FEATURED
The case, filed by conservative education advocate Nicole Solas, alleges civil rights violations
A University of Rhode Island job applicant alleges the public institution discriminated against her because she isn’t a union member, according to a new lawsuit.
The Goldwater Institute in collaboration with American Freedom Network Attorney Kevin McCaffrey recently filed the federal lawsuit, alleging the University of Rhode Island gives discriminatory “preferential consideration” to hiring labor union members.
“An individual’s access to a government job or benefit should not be conditioned upon that person joining a union,” Goldwater Senior Attorney Scott Freeman told The College Fix in a recent email.
According to court filings, the plaintiff, Nicole Solas, was rejected for a position as a higher education administrative assistant at the university. Solas is a conservative education advocate who was sued by a teacher’s union after requesting records about critical race theory being taught in her child’s school district.
The lawsuit alleges Solas met or exceeded all “Required Qualifications” listed in the November 2024 job posting. However, the university rejected her for the position, stating in the post that union members would receive “preferential consideration” and the university “would only consider nonmembers if [a union] member could not fill the position.”
The job posting also stated that members of the National Education Association Rhode Island union would be given preference, and Solas is not a member, according to the lawsuit.
“I’m not a union member—I’ll never be a union member. This should have no bearing whatsoever on my employment prospects with a government agency because it is my absolute First Amendment right,” Solas stated in a news release.
The lawsuit cites the Civil Rights Act of 1871, alleging the university violated her right to free speech and freedom of association under the First and 14th Amendments.
The case argues that in the 2018 ruling, Janus v. AFSCME, the U.S. Supreme Court ruled that freedom of speech entails freedom of association and “[f]orced associations that burden protected speech are impermissible.”
More specifically, the lawsuit argues that the Janus case made it “unconstitutional for public-sector unions and state employers to collect/deduct union dues or fees from public employees without their affirmative consent and knowing waiver of their First Amendment rights, and they cannot grant special benefits to public employees to the detriment of non-members.”
Attorney Freeman told The Fix that courts have interpreted Janus to mean that “the government cannot condition the granting of a benefit on union membership.” He said a favorable court ruling would help “all individuals who work for government agencies or seek employment from them.”
The Fix also reached out to the National Right to Work Foundation, a non-profit that seeks to “eliminate coercive union power and compulsory unionism abuses” for comment on the lawsuit.
Vice President Patrick Semmens cited Janus in his response, saying that “all public employees have a First Amendment right to refrain from paying dues to an unwanted union.”
Semmens told The Fix via email that “it is reprehensible for university officials to blatantly discriminate against those who choose to exercise that constitutional right, and we hope the court quickly strikes this discriminatory policy down.”
The lawsuit asks the court to stop the university from enforcing its union-preference hiring policy and compulsory union dues policy, which, it argues, are unconstitutional.
The Fix reached out to the university’s media relations office for comment on the lawsuit twice over the past two weeks, but did not receive a response.
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