Lift the Ban Watch: New York Edition Update, When Unions Attack

When last we posted about the UFC's efforts to get MMA legalized and regulated in New York state one thing didn't quite add up. From published accounts it appeared that the UFC had a well funded lobbying operation and everything was lined up for the bill to pass when one brave legislator stood up for right and decency and killed the bill.

That didn't sound like the New York politics I know.

And sure enough there was a well-financed entity on the other side, a union of all things.

Robert Joyner on MMA Payout breaks the story:

Many in the MMA community interpreted the result as another example of ignorance about the sport. However, in actuality the result had little to do with MMA and everything to do with a battle that has been raging in Las Vegas outside of the octagon.

According to WCBS, the sole correspondence received by the Committee was from UNITE HERE, the hotel and restaurant workers’ union. The letter cited the American Medical Association’s opposition to the sport as well as the alleged concerns of policeman about teenagers emulating the sport on the streets. The union urged the committee to “fully explore” the “social cost” of sanctioning MMA in New York.

UNITE HERE is a powerful force in the state with 90,000 members in New York. Last year the union spent $100,000 lobbying the Albany legislature and made more than $130,000 in political contributions to the Democratic and Working Families parties. That financial commitment dwarfs the UFC’s reported $40,000 in donations to New York Democrats.

The union’s opposition to sanctioning is the result of its failed efforts to unionize the Fertitta’s Station Casinos in Las Vegas. The Culinary Union Local 226, the Las Vegas local of UNITE HERE, is the largest local of the union in the United States and it’s most politically potent. However, it has failed to crack into the locals casino market in the city, one dominated by Station Casinos which is the last major non-union company in Las Vegas.

The family owned Station Casinos has long been staunchly open shop, but its relations with UNITE HERE took a turn for the worse with the company’s purchase of a union casino in 2000. Station fired 1,000 union workers and required them to reapply for their jobs. Only 150 were rehired according to union officials.

So there we have it. The Fertitta's union busting antics in Las Vegas are coming back to haunt them in New York, the 2nd biggest fight market in the country. This won't be the last instance of the Fertitta's other business activities coming back to haunt the UFC and MMA as a whole I'm afraid.