Suit: Union Withholds Teacher’s Charitable Contribution to Pro-Life Organization

A Pennsylvania high school teacher is suing the state’s largest teachers union for violating her right to free speech.

Linda Misja, a 35-year veteran high school teacher, alleges that the Pennsylvania State Education Association (PSEA) is discriminating against her by refusing to allow her to donate dues money to People Concerned for the Unborn Child, a pro-life charity.

“The PSEA engages in the practice of perpetuating the charity selection process indefinitely, imposing viewpoint-based restrictions on her speech and association, and stripping her of protections consistent with Pennsylvania law,” the suit says.

Misja is one of 200 religious objectors affiliated with PSEA, a status that allows her to abstain from full membership in the union. Pennsylvania, which is not a right-to-work state, has a policy that requires religious objectors to contribute the equivalent of dues payments to charity . . .

Misja’s suit claims that denying her the ability to give to a cause of her own choosing represents an unconstitutional violation of her conscience and due process rights. The ordeal began in 2011 when her local school district negotiated a contract with the PSEA that made schools a closed-shop system, mandating that all teachers pay fees to the union. (Read more from “Suit: Union Withholds Teacher’s Charitable Contribution to Pro-Life Organization” HERE)

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