I have posted before on the Service Employees International Union's (SEIU) battle with the Union of Healthcare Workers, and expressed envy that the unions always get exciting stories about splinter groups and intrigue, while we here at the Chamber just keeping plugging along trying to save and create jobs. But I surrender my jealousy; they can keep the drama, 'cause this is getting out of hand.  Below is from a press release by the National Union of Healthcare Workers about the SEIU hiring spies and using them to monitor members of the competing union.  Seriously, how did card check ever even get on the table?

On Friday, an international security company sued SEIU in federal court for failing to pay all of its $2.2 million in bills for surveillance and security services...According to the recently filed lawsuit, SEIU officials contacted the OSO Group's Garnett Williams on January 14, 2009 through a former U.S. Secret Service agent to request the company's assistance in putting SEIU-UHW in trusteeship. The timing of SEIU's action is notable. SEIU officials hired the company more than a week before Trusteeship Hearing Officer Ray Marshall had presented the findings of his trusteeship investigation to SEIU's International Executive Board for its consideration.

On January 15th the OSO Group began its operations for SEIU, according to the lawsuit. It deployed off-duty and retired police officers - at $110 per hour - to conduct 24/7 surveillance of UHW's offices. The agents, who were stationed in cars outside SEIU-UHW's offices, attempted to intimidate union members and staff by photographing and videotaping them as they came and left the offices.
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The lawsuit also contains a stunning disclosure about SEIU's efforts to surveil its own members' union meetings. In the first known acknowledgement of this matter, the lawsuit indicates that SEIU directed the OSO Group to conduct "a security and surveillance operation" targeting thousands of members who attended five SEIU-UHW membership meetings held in schools and auditoriums across the state on January 24th.
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Altogether, the lawsuit provides dramatic new details about the timing, funding and execution of the trusteeship. The news that SEIU's top officials are spending millions of dollars of their members' dues money to hire intelligence operatives and strike-breakers to intimidate and spy on SEIU members raises profound ethical concerns that demand immediate attention.