Mark Mix, president of the National Right to Work Committee, is confident Virginia’s long-standing Right-to-Work law will be a defining issue in the Commonwealth’s gubernatorial election on Tuesday between Republican Lieutenant Governor Winsome Earle-Sears and Democrat Abigail Spanberger.
On Monday’s edition of The John Fredericks Show, Mix praised Earle-Sears for making the preservation of Virginia’s Right-to-Work law a “centerpiece” of her campaign, arguing that it embodies both individual liberty and economic opportunity.
He noted that since 1947, Virginia workers have had the freedom to choose whether to join or financially support a labor union, which, he noted, helps attract businesses and investment to the Commonwealth.
“Since 1947, workers in Virginia have been free to choose whether or not they want to support a labor union financially, and it’s not a tough call. You don’t have any problem with Right to Work because that’s all it does, is give individual workers the choice,” Mix said.
“The individual liberty part about it is the most important part, obviously, but economically…Right to Work’s been one of the issues that’s really important when people are looking to expand and invest and create opportunities for Virginians,” he added.
Mix contrasted Earle-Sears’ strong support for Right to Work with what he described as Spanberger’s evasiveness and anti-worker choice voting record, pointing out that while Spanberger has avoided clear answers during the campaign, she voted twice in Congress to repeal Right-to-Work laws across the nation.
“Abigail Spanberger has indicated that she won’t answer the question about whether or not she believes workers should be forced to pay dues or fees. It’s just another kind of obscure, ambiguous answer that she gives to any of these issues that are important on the campaign trail right now, despite the fact that as a member of Congress, she voted not once but twice to repeal Virginia’s Right-to-Work law already,” Mix said.
This, he said, demonstrates the Democrats’ alignment with national labor union interests rather than Virginia’s workers.
“So her position is clear on what she wants to do. She wants to force workers to pay union dues or fees to keep a job in Virginia. She wants to take away the choice that workers have right now when it comes to supporting an organization that they may or may not want to be involved with,” he added.
Mix further warned that union officials, empowered by forced dues, spend billions on politics while workers lose control over how their money is used.
“The only way you can hold union officials accountable for the activities that they do outside of the workplace and what they want to do in Richmond, what they want to do in Washington, DC politically, is to allow workers to choose whether or not they want to support that behavior,” Mix explained.
“Union officials who can take your money without any accountability end up spending $2 billion every two years on politics,” he added.
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Kaitlin Housler is a reporter at The Virginia Star and The Star News Network. Follow Kaitlin on X / Twitter.
Editor’s Note: John Fredericks is the Publisher of The Virginia Star.
