Judge restores collective bargaining rights to unions in Wisconsin in landmark decision

foxbusiness.com:

Around 700 hospitality employees at Virgin Hotels Las Vegas who are Culinary Union members walked off the job at 5 a.m. Friday.

A Wisconsin judge handed a major legal win to Badger State public union workers on Monday, restoring their collective bargaining rights after a 13-year-old law renounced them.

Dane County Circuit Judge Jacob Frost ruled on Monday that certain sections of Act 10 violated the Wisconsin Constitution. Also known as the Wisconsin Budget Repair Bill, the law was signed by then-Governor Scott Walker in 2011 with the goal of cutting state costs.

The legislation strictly limited compensation for state employees and took away collective bargaining rights from state union workers, causing national controversy at the time and fueling protests for weeks.

Wisconsin labor unions argued that Act 10 limited their ability to organize and right to speak under the First Amendment. In his ruling, Frost wrote that several portions of the law were created «without a rational basis.»

HUNDREDS OF CULINARY UNION WORKERS GO ON STRIKE AT HOTEL NEAR LAS VEGAS STRIP

A Wisconsin judge has ruled that certain portions of Act 10 are unconstitutional. (iStock | Getty Images / Getty Images)

«This gets to the heart of the Court’s July Decision – the unconstitutional creation of the ‘public safety employee’ group and differential treatment of it without a rational basis – so I strike these sections,» Frost wrote, according to FOX 6 Milwaukee.

The decision was met with mixed reactions from Wisconsin legislators. Democrats praised the move, while Republicans expressed fiscal concerns about the decision.

«This lawsuit came more than a decade after Act 10 became law and after many courts rejected the same meritless legal challenges,»