Last week, the Transport Workers Union submitted material to the National Mediation Board alleging that the International Brotherhood of Teamsters had forged signatures to “showing of interest” cards.
As a result, the Teamsters – who are seeking to supplant the TWU as bargaining agent for American’s mechanics and related employees – asked the NMB on Tuesday to give it until Aug. 23 to respond.
The Teamsters also asked to see non-redacted documents. The filings by the TWU had blacked out the names of the accusers and other relevant information.
The IBT “takes TWU’s charges very seriously and is planning to submit a complete response to TWU’s accusations,” Teamster staff counsel Nicolas M. Manicone said in Tuesday’s letter to the NMB.
“The IBT’s task in this regard is more difficult because it does not have access to all of the relevant TWU allegations. By separate letter today IBT requests unredacted versions of the TWU’s brief and declarations so that it can respond to TWU’s allegations,” the letter stated.
As an example of the TWU accusations, the TWU submitted a declaration from someone who purported to be part of the Teamsters organizing team at American.
“There were multiple cards from the same workers with different signatures, assessments of workers who were never spoken to, and there were authorization cards from at least 1500 workers who had never been seen, spoken to, or assessed,” the declaration stated.
Another declared that he or she was aware of reports of falsifications involved in the collecting of signatures.
In its filing July 23, the TWU noted: “While our declarants did not directly witness the commission of the forgeries, they were alerted to this misconduct by fellow organizers and other staff who either witnessed the misconduct or were made aware of it.”
The unions are also sparring on the issue of who should be on or off the list of eligible voters.
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