Emails obtained through Freedom of Information Act request show NLRB staff praising Biden’s controversial firings and “Acting General Counsel” appointment

Washington, DC (May 19, 2021) – Newly released emails show National Labor Relations Board (NLRB) staff celebrating President Biden’s controversial, unprecedented and possibly illegal firing of NLRB General Counsel Peter Robb. The emails were obtained by the National Right to Work Legal Defense Foundation through a Freedom of Information Act (FOIA) request.

Mere minutes into Biden’s presidency the White House Office of Presidential Personnel sent an email to Robb demanding he resign by 5pm the same day or be fired. In response, Robb declined to resign, saying the demand was “unprecedented since the nascence of the National Labor Relation Act (NLRA) and the NLRB” and “undermines Congress’s intent that the Office of the General Counsel be independent of the Board and the Executive Branch.”

“Indeed, my own experience, as well as my conversations with those who held this position before me, have confirmed the need for the NLRB General Counsel to act independently without constant fear of removal,” Robb continued. “The prosecution of violations of the NLRA will now be subject to the political influence of the White House, in violation of Congressional action to improve the function of the NLRB to achieve the NLRA’s mission to fairly resolve labor disputes.”

Despite Robb’s warning about the politicization of NLRA enforcement, his deputy, Alice Stock, was also removed the next day after being designated Acting General Counsel. Soon after, Biden selected long time NLRB bureaucrat Peter Sung Ohr as Acting General Counsel.

The FOIA-requested emails show that although some NLRB officials were surprised by Biden’s actions – with one career NLRB attorney noting the move was “not expected” – some current and former NLRB officials voiced their approval of the unprecedented and arguably illegal actions.

Los Angeles-based NLRB Region 31 director Mori Rubin sent an email to her colleagues reacting to the news that Stock had been fired along with Robb. Rubin derided Stock as a “clone” of Robb. She said “there is talk that Peter Ohr may be appointed acting GC, which would be wonderful!” Respondents to the thread, whose names are redacted, proclaimed: “Go Biden!!” “That would be terrific!” and “Hope this comes true!”

Once appointed, Ohr swiftly began to do the bidding of union officials, withdrawing pleadings in cases filed by workers with National Right to Work Foundation legal aid, thereby preventing the cases from being decided by the full Board in Washington, DC. Among others, Ohr ordered the withdrawal of two cases in which workers contended that their employers’ “neutrality agreements” unlawfully aided union officials during organizing drives.

Ohr also rescinded almost a dozen guidance memos issued by Robb, including memos ensuring workers could avoid funding union political and lobbying activities, allowing workers to intervene in legal actions that were used to block efforts to secure decertification votes, and strengthening unions’ duty of fair representation for workers subject to monopoly bargaining. In all these instances Ohr took the position advocated by union officials who had backed Biden’s election campaign, and against those of the Foundation-backed employees.

Ohr earned praise for his aggressive implementation of the Biden agenda. Among the emails unearthed in the FOIA request was a message to Ohr from a redacted individual (identified in a subsequent FOIA as longtime NLRB attorney Emily Hunt) describing her reaction on the day of Biden’s inauguration when she learned that Robb had been removed: “I exclaimed to myself, ‘This day just keeps getting better and better!’” The email commends Ohr for rescinding Robb’s memos.

Biden followed his unprecedented removal of Robb by nominating Jennifer Abruzzo to be General Counsel. Until her nomination Abruzzo was a lawyer for the Communications Workers of America (CWA) union, which endorsed Biden and pledged huge resources to his campaign. At a Senate hearing Abruzzo admitted she was part of the NLRB review team advocating Robb’s removal, thus undermining the independence of the very office she seeks to hold. At the hearing Abruzzo also refused to commit to recusing herself from cases involving her former employer or its affiliates.

Abruzzo’s refusal to commit to recusal is consistent with the relaxed ethics standards Biden has been applying to former Big Labor officials in his administration. In order to hire former high-ranking union officials, Biden has abandoned ethics requirements that prevent former members of lobbying groups from dealing with their old employers when they join the Administration. Last week it was reported that Biden had already waived ethics rules for Celeste Drake, a former employee of the AFL-CIO, and Aletha Predeoux, once a top lobbyist for the American Federation of Government Employees.

The Foundation’s FOIA-requested emails, combined with other messages discovered by a similar FOIA request from the Freedom Foundation, demonstrate a fawning approval among NLRB staff for Biden’s undermining of the NLRB’s independence. This approval reaches the top levels of the bureaucracy at the NLRB’s main office in Washington. The Freedom Foundation’s FOIA request revealed that NLRB Senior Attorney Neelam Kundra responded to the news with “so exciting!” and “such a REFRESHING change!!!”

“The President’s unprecedented attack on the NLRB’s Congressionally-established independence should have shocked any NLRB official concerned about neutrally applying the law, rather than twisting it to the benefit of the President’s political allies,” said National Right to Work Legal Defense Foundation President Mark Mix. “Yet the documents obtained show the Biden power grab was celebrated by many inside the agency who are supposed to impartially apply the law.”

“Independent-minded workers should not have their cases adjudicated by officials who celebrate partisan, pro-union boss attacks on the NLRB,” added Mix. “The Biden Administration continues to stack the deck in favor of union bosses and against the rights of workers who want nothing to do with union affiliation, and these emails show many at the NLRB seem all too happy to go along.”

UFCW union officials demanded employer hand over unique information only about worker who petitioned to oust union, not any coworkers

Selbyville, DE (May 18, 2021) – Delaware Mountaire Farms employee Oscar Cruz Sosa is challenging National Labor Relations Board (NLRB) Region 5’s dismissal of his federal charge against the United Food and Commercial Workers (UFCW) Local 27 union. Cruz Sosa charged Local 27 officials with illegally surveilling him while he was helping his coworkers exercise their right to vote out the union.

Cruz Sosa submitted a petition in February 2020 signed by hundreds of his coworkers – enough to trigger an NLRB-supervised vote to remove the union (known as a “decertification election”) – but UFCW officials sought to block the vote by claiming that a “contract bar” existed that prevented any election. The “contract bar” is a non-statutory NLRB-concocted policy that forbids workers from voting out unpopular union bosses for up to three years after management and union officials broker a monopoly bargaining contract.

Over the union’s objections, the NLRB Region 5 Director in Baltimore allowed the vote Cruz Sosa and his coworkers requested because he found that the union contract contained an illegal forced-dues clause, and thus the “contract bar” did not apply. However, unwilling to lose power over 800 forced-dues payers in Cruz Sosa’s workplace, UFCW lawyers petitioned the full NLRB to reimpose the “contract bar.” In response, Foundation staff attorneys urged the Board to reform the restriction or eliminate it entirely.

The case was under consideration by the full Board until last month, when it reversed the Regional Director’s months-old ruling that the contract was invalid, kept the controversial “contract bar” in place, and ordered that hundreds of employee ballots cast in the election to remove the unpopular UFCW union bosses be destroyed rather than counted.

While the case was still being litigated, the NLRB issued a complaint against Mountaire Farms in a separate case UFCW union officials filed, which revealed that Mountaire Farms officials had not acquiesced in union officials’ March 2020 demands for “[c]opies of the daily hours of work and the time and attendance records for employee Oscar Cruz Sosa between August 1, 2019 and March 15, 2020.” Cruz Sosa submitted the employee-backed petition for a vote to decertify UFCW union officials in February 2020.

Foundation staff attorneys subsequently filed an unfair labor practice charge for Cruz Sosa, arguing the union’s demands for Cruz Sosa’s private information were an obvious attempt to intimidate and retaliate against him and stymie his and his coworkers’ efforts to exercise their right to vote union bosses out of power.

Cruz Sosa’s Foundation-provided staff attorneys defend that charge in the current appeal, contending that NLRB Region 5’s dismissal of his charge was wrong because “Local 27 had no legitimate representational objective for this information―unless surveilling your decertification opponent (an employee you purport to represent) is now considered ‘legitimate representational activity.’”

The appeal reiterates the intimidating and harassing nature of UFCW officials’ actions, emphasizing “that Local 27 made no similar information requests about any of the 799 other chicken processors employed at Mountaire Farms.”

“UFCW bosses have unequivocally shown that they value maintaining power at the Selbyville Mountaire plant far more than respecting the rights of the employees they claim to represent, whether that entails unlawfully surveilling an employee who is engaging in protected activity or fighting for the destruction of workers’ ballots,” commented National Right to Work Foundation President Mark Mix. “No American employee should have to go to work thinking that they are being spied on merely for helping their fellow employees exercise their right to resist union power.”

Union officials’ vague letters to workers failed to acknowledge requests to end dues deductions

Washington, DC (May 13, 2021) – Michigan Rieth-Riley Construction Company employees Jesse London and Rob Nevins are appealing to the National Labor Relations Board Office of Appeals their case charging International Union of Operating Engineers (IUOE) Local 324 union officials with blocking their right to refrain from union financial support.

Their appeal, filed with free legal aid from National Right to Work Legal Defense Foundation staff attorneys, challenges IUOE bosses’ cryptic responses to London’s and Nevins’ requests in early 2020 to resign from the union and stop all dues deductions from their checks.

According to their appeal, IUOE officials responded to both men’s letters in April 2020, acknowledging their resignations but not accepting their dues revocations, instead telling them to refer to copies of their dues authorization forms “with respect to revocation.” Both men assert that they had submitted their requests to terminate dues deductions within a 15-day “window period” for such demands imposed by IUOE officials, and it was unclear what the union bosses’ reply meant.

The appeal also recounts that IUOE bosses mailed a check to each man for roughly $250, though no explanation was given on what the money was for or whether the checks meant that “Local 324 actually had honored their revocations so that roughly $2,100-2,500 in union dues would not be taken out of their” checks later in the year.

The appeal comes after NLRB Region 7 in Detroit, last month, refused to prosecute IUOE Local 324 for the inadequate responses, even though the Region had issued its second amended complaint just a month earlier stating that the union officials’ responses violated London’s and Nevins’ rights.

The rationales given for this reversal included Acting General Counsel Peter Ohr’s rescission of a memo from former NLRB General Counsel Peter Robb. That memo urged NLRB Regional Directors to prosecute unions who didn’t communicate with workers who missed union-imposed “window periods” in their attempts to stop dues deductions. NLRB Region 7 also magically cited “newly submitted evidence” that supposedly obviated London’s and Nevins’ assertions about the insufficiency of the union’s response.

The appeal argues that Ohr’s withdrawal of Robb’s memo is completely irrelevant to the case because Robb’s old memo “only required unions to actually communicate with employees regarding untimely revocation requests,” and London’s and Nevins’ requests were timely.

It also contends that NLRB Region 7 was wholly unspecific when referring to the “newly submitted evidence” from the union. Although this “evidence” presumably was the “two checks with no explanation or cover letter,” the appeal says, that does not “change the fact that Local 324 failed to accept Mr. London’s and Mr. Nevins’ revocations.”

London’s and Nevins’ appeal coincides with Michigan Rieth-Riley workers’ continued effort to safeguard their right to vote IUOE bosses out of their workplace. In February of this year, the NLRB announced that it would hear Rieth-Riley employee Rayalan Kent’s case that he and his coworkers already-cast ballots should be counted, after NLRB Region 7 officials ordered them destroyed based on unproven union “blocking charges.”

The appeal also was submitted amidst Acting NLRB General Counsel Peter Ohr’s continued attempts to undermine Foundation cases brought for workers who seek to free themselves from coercive union boss control. Just weeks after President Biden fired General Counsel Peter Robb before his Senate-confirmed term was over and installed Ohr, Ohr began dismissing complaints against unions that had forced themselves on Foundation-represented workers via coercive “card check” drives. He also began nixing multiple memoranda issued by Robb which drew on Foundation advice.

“So-called ‘Acting’ General Counsel Peter Ohr will have to make a decision: side with Mr. London and Mr. Nevins against clear violations of their right to refrain from financially supporting union bosses, or add both men to the growing list of rank-and-file workers he has betrayed by letting union officials trample their freedoms,” commented National Right to Work Foundation President Mark Mix. “Union dues deductions should be completely voluntary, not the result of union boss deception. Foundation staff attorneys will continue to fight to ensure that all Rieth-Riley workers know their ‘no means no’ when it comes to dues deductions.”

New Hampshire SEIU bosses seized dues from workers’ paychecks for years despite High Court warning that such seizures would face constitutional scrutiny

Washington, DC (May 3, 2021) – State employees in New Hampshire are petitioning the Supreme Court to hear their case against union officials who forced them to pay union fees as a condition of their employment in violation of the workers’ constitutional rights. The class action lawsuit was brought against the State Employees’ Association of New Hampshire (SEIU Local 1984) by government workers Patrick Doughty and Randy Severance with free legal aid from the National Right to Work Legal Defense Foundation.

The petition asks the High Court to hear the employees’ case seeking the return of union fees seized from Doughty and Severance, as well as countless other New Hampshire public employees who were not members of the union and had not agreed to those payments.

In the Court’s landmark ruling in Janus v. AFSCME, National Right to Work Foundation attorneys successfully argued that forcing public sector employees to pay dues to a union they did not support was a violation of their First Amendment rights to free speech and free association.

The Supreme Court’s ruling in Janus made it clear that public employees must affirmatively consent to union dues payments and knowingly waive their constitutional right not to pay. The Court also stated in its opinion that union officials had been on notice since the Foundation-won Knox v. SEIU case in 2012 that forced union dues in the public sector were likely a violation of the First Amendment.

Foundation attorneys argue that longstanding precedent allows victims of First Amendment violations to sue for damages. Because the court affirmed in Janus that forced dues violate public employees’ constitutional rights, they are entitled to sue for damages.

The workers’ lawyers ask the High Court to overturn lower court rulings that excuse union bosses’ past dues seizures and reject workers’ refund claims. As the petition argues, “if lower courts can manipulate constitutional claims to achieve what they feel is the best policy, many victims of civil rights abuses will be left remediless.”

If the Court decides to hear the New Hampshire workers’ case and rules in their favor, they could receive dues that were taken as far back as three years before their complaint was filed, as permitted by New Hampshire’s statute of limitations.

“Union bosses violated the rights of workers in New Hampshire and across the country for decades and now they must return a few years of those ill-gotten gains,” said National Right to Work Legal Defense Foundation President Mark Mix. “The Court should grant Doughty and Severance’s petition and make it clear that union bosses cannot simply pocket the proceeds of their unconstitutional forced dues scheme.”

“This case was only necessary because New Hampshire lacks a Right to Work law that ensures union membership and financial support are voluntary, not coerced,” added Mix. “Had union dues been voluntary during the period covered in the lawsuit, union officials could not have seized forced fees from unwilling workers to begin with.”

Union officials tried to mask forced fees outlawed by Janus Supreme Court decision as “agreement administration fees”

Cincinnati, OH (April 30, 2021) – City of Hamilton employee Timothy Crane has successfully defended his First Amendment right to refrain from funding the International Union of Operating Engineers (IUOE) Local 20 hierarchy in his workplace.

Crane, who is not a union member, filed a lawsuit in December 2020 with free legal aid from National Right to Work Legal Defense Foundation staff attorneys that challenged so-called “agreement administration fees” that IUOE officials forced him to pay as a condition of keeping his job. Legal documents now confirm that IUOE bosses have backed down from enforcing the deceptive dues scheme and have also refunded to Crane all dues that they seized from him under it.

Crane’s lawsuit maintained that the “agreement administration fee” requirement violated his rights under the Foundation-argued 2018 Janus v. AFSCME Supreme Court decision. In Janus, the High Court ruled that no public worker can be coerced into paying union dues or fees as a condition of getting or keeping a job. The Court also held that union dues or fees can only be deducted from a public employee’s paycheck if that employee clearly and affirmatively waives his or her constitutional right not to pay. Justice Alito wrote for the Court majority that “such a waiver cannot be presumed” by union or state officials.

According to Crane’s lawsuit, he sent letters to IUOE union officials in both August and September of last year attempting to exercise his First Amendment Janus right to end dues deductions from his paycheck. After sending these two letters, he discovered that an “agreement administration fee” was being taken from his pay by the City at the behest of IUOE union bosses.

The complaint contended that that this fee was just a so-called “agency fee” – a forced union payment charged to employees who refrain from formal union membership that was definitively outlawed by the Janus v. AFSCME decision – masquerading under a different name.

With this victory, Crane’s suit is now the fifth resolved favorably by Foundation staff attorneys for Buckeye State employees who have sought to defend their First Amendment Janus rights from union boss wrongdoing. This includes the July 2020 settlement in the Allen v. AFSCME case, in which nearly 30,000 Ohio public employees were freed from an “escape period” scheme imposed by Ohio Civil Service Employees Association (OCSEA) union chiefs, which limited to just a handful of days every few years the time in which a public employee could exercise his or her Janus rights.

“Once again, a Foundation-backed Ohio public employee has prevailed over a duplicitous attempt by union officials to keep worker money flowing illegally into their pockets while trampling workers’ First Amendment rights,” observed National Right to Work Foundation President Mark Mix. “Any Ohio public workers who are subjected to similar arrangements, or are coerced or intimidated by union bosses in any other way into funding a union agenda against their will should contact the Foundation for free assistance in defending their First Amendment Janus rights.”

Notice given after workers submitted majority-backed petition urging employer to drop union, details right to rebuff likely illegal union strike demands

Philadelphia, PA (April 29, 2021) – National Right to Work Legal Defense Foundation staff attorneys have issued a special legal notice to drivers, packers, warehouse staff, and other employees at J. Ambrogi Food Distribution (JAF) in West Deptford, New Jersey, affected by an impending strike that may be ordered by Teamsters Local 929 union officials.

The legal notice informs rank-and-file JAF workers of their rights to refuse to abandon their jobs and keep working to support their families despite the union-ordered strike. The notice discusses why workers across the country frequently turn to the National Right to Work Foundation for free legal aid in such situations.

The notice comes after JAF management filed a federal lawsuit against the Teamsters Local 929 union. The lawsuit maintains that the threatened strike order is illegal because the current contract brokered between JAF and union officials prohibits such “work stoppages.” Reports indicate that Teamsters officials have already engaged in aggressive tactics to prevent workers from doing their jobs, including blocking facility entrances and physically preventing individual drivers from unloading cargo, according to that lawsuit.

“This situation raises serious concerns for employees who believe there is much to lose from a union boss-ordered strike,” the notice reads. “Employees have the legal right to rebuff union officials’ strike demands, but it is important for them to be fully informed before they do so.”

The full notice is available at https://www.nrtw.org/ambrogi-legal-notice/.

The strike threat also follows JAF management’s announcement in February that it would withdraw recognition of the Teamsters union in one bargaining unit, after rank-and-file employees submitted a majority-supported petition asking the company do so once the current monopoly bargaining contract expires. A Foundation-won 2019 decision before the National Labor Relations Board (NLRB) called Johnson Controls permits the process by which employees can petition their employer to end recognition of an unpopular union after the expiration of a contract.

The legal notice outlines the process that JAF employees should follow if they want to exercise their right to return to work during the strike and avoid punishment by union bosses, complete with sample union membership resignation letters.

Further, the notice encourages employees to seek free legal aid from the Foundation if they experience union resistance as they attempt to exercise any of these rights.

“Rather than accept that a majority of employees want nothing to do with their so-called ‘representation,’ Teamsters union bosses are attempting to bully workers into complying with the union’s self-serving strike,” commented National Right to Work Legal Defense Foundation President Mark Mix. “With reports of union agents using dishonest and intimidating tactics to coerce workers into abandoning their jobs, rank-and-file JAF employees should immediately contact the Foundation for free legal aid in defending their rights against this coercive Teamsters boss campaign.”

Employee asserts that NJ law’s tiny “escape period” to stop dues deductions violates rights under Janus Supreme Court decision

Trenton, NJ (April 28, 2021) – With free legal aid from the National Right to Work Legal Defense Foundation, Heather Anderson, an employee of the New Jersey Attorney General’s office, is suing the International Brotherhood of Electrical Workers (IBEW) Local 33 union and the State of New Jersey for illegally restricting her and her coworkers’ First Amendment right to stop union dues deductions from their paychecks.

The class-action civil rights lawsuit was filed today in the United States District Court for the District of New Jersey and challenges a New Jersey law that forbids workers from ending financial support for the union except during a tiny 10-day “escape period” once per year. Anderson’s suit says the state-enforced restriction, which union officials endorsed in their contract with the state, violates her and her coworkers’ rights under the Foundation-won 2018 Janus v. AFSCME U.S. Supreme Court decision.

In Janus, the High Court ruled that no public employee can be forced to pay union dues or fees as a condition of getting or keeping a job. The Court also held that union dues or fees can only be deducted from a public employee’s paycheck if that employee clearly and affirmatively waives their right not to pay. Justice Alito wrote for the Court majority that “such a waiver cannot be presumed” by union or state officials.

Anderson is challenging New Jersey’s so-called “Workplace Democracy Act” (WDEA), which mandates 10-day “escape periods.” The WDEA was passed only months before the Supreme Court handed down its ruling in Janus, seemingly in a preemptive attempt by union-allied legislators to limit any rights the Court recognized in Janus to cut off union financial support.

According to her lawsuit, Anderson exercised her Janus rights in February of this year when she informed IBEW union bosses that she wished to terminate dues payments. New Jersey officials rebuffed her request, claiming it could only be accepted if she submitted it within an “escape period” that would not begin until August, and that the state would continue to seize dues from her paycheck until that time. The “escape period” was not mentioned in any dues checkoff authorization card she signed, according to her lawsuit.

Anderson’s lawsuit asks the federal District Court to declare the WDEA’s “escape period” scheme unconstitutional, and seeks refunds of all dues seized from her paycheck in violation of Janus after she invoked her rights.

Across the country, Foundation staff attorneys are currently representing public servants in more than a dozen cases where union officials have tried to confine their First Amendment Janus rights to an “escape period,” and have favorably settled 8 such cases. The pending cases include that of New Jersey public school teachers Susan Fischer and Jeanette Speck, who were trapped in a similar arrangement by New Jersey Education Association (NJEA) union officials.

“The ruling in the Janus decision was crystal clear: public servants have a First Amendment right to refuse to associate with union bosses whose so-called ‘representation’ they oppose,” commented National Right to Work Foundation President Mark Mix. “It is blatantly unconstitutional that the WDEA prevents public workers from exercising their constitutional right for more than 97 percent of the year.”

Union officials threatened workers with loss of access to employer-sponsored healthcare if they did not retroactively “authorize” illegally seized union dues

San Juan, PR (April 28, 2021) – Employees at the University of Puerto Rico (UPR) have received health insurance cards that were being withheld from them by union officials as retaliation for their refusal to sign union dues forms. Union officials and the university faced pressure to restore the dissenting employees’ healthcare coverage from a legal motion filed by National Right to Work Legal Defense Foundation staff attorneys.

Jose Ramos and Orlando Mendez filed a class-action suit in May 2020 against the University and the University of Puerto and its Workers Union for infringing on employees’ rights as recognized in the 2018 Foundation-won Janus v. AFSCME Supreme Court decision. In Janus the High Court ruled that public employees cannot be required to pay union dues as a condition of their employment, and that union fees can only be taken from public employees if they affirmatively waive the right not to pay.

Ramos and Mendez never authorized union dues deductions and never signed membership forms, yet union officials continued to collect dues from their paychecks. In an attempt to make their years of unauthorized dues deductions legal, union officials demanded workers sign a document retroactively approving all previously deducted dues and consenting to an unspecified number of future deductions. Union officials said the workers would lose access to their healthcare plan if they did not comply.

Ramos and Mendez refused to sign the form, and union officials withheld the employee’s permanent insurance cards, forcing them to rely on temporary insurance certifications. The temporary certifications weren’t received consistently, and there were gaps when the workers were left uninsured. Foundation attorneys filed a motion for a preliminary injunction to immediately restore full access to the employees’ healthcare plan.

Union bosses finally backed down, and the plaintiffs received their permanent insurance cards, restoring access to on-the-job benefits the union threatened in an attempt to coerce workers into approving years of past illegal dues deductions.

The workers’ class action suit against the union and the university for the unlawful dues deductions will continue. The employees seek an order forbidding further enforcement of the unconstitutional dues deductions from nonconsenting employees, and a refund of the dues that were illegally seized “within the…15-year statute of limitations period for breach of contract.”

“Union bosses used their control over employees’ healthcare to try and cover their tracks after illegally seizing dues for years,” said National Right to Work Legal Defense Foundation President Mark Mix. “Instead of seeking workers’ voluntary support, union bosses threatened their healthcare hoping they would cave.”

“While we’re thankful these workers are no longer being illegally denied access to their healthcare plan, their Foundation staff attorneys will pursue the lawsuit until these workers’ First Amendment rights are fully vindicated,” added Mix.