On April 7, Jennifer Abruzzo, general counsel to the National Relations Labor Board (NLRB), issued a memorandum that she will be asking the NLRB to find that meetings in which employers express their views on union organizing are a violation of the National Labor Relations Act. She believes that the NLRB has incorrectly concluded that an employer does not violate the Act by compelling its employees to attend a meeting during which it makes speeches expressing their opposition to union representation.
Abruzzo’s position goes against both the NLRB and court precedents that have upheld employees’ rights to refrain from listening and employers rights to express opinion without coercion. As the U.S. Chamber states, this will “muzzle employers.” And “if the NLRB adopts (Abruzzo’s) view, one can expect that the courts will have to address the question yet again.”
Mike Ripley is vice president of health care policy & employment law for the Indiana Chamber. He has been with the organization since 2008 and previously was a longtime state legislator in northeast Indiana.
