Source: https://openjurist.org/180/f3d/727/american-federation-of-government-employees-v-j-clinton
Timestamp: 2018-06-20 02:15:49
Document Index: 520953171

Matched Legal Cases: ['§ 2464', '§ 2464', '§ 2464', '§ 2464', '§ 2464', '§ 2464', '§ 2464', '§ 2469', '§ 2469']

180 F3d 727 American Federation of Government Employees v. J Clinton | OpenJurist
180 F. 3d 727 - American Federation of Government Employees v. J Clinton
180 F3d 727 American Federation of Government Employees v. J Clinton
180 F.3d 727
AMERICAN FEDERATION OF GOVERNMENT EMPLOYEES; Jim Davis;
Scott Blanch; David C. Sheffer; Jesse R. Salcedo; Darrell
Williams; Michael D. Dearing; George H. White; Hill/DDO/95
Inc.; George Carriker; Harry Burnette; Daniel Sosa; Louis H.
Harwell, Jr.; Connie K. Scarborough; Luanne Lewis,
No. 98-3385.
The plaintiffs argue that the workload performed at Newark, Kelly, and McClellan Air Force Bases was designated as "core logistics" work. For national security reasons, core work must be done only by federal employees who report directly to the military. See 10 U.S.C. § 2464(b)(1). The Secretary of Defense designates which functions are "core." See 10 U.S.C. § 2464(a). The Secretary may waive the core designation. See 10 U.S.C. § 2464(b)(2). Under 10 U.S.C. § 2464(b)(2), plaintiffs argue, if the Secretary does waive the core designation of a workload, the workload can only be considered for conversion to private performance in accordance with OMB Circular A-76, which requires competition between public and private bidders. The plaintiffs argue that the Secretary did not waive the core designation at the three bases and that only private contractors were allowed to bid on the transferred workload. They assert that this conduct thus is a violation both of the statute and of Circular A-76, which would only apply if the Secretary waived the core designation.
For purposes of ruling on a motion to dismiss for lack of standing, a complaint must be viewed in the light most favorable to the plaintiff; all material allegations of the complaint must be accepted as true. See Warth v. Seldin, 422 U.S. 490, 501, 95 S.Ct. 2197, 45 L.Ed.2d 343 (1975). Plaintiffs, however, bear the burden of persuading the court that it has subject matter jurisdiction. See Rogers v. Stratton Indus., Inc., 798 F.2d 913, 915 (6th Cir.1986). A party's standing is a question of law reviewed de novo. See Greater Cincinnati Coalition for the Homeless v. City of Cincinnati, 56 F.3d 710, 715 (6th Cir.1995).
To establish Article III standing to sue in federal court, an individual plaintiff must show that (1) he or she has suffered an "injury in fact"; (2) there is a causal connection between the injury and the conduct complained of; and (3) the injury will likely be redressed by a favorable decision. See Lujan v. Defenders of Wildlife, 504 U.S. 555, 560-61, 112 S.Ct. 2130, 119 L.Ed.2d 351 (1992).
The district court correctly read Dalton v. Specter, 511 U.S. 462, 114 S.Ct. 1719, 128 L.Ed.2d 497 (1994), as foreclosing review of the decision to close the three bases. The closures were the result of the 1993 and 1995 Base Realignment and Closure Commission Reports, themselves made pursuant to and in accordance with the Defense Base Closure and Realignment Act of 1990. The Supreme Court held that "[w]here a statute, such as the 1990 Act, commits decisionmaking to the discretion of the President, judicial review of the President's decision is not available." Dalton, 511 U.S. at 477.
The plaintiffs do not challenge the closures, however, but instead challenge the procedures by which base workloads were assigned to private contractors. Basically, they assert that the workloads should have been assigned to other military bases as "core logistics work" pursuant to 10 U.S.C. § 2464(b)(1), or that if the Secretary of Defense had exercised his discretion and waived the core designation, public and private bidders should have competed for the workloads in accordance with OMB Circular A-76. They argue that the failure to transfer the workload to other military bases, or at least to give those bases the opportunity to compete for the workload, injured their employment or employment prospects in various ways.
The scenario here is similar to that of National Maritime Union of America, AFL-CIO v. Commander, Military Sealift Command, 824 F.2d 1228 (D.C.Cir.1987). In National Maritime, unions representing employees of unsuccessful bidders for government contracts challenged the contract award, alleging that the failure to include a specific wage and benefit determination from the Labor Secretary violated the Service Contract Act. See id. at 1235. While the District of Columbia Circuit found that the loss of present or future jobs as a result of the contract award might constitute a "distinct and palpable" injury (in a way that mere harm to employment "prospects" alleged by some of the plaintiffs here does not), that injury was "neither fairly traceable to the putatively illegal omission of a wage determination from the contract nor fairly redressable by the remedy the Unions seek." Id. Nothing suggested that the winning bidder would not have won the contract anyway, that the losing bidder would have participated in a rebidding, or that the government's internal cost analysis would have changed. These facts, along with the "uncertainty about the effect of the private bidders' assumed wage and benefit levels on the bids in the second round of bidding[,]" all pointed "to a single conclusion that the injury to the Unions' members is causally speculative." Id. at 1236. Here, the fact that the Secretary can simply waive the core designation, and the inability to show a likelihood that the plaintiffs would acquire different or better jobs if mandated procedures were followed, make the injuries to these plaintiffs causally speculative as well.
A case in which the District of Columbia Circuit did find standing for a group of union employees is distinguishable from our facts. In International Union of Bricklayers and Allied Craftsmen v. Meese, 761 F.2d 798 (D.C.Cir.1985), unions challenged Immigration and Naturalization Service ("INS") guidelines for determining when aliens might enter the United States to perform work. The plaintiffs charged that the State Department and INS had violated statutory procedures in issuing work visas to aliens when the plaintiffs and other union members were "ready, willing and able" to perform work on a sawmill. Id. at 800. The court noted that if the plaintiffs were victorious, "relief from the foreign competition engendered (or at least tolerated) by the challenged governmental action will not be conjectural, but immediate. That kind of competition will be stopped." Id. at 803. The facts here, on the other hand, suggest conjectural rather than "immediate" relief. If the Secretary of Defense were forbidden to allow private contractor bidding on core logistic work, he could simply waive the core designation. It is also conjectural whether the plaintiffs would acquire better jobs, or any jobs at all, following a judicial order that particular ongoing depots be allowed to bid on work of closed depots. The facts here are much more like those of Simon v. Eastern Ky. Welfare Rights Organization, 426 U.S. 26, 96 S.Ct. 1917, 48 L.Ed.2d 450 (1976), cited by way of contrast in Bricklayers, 761 F.2d at 803. The Court found in Simon that the relief sought by the plaintiffs (withdrawal of a hospital's tax exemption) was not traceable to the alleged injury (denial of hospital care to indigent patients), since hospitals might restrict such care even if the exemption were removed. Simon, 426 U.S. at 42-43.
The plaintiffs here cannot make this clear showing. Their injuries tend to involve a potential loss of job benefits, not an actual one. Nor is any loss of benefits clearly traceable to a RIF which resulted (under the Cohen plaintiffs' allegations) solely from the failure to follow mandatory procedures. Here, on the contrary, any benefit loss results most clearly from the unchallengeable and unchallenged decision to close bases. Moreover, the plaintiffs here cannot show a likelihood, as opposed to a mere possibility, that a favorable decision of the court would redress their injury. See Cohen, 171 F.3d 460, 1999 WL 144801, at * 7 (citing Steel Co. v. Citizens for a Better Tomorrow [sic], 523 U.S. 83, 118 S.Ct. 1003, 1016, 140 L.Ed.2d 210 (1998) ("plaintiffs must show that it is likely, rather than merely possible, that a favorable decision by the court would redress the injury")).
AFGE brought suit in its representational capacity. "An organizational plaintiff ... may have standing to sue on its own behalf 'to vindicate whatever rights and immunities the association itself may enjoy' or, under proper conditions, to sue on behalf of its members asserting the members' individual rights." Common Cause v. FEC, 108 F.3d 413, 417 (D.C.Cir.1997) (quoting Warth v. Seldin, 422 U.S. 490, 511, 95 S.Ct. 2197, 45 L.Ed.2d 343 (1975)). AFGE must show that (1) at least one of its members has standing to sue in his or her own right; (2) the interests the suit seeks to vindicate are germane to its purpose; and (3) neither the claim asserted nor the relief requested requires the participation of individual members in the lawsuit. See UAW v. Brock, 477 U.S. 274, 282, 106 S.Ct. 2523, 91 L.Ed.2d 228 (1986).
Section 2469(c) states that OMB Circular A-76 does not apply; this seems to contradict § 2464(b)(2). The two provisions are reconcilable, however, by reading § 2464(b)(2) to make Circular A-76 applicable only where the Secretary has explicitly waived core workload designation. Otherwise, reassigned core workload is to be competed under § 2469(a)(1), and non-core workload under § 2469(a)(2)
Hill also would have problems establishing prudential standing, since its claims clearly involve " 'abstract questions of wide public significance' which amount to 'generalized grievances,' pervasively shared and most appropriately addressed in the representative branches." Valley Forge Christian College v. Americans United for Separation of Church and State, Inc., 454 U.S. 464, 475, 102 S.Ct. 752, 70 L.Ed.2d 700 (1982) (quoting Warth, 422 U.S. at 499-500)