In February 2009, SEIU’s Secretary Treasurer and Change to Win Chair Anna Burger wrote a letter to Treasury Secretary Timothy Geithner in which she asked that companies receiving government funds under the TARP program be restricted from lobbying.1
Yet the SEIU itself has benefitted from taxpayer handouts. Since 2000, the SEIU collected $8.6 million in federal grant dollars, and the union has spent heavily on lobbying, with more than $150 million going to political and lobbying activity in just the past four years.2
To add to their hypocrisy, as the SEIU was benefiting from taxpayer money and spending millions in lobbying and political disbursements, it has laid off nearly 100 workers who were members of their own staff’s internal union. When asked about it, Andy Stern claimed that their intention for axing the people they claim to stand up for was to free up funds for more lobbying.3
1SEIU Secretary Treasurer Anna Burger, Letter to Treasury Secretary Geithner, 2/23/09
2Assistance To Recipients, SEIU, FY 2000-2009, www.USASpending.gov; Service Employees International Union LM-2 Filings, 2005-2008
3Alec MacGillis, “Union In Dispute Over Layoff’s,” Washington Post, 3/19/09
