union organizing

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According to a recent Gallup poll, 71 percent of Americans “approve of labor unions,” up three percentage points from 2021.

This represents a generational high-water mark for union support – the last time Gallup measured a higher union approval rating among the American public was 1959 when 73 Americans approved of labor unions. Prior to this year, union support had remained lower than 70% ever since union support dropped to 66 percent in 1967. The low-water mark was reached in 2009 when unions enjoyed only 48% support from the American public.

On August 29, 2022, the NLRB issued its decision in Tesla, Inc., overruling precedent that allowed employers to enforce facially-neutral dress codes to prohibit wearing non-conforming attire, including union insignia and union logos. Now, employers must allow employees to wear union attire absent a showing of “special circumstances.”

It has become increasingly apparent that the Biden Administration’s National Labor Relations Board (NLRB) is aggressively pushing labor-friendly positions, like those seen under the Obama Administration.

Now it appears the NLRB’s General Counsel has taken aim at Section 8(c) of the National Labor Relations Act (the Act), and in so doing undermines 75 years of jurisprudence as “incorrectly concluded.”

On April 7, 2022, the NLRB announced the General Counsel’s desire to restrict employers’ ability to speak to their employees about unions, whether in so-called “captive audience” meetings, or whether “cornered by management while performing their job duties.” The General Counsel claims such meetings and conversations “inherently involve an unlawful threat that employees will be disciplined or suffer other reprisals if they exercise their protected right not to listen to such speech.”

Construction Site Sillouhette with Multiple Cranes at Sunset

On February 4, 2022, President Biden issued Executive Order 14063, requiring certain federal construction contractors and subcontractors “to negotiate or become party to a project labor agreement with one or more appropriate labor organizations.”

The EO’s Project Labor Agreement (PLA) requirement applies to “large-scale construction projects,” defined to include domestic federal construction projects “for…

The Labor Law Insider continues the discussion in this podcast episode with Tom Godar, Tom O’Day, Terry Potter and Rufino Gaytán on actions employers should take proactively to deter unions from garnering employee support in the workplace. Shifting social issues in and outside the workplace along with significant public support for labor unions subject all…

In episode three of the Labor Law Insider podcast, Husch Blackwell attorneys Tom Godar, David Hertel and Laura Malugade note the confirmation of Jennifer Abruzzo as General Counsel as well as two new nominations to the National Labor Relations Board which, upon confirmation, will usher in a new Democratic majority on the Board. With the…