University of Chicago law students fight against compulsory dues for anti-Israel union

Union has to pay because Israel is committing “ethnic cleansing”

Law students at the University of Chicago have filed a lawsuit against their union for violating freedom of speech because of its support for boycotts of Israel.

The pending federal complaint alleges that UChicago's Graduate Students Union is violating students' free speech rights through “a recently entered into collective bargaining agreement.”

The agreement requires doctoral students to “either become dues-paying members of the union or pay an appropriate 'placement fee' as a condition for continuing their work as teaching assistants, research assistants, or similar positions.”

The students object to their money being used to support the “boycott, divestment and sanctions campaign” against Israel and other political positions of the union. The law students were admitted to the union as academic associates in March 2024 after a quick vote. Less than 10 percent of UChicago law students participated in the election.

Both the GSU and its parent union, the United Electrical, Radio and Machine Workers of America, support the boycott, which claims that Israel is an “apartheid regime” that has committed “ethnic cleansing” and “occupied Palestine.”

Likewise, the University of Chicago graduate union joined the UChicago United for Palestine Coalition and reaffirmed its commitment to BDS “just one week after the October 7 terrorist attacks,” the lawsuit states.

The students filing the complaint rely on their work as teaching and research assistants to advance their careers and pay for their education and living expenses. And some, the lawsuit says, “are tormented by having to weigh their conscience against their careers.”

The graduates' union did not respond to several email requests for comment in recent weeks. The College Fix.

The students’ lawyers also did not respond to inquiries from The solution.

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A workers’ liberty advocate said “union bosses” often “take radical positions [that the workers] refuse.”

Patrick Semmens, vice president of the National Right to Work Legal Defense Foundation, cited his organization's experience in hearing from “workers seeking free legal assistance.”

The labor rights group faces similar challenges related to pro-Israel workers objecting to their union's political advocacy. Specifically, his group is also battling the electrical workers' union at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology.

In a media statement he said: “The story of [United Electrical] is full of such examples.”

Semmens cites a recent case in which the foundation's lawyers “provided pro bono legal assistance to several Jewish graduate students at MIT who were appalled by the union's anti-Israel rhetoric and divisive protest activities and sought to deprive the union of any financial support by seeking religious concessions under Title VII.”

Semmens reported that “foundation attorney Glenn Taubman said at a congressional hearing that his phone has been ringing off the hook since the Oct. 7 attack on Israel because Jewish students and workers across the country increasingly feel attacked by union rhetoric and want to distance themselves from it.”

Although the case of the foundation at MIT and the one at UChicago are at different stages, Semmens said: “They have one thing in common: The union representatives of the GSU-UE initially refused to grant both the legally required religious concession on the grounds that there was nothing in Judaism that prevented them from supporting a union.”

Under the National Labor Relations Act, “workers can opt out of membership, but in states without Right to Work laws, such as Illinois, they may be required to pay dues or fees to union leadership as a condition of continued employment,” Semmens said.

In Right-to-Work states, workers have more freedom to leave a union.

Semmes says he hopes that through this and similar lawsuits, the courts will recognize “that there is no place for this kind of coercion in America.”

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IMAGE: COGS Union/Instagram

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