NASHVILLE, Tenn. (AP) – A hospital custodian at the Fort Campbell Army post has filed a lawsuit against her union arguing she shouldn’t have to pay dues because of her religious beliefs.
The lawsuit was filed by Dorothy Frame, who works at Fort Campbell’s Blanchfield Army Community Hospital on the Kentucky-Tennessee border as an employee for a J&J Worldwide, a services company. The company has a contract with the Laborers’ International Union, according to the federal lawsuit.
Frame argued in the lawsuit filed Tuesday in Nashville that her religious beliefs are being violated because “her opposition to the union’s stance on abortion,” according to a media release from the legal firm representing Frame.
“She believes joining or financially supporting the unions would make her complicit in that sin because she believes that the unions support and promote abortion,” said the release from the National Right to Work Legal Defense Foundation, which battles unionization efforts.
The legal group was involved in a 2018 Supreme Court decision that said federal workers can’t be forced to pay dues to a union that represents them in collective bargaining.