Jason Miyares, who served as Virginia’s attorney general from 2022 to 2026, is taking on a new role in the fight over worker freedom. In an op-ed published by The Daily Wire, Miyares announced he is partnering with the Freedom Foundation, a nonprofit that describes its mission as protecting public employees from compulsory unionism.
Miyares, now a partner at Torridon Law PLCC and a senior advisor to the Freedom Foundation, frames the effort as a defense of individual liberty against entrenched union interests. He points to what he calls a pattern of abuses by government union bosses — from locking a home-care provider in a room until she signed a union card, to more than a dozen documented cases of forged signatures on membership forms, to Jewish teachers and professors forced to fund unions that have ignored antisemitism in their ranks.
“These are not abstractions,” Miyares writes. “These are our neighbors, teachers, correctional officers, and caregivers, who never consented to being spoken for, and who have had nowhere to turn when the union that claims to represent them stops representing their values.”
Right to Work under threat in Virginia
Miyares, a Republican who made his name in part on law-and-order and government-transparency issues, specifically warns that union allies in Richmond are pushing to unwind Virginia’s Right to Work protections. These laws, which exist in 26 states, prohibit requiring workers to join or fund a union as a condition of employment.
“Right to Work isn’t an anti-union slogan. It’s a simple, commonsense principle,” he writes. “No American should be forced to join or fund an organization as a condition of holding a job.”
He argues that weakening these laws would strip workers of their ability to say no, calling it “the definition of worker freedom.”
Teachers unions under fire
The bulk of Miyares’s critique is aimed at teachers unions, particularly the National Education Association (NEA). He notes that this summer, the NEA’s Representative Assembly elected leadership tied to a Democratic Socialists of America convention, pushed through new transgender ideology resolutions for the classroom, and raised member dues to pay for it.
He also points to the Chicago Teachers Union, which has sent delegations to Venezuela to study Hugo Chávez’s “Bolivarian Revolution” as a model. And he cites an analysis of the NEA’s $450 million annual budget, which found that less than 10% of it went to direct representation of members — things like contract fights and grievances.
“The rest fuels a political machine that most of the teachers paying into it never asked for and don’t agree with,” Miyares writes.
He argues that the teaching profession is far more politically diverse than its union leadership, noting that a meaningful share of teachers identify as moderate or conservative — and that even self-described liberal teachers often have no interest in DSA-style politics in their classrooms or contracts.
In New York City, he says, teachers have described a small, highly organized socialist caucus capturing their union and steering it away from bread-and-butter representation toward permanent activism. “This is not democracy,” he writes, “but rather a hostile takeover of an organization funded by mandatory dues.”
A call to end taxpayer-funded union politics
Miyares is calling for an end to taxpayer dollars subsidizing union politics, arguing that public money should go to educating kids, not bankrolling a political operation most taxpayers and teachers never agreed to fund.
“That is precisely the model I believe that every state that values liberty should reject,” he writes.
His partnership with the Freedom Foundation is part of a broader legal and advocacy strategy. The foundation has a track record of suing public-sector unions over issues like the use of public resources for political activity and has won several high-profile cases in states including Washington, Oregon, and California.
Miyares says he intends to assist the organization’s fight “state by state.”
Union response and context
The NEA and other major unions have not yet responded publicly to Miyares’s op-ed, but they have historically defended their political activities as essential to protecting workers’ interests. Union leaders often argue that collective bargaining and political advocacy go hand in hand, and that attacks on union funding are attempts to weaken workers’ voices.
The debate over public-sector union power has intensified in recent years, particularly after the 2018 Supreme Court decision in Janus v. AFSCME, which ruled that public employees cannot be forced to pay union fees as a condition of employment. That ruling has led to a wave of litigation from groups like the Freedom Foundation, which have sought to notify workers of their rights under the decision.
Miyares’s entry into the fray is notable because Virginia is a Right to Work state, but one where Democrats have made inroads in recent elections. The state legislature has considered bills to weaken Right to Work laws in the past, though none have passed.
“On the 250th anniversary of the ‘New Birth of Freedom’ that is the United States, we understand that Americans didn’t win their freedoms by staying quiet or passive,” Miyares writes. “I’m honored to be part of a movement to stand with thousands of teachers, caregivers, and public servants who simply want the freedom to choose for themselves.”
Source: www.dailywire.com — https://www.dailywire.com/news/unions-silenced-the-american-worker-now-its-time-to-reclaim-freedom