Elected officers at the Service Employees International Union’s largest California chapter are out of their posts after the U.S. Labor Department charged the local’s leaders with violating labor laws.

United Long-Term Care Workers President Tyrone Freeman and his cohorts are the focus of a Labor Department investigation. Freeman, who himself is already under scrutiny for alleged improper spending practices, is charged with making it too difficult for would-be challengers to qualify for the local’s election ballot. The complaint says the local required 4,800 signatures to be collected in just three weeks from members working mostly in private homes. Due to the difficulty of the requirements, the only ones to qualify for the ballot were Freeman and his allies.

Until the investigation is concluded, the SEIU has placed the ULTCW local into trusteeship. Several former members of the ULTCW board have filed a suit against SEIU asking the union to revoke the trusteeship. Freeman is not part of that suit, and has denied any wrongdoing.