, sides with terrorist organizations, and advocates for the destruction of Israel in order to be a public defender in New York.”
After the Hamas massacre on October 7th, Jewish lawyers at New York City’s Legal Aid Society faced an environment so hostile they considered quitting, the Free Press reported last month. Members of their own union, the Association of Legal Aid Attorneys (ALAA)/UAW Local 2325, were attacking them from within for supporting Israel, and the reporters had been handed the receipts. Nasty group texts and leaked emails called defenders of the Jewish state “fascist,” “deranged,” and “mentally disturbed,” while hundreds of other messages accused Israel of “genocide,” “ethnic cleansing” and “apartheid.”
Then, on December 19, over the objection of pro-Israel union members and in defiance of Legal Aid Society policy, the ALAA passed a resolution calling for a ceasefire in Gaza and boycott of Israel for its “apartheid and occupation” of Palestinian land. There is no mention of Hamas, much less its role in the ongoing conflict, which the resolution blames Israel for “escalating.”
The resolution triggered a federal probe into antisemitism at the ALAA, by the same House committee investigating campus antisemitism at the universities we covered here. If the committee’s letter and demand for documents are any indication, the union should get the same grilling that those schools got last year. The ALAA’s failure to condemn Hamas, wrote Chairwoman Virginia Foxx, was “deplorable,” and it has “alienated a sizable portion” of its members.
And now, two of those Jewish members are suing the ALAA, the Legal Aid Society (LAS), and the City of New York in federal court. They allege they should not be forced to pay dues to the ALAA to subsidize political speech they disagree with as a condition of their employment—and in violation of their First Amendment rights.
For the legal geeks wondering how the plaintiffs allege a constitutional claim based on these facts, the complaint sets out the relationship between the City and the LAS that gives rise to the state action necessary to support it.
According to the complaint, New York City satisfies its constitutional obligation to provide representation to poor criminal defendants through a contractual arrangement with the LAS, which in turn employs criminal defense attorneys, including the plaintiffs. Under a collective bargaining agreement between the LAS and the ALAA, all LAS attorneys must pay dues or their substantial equivalent to the ALAA.
And that’s where the constitutional claim comes up: The City’s hiring of the plaintiffs through LAS, which requires them to be part of ALAA, constitutes state action, the complaint alleges.
From the complaint, Paragraphs 42-45:
42. …[B]y entering into its contracts with LAS in order to provide a core government function (criminal defense representation to indigent), the City knew that those criminal defense attorneys would be required to pay money to ALAA as a condition of providing criminal defense representation for the City.
43. Here, in substance, Defendants’ hiring of Plaintiffs through LAS, which required them to be part of ALAA, constitutes state action.
44. Plaintiffs have not provided affirmative consent to pay the union because they were never given a choice but to pay money to the union in order to provide criminal defense representation.
45. By requiring Plaintiffs to pay dues or fees to ALAA as a condition of their employment, Defendants are violating Plaintiffs’ First Amendment rights to free speech and freedom of association …
The plaintiffs are represented by The Liberty Justice Center. In their statement announcing the lawsuit, they explain further:
The Supreme Court has held that the First Amendment prohibits the government from compelling a person to subsidize a union’s speech. In Janus v. AFSCME, the Court held that a government could not force its employees to pay a union as a condition of their employment. And in Harris v. Quinn, the Court held that a government could not compel recipients of government funds, through a state program to provide services to other private individuals, to pay money to a union.
“Under Janus, the government cannot compel public defenders to pay money to a union as a condition of their employment,” said Jeffrey Schwab, Senior Counsel at the Liberty Justice Center. “Nor can the City of New York force its public defenders to pay money to a union by hiring them through a nonprofit organization whose employees are unionized.”
As one of the plaintiffs put it: “I shouldn’t have to financially support an organization that adopts antisemitic resolutions, sides with terrorist organizations, and advocates for the destruction of Israel in order to be a public defender in New York.”
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Comments
I would wager good money that every single secular Jew involved in this NYC kerfluffle has voted only for Democrats in the past and will continue to do so in future, despite leftism’s bone-deep and unchanging antisemitism.
My sympathy is muted by this reality.
Your Jew hatred is showing. My only hope is that no Jewish businesses where you live have glass windows.
It’s not Jew hatred. If for instance Jews voted for Nazis in 1930s Germany then your sympathy for them would be substantially muted. They got what they voted for.
Similarly secular America Jews mostly vote
Nazi(Democrat) and refuse to vote anything else. Now they’re getting bitten by those they support. If you won’t not voteNazi(Democrat) then what do you expect?Criticise Republicans all you like, but at least they’re not siding with terrorists, murderers, rapists, racists and tyrants.
“If for instance Jews voted for Nazis in 1930s Germany then your sympathy for them would be substantially muted. They got what they voted for.”
RIDICULOUS!
A lot of German Jews did vote Nazi in 1933, because there didn’t seem to be any better alternatives. The Sozis may not have hated Jews, but overall they seemed to be worse for the country than the Nazis.
As Mises wrote in The Road to Serfdom, there weren’t any liberals left in Germany. Everyone was some kind of socialist, so it must have seemed reasonable to vote for what seemed like the least bad socialists, and the fact that they hated Jews must have seemed like a minor concern. Nobody expected that if elected they would actually make antisemitic laws, let alone that five years later they would begin physically attacking Jews — and even after that nobody expected that they would move on to an attempt to wipe the Jews out.
Real lawfare for a real cause.
Classic example of getting exactly what you voted for
I suspect that if the union would simply change the name from “pro-Hamas” to “Anti-West” the Jewish public defenders would be back on board.
You suspect wrong.
That says more about you than it does about then. Next you can tell us about all the Jewish Bolsheviks.
Unions exist entirely to support the left. Nothing that follows from that is a surprise.
“I shouldn’t have to financially support an organization that adopts antisemitic resolutions, sides with terrorist organizations, and advocates for the destruction of Israel in order to be a public defender in New York.”
Take a step back. Maybe you shouldn’t be a public defender.
Public defenders are a vital part of our justice system, and necessary for our liberties.
Joe Biden says, “You ain’t Black if you don’t vote for me.”
Trump says: “You ain’t Jewish if you don’t vote for me.”
To hell with both of these degenerate, senile, imbeciles. How in the world did the greatest country in the history of the world degenerate into having to chose between these two fuck— idiots.
The difference is, sad as it is, that Trump is actually right about this.
Except he did not say that. He made an observation about Jews that vote Democratic. He did NOT ask for their vote. Painting the extreme interpretation is poor. Biden explicitly said what he did.
Ironically, Biden’s support among blacks falls, while Trump’s popularity with Jews rises. Imagine that. So the comparison falls there as well.
Calling Trump degenerate is a clear sign of TDS. Compare their families, for example. On virtually every level, they are completely different. Failing to acknowledge that is telling.
A distinction without a difference. Trump’s (accurate) observation amounts to the same thing as what Biden said explicitly (and inaccurately).
And while Trump’s family is a lot more successful than Biden’s, that is probably more to his wives’ credit than to his. “Degenerate” is a good term for the way he’s lived his own life.
Distinction without a difference, to you, despite there was a distinction with a difference, as pointed out in several respects.
Trump never said that, you idiot.
“I shouldn’t have to financially support an organization that adopts antisemitic resolutions, sides with terrorist organizations, and advocates for the destruction of Israel in order to be a public defender in New York.”
Yeah? Now tell us which union leaders you voted for and why.
Would it have made any difference? The union reflects its membership.
Now do teachers’ unions.
It is evil for the government to compel its workers to financially support any union.
Democrats, when they are in control, force all workers to financially support unions.
In theory, non-members are not charged for the union’s politics.
However, any support for an organization that is inconsistent with the employee’s views is wrong.
Oh, look what they just did with the “PRO Act”, going after freelancers.