Josh Hawley thought he was investigating radical activists.
But what he uncovered goes much deeper than anyone expected.
And Josh Hawley made one discovery about union bosses that has them scrambling to cover their tracks.
Union bosses caught financing violent riots
Senator Josh Hawley (R-MO) launched a formal Senate investigation into the Coalition for Humane Immigrant Rights of Los Angeles, better known as CHIRLA.
The Missouri Republican wants answers about CHIRLA’s role in stoking violent riots targeting Immigration and Customs Enforcement operations in Los Angeles.
Hawley is demanding to know whether the organization financed and planned illegal activities.
But the real bombshell came when investigators started following the money trail.
Financial disclosures from nine major unions reveal hundreds of thousands of dollars in grants flowing directly to CHIRLA.
The AFL-CIO, Service Employees International Union, and Randi Weingarten’s American Federation of Teachers all cut checks to the radical organization.
These aren’t small donations either.
Union bosses have been tossing around four- and five-figure grants like they’re pocket change.
The forced dues connection no one wants to talk about
Here’s where the story gets really infuriating for working Americans.
Big labor rakes in more than $15 billion every year from its members.
Much of that money comes from workers who will be fired if they refuse to pay union dues.
In states without right-to-work protections like California, New York, and ironically Hawley’s own Missouri, workers have no choice.
Even if you think your union is doing a terrible job or hate the radical political causes it supports, money gets seized from your paycheck anyway.
When union officials don’t have to earn their revenue, they feel zero obligation to represent the political views of the workers they supposedly serve.
Take SEIU California president David Huerta.
This guy has pocketed $2.7 million in forced-dues funded salary and benefits since 2001.¹
Huerta didn’t bother consulting any of the workers he "represents" before getting himself arrested for physically obstructing federal agents.
The SEIU rushed to Huerta’s defense, posting on social media that "ICE’s brutal, military-style tactics have no place in our communities" and demanding his release.
The union then organized protests across the country supporting Huerta and opposing Immigration and Customs Enforcement.
More union connections keep surfacing
It gets worse.
A man arrested by the FBI for allegedly distributing construction-grade face shields to Los Angeles rioters turned out to be a Teamsters union official.
That’s not a coincidence.
Union bosses have been systematically funding the very organizations working to undermine immigration enforcement.
They’re using forced dues from workers to bankroll radical causes that many of those same workers oppose.
Hawley’s blind spot on forced union dues
Here’s the most maddening part of this whole story.
Hawley recently reversed his position on voluntary union dues.
The Missouri Senator now says he wouldn’t want to "impose right to work on anyone."
Think about that logic for a second.
In Hawley’s upside-down world, having the freedom to withdraw financial support from a radical union like the SEIU is somehow an imposition.
But being forced to pay dues that fund riots and radical activists is perfectly acceptable.
Hawley has the power as chairman of the Senate’s Judiciary Subcommittee on Crime and Terrorism to investigate these connections thoroughly.
The question is whether he’ll follow the facts wherever they lead.
Even if it forces him to rethink his cozy relationship with union bosses who are using workers’ money to fund the very chaos he’s investigating.
Working Americans deserve better than having their paychecks confiscated to bankroll radical causes they never signed up for.
¹ National Right to Work Legal Defense Foundation analysis of union financial disclosures, 2025.
