Anthony Reardon is the national president of the National Treasury Employees Union (NTEU), the second largest federal employees’ union in the United States. ¹ Reardon worked for the union for 25 years in executive positions before being elected its leader in 2015.

In 2015, a whistleblower accused NTEU under Reardon’s leadership of engaging in a “Jimmy Hoffa level of abuse and corruption” that included blatant favoritism for members loyal to the executive staff, targeted harassment of dissenters, and widespread spying on union members. ² Federal authorities did not take action against the union or Reardon.

Career

As of 2020, Anthony Reardon has been a member of the National Treasury Employees Union for 30 years. In 1990, he joined as the director of operations and managed the union’s finances and other day-to-day operations. In 1997, Reardon joined the NTEU’s executive committee. After 11 years as director of operations, Reardon became chief operating officer. In 2013 he began serving as executive vice president under his predecessor, Colleen Kelley. In August 2015, Reardon was elected the NTEU’s national president. ³⁴

After becoming national president, President Barack Obama appointed Reardon to the Federal Salary Council and the National Council on Federal Labor-Management Relations. Former NTEU president Colleen Kelley also held both positions. ⁵

In 2018, President Donald Trump issued an executive order which streamlined the collective bargaining process between federal agencies and federal employee unions to give the agencies more power in hiring and firing practices. The NTEU condemned the measure and soon after sued the U.S. Patent and Trademark Office for overstepping the bounds of the order. In September 2020, an arbitrator ruled partially in favor of the NTEU and declared portions of the executive order unlawful. ⁶

As national president, Reardon has continued the NTEU’s heavy use of “official time,” or union activity conducted on-the-clock at taxpayers’ expense. Rep. Paul Gosar (R-AZ), author of the proposed PURSE Act intended to remove the ability of IRS workers to join a union, has pointed out that in 2016 the IRS spent $22 million and 482,000 work hours on union activity. In 2014, then-House Ways and Means Committee Subcommittee on Oversight chair Charles Boustany (R-LA) criticized the IRS for maintaining an employee in Washington, D.C., with a salary well over $100,000 who only did union work. At the time, the IRS was publicly claiming that it was underfunded and understaffed. ⁷

Accusations of Corruption in NTEU

In April 2016, the right-leaning online outlet Daily Caller published an article alleging corruption and abuse inside the NTEU under Reardon based on the testimony of IRS attorney and NTEU member Jane Kim. Kim alleged that the NTEU was organized as a “caste-like system” where members loyal to the leadership were given preferential treatment and dissenters were harassed by legal complaints, bureaucratic pressure, and emotional abuse. Supposedly, many union members never performed their government jobs, but instead focused on union work full-time. Kim also claimed that NTEU leaders spied on their subordinates by secretly recording communications which could then be used as evidence in trumped-up charges of union or employer rule violations. Kim was investigated four times, including for being a violent threat in the workplace, but she was never charged with an infraction. ⁸

Kim contacted the Equal Employment Opportunity Commission to report the NTEU’s abuses, but the organization was unable to take meaningful action as long as the union’s executives supported its lower-level overseers. Kim then contacted numerous other federal labor regulation agencies but found no help. ⁹

Kim had previously spoken out against the NTEU in 2014 when she sent a letter to Congress claiming the NTEU failed to protect its lawyers from overworking and that NTEU executives had verbally harassed staff members. ¹⁰

According to Kim, the NTEU’s corrupt structure and culture operated under former NTEU president Colleen Kelley whom Reardon served under as executive vice president. By the article’s release, Reardon had been the head of the union for almost a year, and Kelley claimed that he was at least aware of the abusive culture of the union. ¹¹

1. Ogrysko, Nicole. “Two largest federal employee unions endorse Biden for president.” Federal News Network. July 20, 2020. Accessed October 23, 2020. https://federalnewsnetwork.com/unions/2020/07/two-largest-federal-employee-unions-endorse-biden-for-president/.
2. Wolf, Connor D. “Whistleblower Allegedly Exposes Vast Abuse Within IRS Union.” Daily Caller. April 2, 2016. Accessed October 25, 2020. https://dailycaller.com/2016/04/02/whistleblower-allegedly-exposes-vast-abuse-within-irs-union/.
3. Miller, Jason. “NTEU elects Reardon as new national president.” Federal News Network. August 12, 2015. Accessed October 25, 2020. https://federalnewsnetwork.com/unions/2015/08/nteu-elects-reardon-new-national-president/.
4. “Anthony M. Reardon NTEU National President.” House.gov. Accessed October 25, 2020. https://docs.house.gov/meetings/HM/HM11/20160419/104699/HHRG-114-HM11-Bio-ReardonA-20160419.pdf.
5. “Anthony M. Reardon NTEU National President.” House.gov. Accessed October 25, 2020. https://docs.house.gov/meetings/HM/HM11/20160419/104699/HHRG-114-HM11-Bio-ReardonA-20160419.pdf.
6. Ogrysko, Nicole. “NTEU earns win in ongoing legal battle over Trump’s workforce executive orders.” Federal News Network. September 23, 2020. Accessed October 23, 2020. https://federalnewsnetwork.com/unions/2020/09/nteu-earns-win-in-ongoing-legal-battle-over-trumps-workforce-executive-orders/.
7. Ludwig, Hayden. “Litigious Labor in the White House: Limiting Labor’s Sway.” Capital Research Center. November 15, 2018. Accessed October 23, 2020. https://capitalresearch.org/article/litigious-labor-in-the-white-house-part-3/.
8. Wolf, Connor D. “Whistleblower Allegedly Exposes Vast Abuse Within IRS Union.” Daily Caller. April 2, 2016. Accessed October 25, 2020. https://dailycaller.com/2016/04/02/whistleblower-allegedly-exposes-vast-abuse-within-irs-union/.
9. Wolf, Connor D. “Whistleblower Allegedly Exposes Vast Abuse Within IRS Union.” Daily Caller. April 2, 2016. Accessed October 25, 2020. https://dailycaller.com/2016/04/02/whistleblower-allegedly-exposes-vast-abuse-within-irs-union/.
10. Johnston, David Cay. “Union Is Target of IRS Attorney’s Latest Accusations.” Tax Analysts. May 6, 2014. Accessed October 25, 2020. http://www.taxhistory.org/www/features.nsf/Articles/4C3D74C1C8E3512385257CD0004866FD?OpenDocument.
11. Wolf, Connor D. “Whistleblower Allegedly Exposes Vast Abuse Within IRS Union.” Daily Caller. April 2, 2016. Accessed October 25, 2020. https://dailycaller.com/2016/04/02/whistleblower-allegedly-exposes-vast-abuse-within-irs-union/.