Right to work legislation for Michigan has been in the works for years

While the "right to work" melee throughout the past two weeks seemed to develop extremely quickly, a Reuters report Thursday said the groundwork had been laid by the bills’ authors during the past two years.

According to the report, state senator Patrick Colbeck had systematically been putting together support for the legislation among Republican legislators, going from the bottom up. Getting the Republican leadership, including Governor Rick Snyder, on board with the initiative actually was a final step rather than a first step.

The campaign to make Michigan a right-to-work state also benefitted from deep-pocketed support from the Koch brothers and Richard DeVos. DeVos was cited in the article as helping to sway some Republican lawmakers who were not 100 percent on board with the legislation.

Click here to read the full report from Reuters.

Ben Freed covers business for AnnArbor.com. You can sign up here to receive Business Review updates every week. Reach out to Ben at 734-623-2528 or email him at benfreed@annarbor.com. Follow him on twitter @BFreedinA2