Suit: Outdated federal precedents wrongfully permit union officials to block workers from stopping union dues payments

Milwaukee, WI (September 18, 2026) – Caryn Johnson, an employee of Olympic Companies, has filed a new class action lawsuit against both International Union of Painters and Allied Trades (IUPAT) District Council 7 and her employer. The lawsuit states that the union and employer continue to deduct union dues from Johnson’s paycheck after she provided written notice of termination of her union membership, which violates Wisconsin state law.

The lawsuit was filed in the U.S. District Court for the Eastern District of Wisconsin with free legal aid from National Right to Work Foundation staff attorneys, and represents the latest in a line of violations that union officials have committed against Johnson. In June, Johnson and her Foundation staff attorneys filed charges at the National Labor Relations Board stating that union officials falsely claimed union membership was mandatory.

Johnson argues in the lawsuit that previous federal court decisions limiting Wisconsin’s state Right to Work protections were decided incorrectly, and that she and others in similar situations deserve the full workplace freedoms Wisconsin law provides.

Federal Courts Incorrectly Override State Laws Protecting Workers’ Right to Stop Union Dues

Wisconsin is a Right to Work state, meaning that employees such as Johnson are not required to join or pay dues to a union in order to get or keep a job. Wisconsin’s state Right to Work law is designed to be comprehensive, proactively guaranteeing that if an employee wants to stop payroll deductions of union dues, the employer must honor that request within 30 days.

This law should prevent union bosses in Wisconsin from imposing unilateral and arbitrary “window periods” to keep independent-minded employees from stopping dues payments except during a narrow time period established by union officials. However, in 2018, a divided panel of the U.S. Seventh Circuit Court of Appeals decided in Allen that Wisconsin’s state law was preempted by federal law, citing the 1971 Sea Pak Supreme Court decision.

In Johnson’s case, local IUPAT officials told her that she had to wait until a 10-day period in February 2027 to stop paying dues, despite the fact that Johnson was illegally coerced into the union in the first place and Wisconsin law protects her right to choose when to stop dues payments. Now, on behalf of other workers subject to the union’s arbitrary window periods, Johnson is arguing that Allen and Sea Pak were wrongly decided, and Wisconsin’s state law is a legitimate state protection for workplace freedoms.

Previously, the issue was presented to the U.S. Supreme Court in 2019 in the Allen case. However, Democrat Wisconsin Attorney General Josh Kaul, almost immediately after being elected, withdrew the state’s petition to the U.S. Supreme Court asking the High Court to review and overturn the Allen decision. Reports show union officials gave Kaul’s campaign hundreds of thousands of dollars in direct contributions, with union affiliates being his seven largest contributors.

“Wisconsin’s popular Right to Work law is designed to fully protect workers from being forced to pay union dues against their will, yet that right is being improperly limited by union officials using arbitrary ‘window periods’ to stifle workers’ attempts to stop dues,” commented National Right to Work Foundation President Mark Mix. “We are proud to assist Ms. Johnson as she fights for not only her own rights, but to defend the workplace freedoms of all Wisconsinites.”