He Said It on a Union Podcast. Now Nevadans Need to Hear It.
Nevada has been a right-to-work state since 1953. That means no employer can force you to join a union. No boss can dock your pay and hand it to a union boss just to keep your job. This simple idea has served Nevada workers well for more than seventy years.
Aaron Ford wants to end it. He said so on a union podcast, to union leaders, when he thought most Nevadans weren’t listening.
“The moment you send it to me — first term, I ain’t waiting,” Ford said during the GangboX podcast last December, hosted by construction worker union leaders.
“It can be done legislatively. They can send me a bill. And if they send it to me, I’m signing it.”
He is telling union bosses exactly what they want to hear, in their own house, with their own microphone.
Union Circuit Tour
Ford has quietly shared his repeal stance in union endorsement interviews while keeping it off his public platform.
The Nevada State Education Association has endorsed Ford, and this month he was the keynote speaker at its Delegate Assembly.
He also joined Teamsters Local 631 members in Henderson to support their contract fight. These are not coincidental appearances. Ford is methodically visiting union audiences, making promises to each one, and counting on most Nevadans never hearing about it.
Marc Ellis, president of CWA Local 9413, confirmed Ford’s repeal promise is exactly what secured his union’s endorsement:
“I applaud Aaron Ford,” Ellis said.
“He’s doing what Sisolak wouldn’t do.“
Think about that for a second. Even former Democratic Governor Steve Sisolak — who held the governorship, the state Senate, and the Assembly all at once in 2019 — wouldn’t touch right-to-work repeal. Democrats had every tool they needed and still blinked.
And if you had any doubt about whose team Ford is really on, consider this: former Vice President Kamala Harris is headlining a luncheon fundraiser for Ford’s gubernatorial campaign on May 7 in Las Vegas.
Tickets run from $1,000 for a general guest up to $5,000 for a VIP couple.
That is the Biden-Harris crowd — the same people who spent four years pushing the most aggressively pro-union federal agenda in modern history — now showing up in Nevada to put their stamp on Aaron Ford.
Ford talks like Biden’s labor agenda, walks like Biden’s labor agenda, and fundraises with Kamala Harris. Nevada rejected that agenda in November 2024, but Ford wants a chance to govern like them anyway.
Your Dues, Their Politics
Here is something union bosses never put in the membership newsletter. Unions do not primarily spend dues money on fighting for better wages and working conditions at the bargaining table. They spend it on politics. Almost exclusively one party’s politics.
For example, the National Education Association (NEA)’s own federal filings show the national union spent over $40 million in 2024 on political candidates, lobbying, and support for ideologically driven organizations — plus $18 million on conferences, events, and catering, and nearly $14 million on airfare, hotels, and travel.
That is your dues money. It’s not going to your pension or your kid’s classroom supplies. It’s spent on political campaigns and hotel bar tabs.
In Nevada, this machine has a name and a history. The late Senator Harry Reid spent decades building one of the most sophisticated political organizing operations in the country, and unions were the engine: Culinary Workers Local 226, the building trades, and the teachers’ unions.
Reid understood that union infrastructure — the voter files, the phone banks, the bodies at the doors — was worth more than any TV buy. He used it to flip Nevada from a Republican-leaning state into a reliable Democratic stronghold. That machine did not die with Reid, but was inherited by other Democrats.
When you strip away right-to-work and force a worker to pay union dues as a condition of employment, you are not just taking money from their paycheck. You are conscripting them into a political operation they may deeply oppose.
A Nevada construction worker who voted for President Trump but works a union job would be forced to fund campaigns and causes that work against everything he believes in. That is a First Amendment issue.
The Two-Week Trap: What CCSD Teachers Already Know
If you want to understand how union bosses really feel about worker choice, look at what already happens inside the Clark County School District right now, under existing law.
CCSD teachers who want to leave the Clark County Education Association have exactly one window to do it: July 1 through July 15. Two weeks per year. And most teachers are on summer vacation during that period, with school the last thing on their minds.
That is not an accident. The Nevada Policy Research Institute called it:
“a transparent attempt by union bosses to keep their power by restricting teachers’ ability to leave CCEA.”
Over the years, more than 40 percent of CCSD teachers have already opted out of union membership entirely. When teachers get real information and a genuine chance to leave, they leave.
That tells you about how unions keep members — not through value, but through fine print and inconvenience.
Why Janus Matters — And Why Ford’s Union Allies Hate It
The Supreme Court addressed the forced dues issue directly in its landmark 2018 ruling, Janus v. AFSCME. The case was brought by Mark Janus, an Illinois state employee who objected to paying union fees because he disagreed with the union’s political positions and bargaining priorities.
He argued that forcing him to financially support an organization whose speech he rejected violated his First Amendment right to free speech and free association.
The Court agreed. By a 5-4 vote, the justices ruled that government workers cannot be compelled to pay union fees as a condition of their employment. The reasoning was straightforward. A union does not just negotiate wages. It takes political positions, backs candidates, funds causes, and lobbies legislators. Forcing a worker to pay for all of that — whether he agrees with it or not — is compelled political speech.
The First Amendment forbids the government from putting words in your mouth. It equally forbids the government from forcing you to fund someone else’s.
That ruling was a landmark victory for worker freedom. But it only covers public employees. Private sector workers still have no such federal protection. Right-to-work laws at the state level are the only shield private workers have.
Strip away Nevada’s right-to-work law, and every private sector worker in a unionized shop loses that protection entirely. Pay up or lose your job. That is the world Aaron Ford is promising to deliver.
What Comes Next
Nevada voters have already rejected the repeal three separate times in the 1950s.
Since 1959, the legislature has tried and failed at least ten more times to weaken or eliminate the law. Every single time, Nevadans said no. The Las Vegas Chamber of Commerce has made protecting the law a top priority for decades, writing recently that every Nevadan should be able to decide how their own paycheck is spent.
Governor Joe Lombardo has been clear: his position on right-to-work has not changed. He believes Nevada’s business-friendly environment depends on protecting workers’ freedom to choose.
If Ford wins in November and Democrats reclaim the legislature, right-to-work in Nevada will face its gravest threat in seventy years. Ford already told the union bosses he is ready to sign on day one. Now Kamala Harris is flying in to help him raise the money to do it.
Nevada has said no to right-to-work repeal over a dozen times. Ford is betting that streak ends.
On November 3, your paycheck gets a vote.
The opinions expressed by contributors are their own and do not necessarily represent the views of Nevada News & Views. This article was written with the assistance of AI. Please verify information and consult additional sources as needed.
