This week in the War on Workers: NYU okay with union-buster sending thugs to threaten students

Anti-union thugs threaten pro-union NYU student protesters. Last month, a rally by New York University students supporting workers at nursing homes owned by NYU Law School trustee and major donor Daniel Straus was met by an aggressive counter-protest of people obviously paid to be there (they claimed to be nursing home workers but didn't know where they worked, among other things) who threatened students and yelled homophobic slurs while holding signs saying things like "Daniel Straus cares."

It was reasonable to assume that Straus had hired these goons, but it seemed unlikely it could be proven. Except that it has been, and a Straus spokesperson has admitted that CareOne and HealthBridge, Straus's nursing homes, did hire "security."

Hiring thugs to insult, intimidate, and threaten college students rallying outside an event at their own school is about what you'd expect of Straus, whose nursing home chains have been hit with repeated National Labor Relations Board charges due to a pattern of illegal behavior against workers. But you'd think NYU might care that its students were being threatened by people hired by one of its law school's trustees. Not really, though.

An N.Y.U. spokesperson declined to answer this reporter's question of whether the university will investigate the students' claims regarding Straus's involvement in the matter.

'The university is not a party to this labor dispute, [and] has no input into how either side is managing its PR campaigns to convey its views,' the spokesperson wrote in an e-mailed statement, while stressing that the principle of peaceful and lawful protest is 'crucially important' at N.Y.U.

'And we caution all parties to take the steps necessary to ensure that [that principle] is upheld and to avoid any actions that might be seen to undermine it,' the statement added.

Got that? Threatening protesters = "managing a PR campaign." And any caution that's going to go out goes to everyone equally. In other words, NYU cares more about Daniel Straus's millions than about its students' ability to protest Daniel Straus's many violations of the law without being threatened for it.