They fought off a six year long unionization drive by AFSCME and SEIU, overturned in court an executive order by Minnesota Governor Mark Dayton and successfully supported the passage of legislation (vetoed by Dayton) prohibiting union dues from being deducted from state child care subsidy payments. Not bad for a loosely knit group of small business owners struggling to call attention to an issue that even political insiders hadn’t heard of at this time a year ago, when the Fr...

A little publicized federal court case being heard on Tuesday in US District Court in Minneapolis, however, takes the divisive issue away from state lawmakers and propels it to the national level, with the potential to end or embolden what some call compulsory unionization, once and for all.

A Ramsey County District Court judge issued a ruling on Friday saying that the executive order issued by Gov. Mark Dayton last year authorizing an election of state child care providers is “null in void.”According to Judge Dale Lindman, Gov. Dayton exceeded his authority because the order was an “unconstitutional usurpation of the Legislature's constitutional right to create and or amend laws” and violated the Separation of Powers doctrine.

ST. PAUL, MN- A group of child care providers from across Minnesota plan to file a lawsuit in U.S. District Court in Minneapolis as soon as today challenging child care unionization on constitutional grounds.

Now that Governor Dayton has ordered a union vote, childcare providers who oppose it expressed concern over the fairness of the process and the potential for undue union influence in carrying out the election.While the Minnesota Bureau of Mediation Services (BMS) will oversee the union election, Dayton’s executive order allows the state to in effect outsource the job to an outside group paid for by the unions.