Issued July 10, 2008

 

The Service Employees International Union (SEIU), the fastest growing labor organization in the Americas, works with counterpart unions and human rights organizations in more than 40 other countries around the world to improve the standard of living for working people abroad and at home.   With these partners, SEIU crafts global alliances to address worker and human rights issues at global employers and to help all workers attain workplace justice.

 

Because the FISA grants the executive branch the right to seize millions upon millions of communications between innocent Americans and their friends, families, or business associates overseas without judicial oversight, this law represents a direct threat to our staff members who work internationally to advance workers' right to organize and fair labor standards.  SEIU staff members frequently communicate with academics, nongovernmental organizations, and labor union officials who work at considerable personal risk in repressive environments around the world.  If labor activists believe that their communications with SEIU could be acquired by the U.S. government (and perhaps turned over to their own governments), they may decide that working with SEIU is simply too risky.  Workers around the world will pay the price.

 

FISA is both unconstitutional and unacceptable.  To protect the interests of working people in the US and the world, SEIU has joined the ACLU in filing suit in the U.S. District Court for the Southern District of New York today, seeking a court order declaring that the new law is unconstitutional and ordering its immediate and permanent halt.