According to the Center for Media and Democracy (CMD), a national corporate watchdog organization, the SPN is currently working to weaken the unions that represent first responders who are helping Houston residents get back on their feet after Hurricane Harvey:
The remnants of Hurricane Harvey are still generating devastating floods in South Texas and Louisiana. While the Texas State Association of Firefighters and the Houston Police Officers Union and countless other public workers are working night and day on search and rescue — and a fleet of union nurses start to arrive from around the country — a little known ally of the American Legislative Exchange Council (ALEC) is meeting in rain-soaked San Antonio planning an attack on public sector workers nationwide.
The $80 million network of state “think tanks” and other right-wing organizations known collectively as the State Policy Network (SPN) is holding its annual meeting in San Antonio this week with Koch operatives, corporate donors, and ALEC staff to coordinate an assault on American unions. SPN is bankrolled by many of the same companies as ALEC and receives funds from the Charles G. Koch Foundation.
CMD details how SPN is indeed a coordinated think tank initiative that draws on the state lobbying successes and techniques of the American Legislative Exchange Council, describing an SPN secret “toolkit” of bills aimed at destroying unions and presenting “a fundraising letter for a $8 million campaign.” CMD reports:
As a point of comparison ALEC is only about an $8 million dollar organization; it works hand in hand with SPN peddling state laws, like the anti-worker “right to work” and Voter ID, that rig the system in favor of Republicans and disadvantage Democrats.
SPN’s union-busting “tool kit” … [includes] one borrowed from Governor Scott Walker’s Act 10 bill. It requires unions to annually re-certify by a vote of 50 plus one of the bargaining unit (not just the majority of those voting like in a normal campaign). With poll-tested spin, SPN is pushing this law in the name of “worker voting rights,” but it [is] really a poison pill that forces unions to spend all their time and energy on internal elections. Imagine if a law was passed forcing corporations to reincorporate annually in the name of “shareholder rights.”