Through this opinion, the Court joins an ever-growing number of courts that have found that causes of action seeking to enjoin collection of fair-share fees and recоup damages based on prior collection of those fees must be dismissed in light of Janus v. American Federation of State, County, & Municipal Employees, Council 31 , --- U.S. ----,
Janus v. American Federation of State, County, & Municipal Employees, Council 31 , [--- U.S. ----],[ 138 S.Ct. 2448 ] (2018) does not entitle Hough to a refund of the fair-share fees he paid before the ruling came down. Assuming it's necessary to inquire whether the defendant's good-fаith reliance on then-existing law bars Hough's refund claim under 201 L.Ed.2d 924 42 U.S.C. § 1983 , the defendants have indeed established good-faith reliance as a matter of law. This is so for the reasons provided in the following cases: Janus v. American Federation of State, County, & Municipal Employees, Council 31 , No.15 C 1235 ,, at *3 (N.D. Ill. Mar. 18, 2019) ; Carey v. Inslee , No. 3:18-CV-05208-RBL, 2019 WL 1239780 , at *9 (W.D. Wash. Mar. 11, 2019) ; Cook v. Brown , No. 6:18-CV-01085-AA [ 2019 WL 1115259 , 1192-93], 364 F.Supp.3d 1184 , at *7 (D. Or. Feb. 28, 2019) ; Danielson v. American Federation of State, County, & Municipal Employees, Council 28 , 2019 WL 982384 , 1087 (W.D. Wash. 2018). 340 F.Supp.3d 1083
Hough v. SEIU LOCAL 521 , No. 18-CV-04902-VC,
Lee seeks to avoid the same result as the cases above by asserting error in these recent decisions. First, Lee claims that her request for injunctive relief is not moot based upon the voluntary cessation of the conduct by NEA. However, as another colleague noted,
Nevertheless, Mr. Lembo-and all the Defendants-complied with Janus . They did sо not because they wanted to evade the Court's jurisdiction, as is the case in so many voluntary cessation cases, butbecause the Supreme Court's new and controlling precedent not only affected the rights of the parties immediately before it (the state of Illinois) but also announced a broad rule invalidating every state law permitting agency fees to be withheld. In unequivocal terms, the Supreme Court stated that: "States and public-sector unions may no longer еxtract agency fees from nonconsenting employees." Janus , , slip op. at 48. 138 S.Ct. at 2486
Lamberty v. Connecticut State Police Union , No. 3:15-CV-378 (VAB),
See, e.g., See Jernigan v. Crane ,, 979 (8th Cir. 2015) (refusing to hold that a constitutional challenge to Arkansas's marriage laws had bеcome moot after Obergefell v. Hodges , --- U.S. ----, 796 F.3d 976 , 135 S.Ct. 2584 (2015), because Obergefell had "invalidated laws in Michigan, Kentucky, Ohio, and Tennessee-not Arkansas."); Rosenbrahn v. Daugaard , 192 L.Ed.2d 609 , 922 (8th Cir. 2015) ("South Dakota's assurances of compliance with Obergefell do not moot the case."); Waters v. Ricketts , 799 F.3d 918 , 686 (8th Cir.2015) ("Nebraska's assurances of compliance with Obergefell do not moot the case."); Waters v. Ricketts , 798 F.3d 682 , 999-1000 (D. Neb. 2016) (refusing to find the plaintiffs' constitutional challenge to Nebraska's laws moot because "no Court has yet declared Section 29 unconstitutional.... It has not been repealed and is still published as part of the Nebraska Constitution.... The Obergefell case struck down the marriage exclusions in Michigan, Kentucky, Ohio, and Tennessee. While precedent does in fact dictate the result in the case befоre this Court, Section 29 has not specifically been declared unconstitutional."); Strawser v. Strange , 159 F.Supp.3d 992 , 1081 (S.D. Ala. 2016) ("[A] government ordinarily cannot еstablish mootness just by promising to sin no more." (citation and internal quotation marks omitted) ). 190 F.Supp.3d 1078
Doc. 41 at 10. As detailed above, cases survived post- Obergefell because courts concluded that specific, state statutes had not been the subject of the decision by the Court in Obergefell . The same cannot be said here. Janus , as detailed above, used broad language that immediately made it unconstitutional for unions to extract agency fees from nonconsenting employees. There is no dispute that NEA immediately ceased collecting such fees. Accordingly, any request for injunctive relief is MOOT.
In a similar fashion, Lee amended her complaint in the hope of creating a factual issue surrounding NEA's good faith defense. Lee contends that this Court cannot dismiss the matter because NEA must demonstrate factually that it comрlied with prior Supreme Court precedent and that its decisionmakers subjectively believed that the precedent was cоrrect. The Court finds no merit in such a contention.
First, Lee's assertion regarding the subjective belief of members of NEA cannot withstand scrutiny. The entity acts solely through its actions. Those actions included collecting fees under Abood v. Detroit Board of Education,
Second, it is unclear what facts Lеe believes need to be proven to establish compliance with Abood and its progeny. It appears that Leе is suggesting that if NEA was routinely violating Abood and its progeny, such a finding would undermine any good faith defense. However, even in the now-amended complaint, Lee has not even hinted at any such violation. Moreover, given the current litigation, it is difficult to conceive of a circumstance where the NEA would have disregarded Abood in such a blatant manner as to destroy a goоd faith defense and yet still avoided litigation. As such, the Court declines to open discovery into the matter. The facts are undisputed that NEA collected fees under the binding precedent of Abood and the subsequent state statutes it spawned. As a mаtter of law, therefore, those collections efforts were done in good faith that they did not violate the United States Constitution.
Based upon the above, the complaint is hereby DISMISSED.
IT IS SO ORDERED.