Walker administration finally gets around to stripping collective bargaining on “unpatriotic” firefighters and police for supporting public unions.

It didn’t take long to remove even more worker rights, worker protection by union organizations that many conservatives consider unconstitutional. Ironically, the bill extending the attack on workers was written by a former Democrat, now independent, who thinks he’s just leveling the labor rights playing field.

Cap Times: A bill was quietly introduced Tuesday that would expand on Gov. Scott Walker's proposal to strip most collective bargaining rights from public employees by extending bargaining restrictions to police and firefighters. Unlike Walker's proposal, Assembly Bill 127, introduced by Rep. Bob Ziegelbauer of Manitowoc, would only prevent public safety employees from negotiating over pension and health-care contributions. Ziegelbauer's bill maintains the ability of public safety unions to bargain over work conditions, as well as maintain their rights to deduct union dues from the payroll and would not require union members to vote annually on whether to recertify their unions. 

"We're not surprised a bill has been introduced to bring us in," said Mahlon Mitchell, state president of the Professional Firefighters of Wisconsin, on Thursday. "We've been hearing rumors this would be done since Walker first introduced his plan in February." While Mitchell called the ability to keep those bargaining rights "huge," he said public safety unions remain committed to standing in solidarity with other public sector unions. 

Note: This is a rewrite of an earlier blog post wiped out by a "Blogger" technical problem.