Workers challenge NLRB policies limiting ability to decertify unions

Attorneys from the National Right to Work Legal Defense Foundation are appealing on behalf of Hause. They argue that the merger doctrine violates employee rights and shields established unions from being removed by dissatisfied members.

The Foundation has also represented other workers affected by similar policies. In Wisconsin, fewer than ten First Student employees tried to decertify their union but were blocked after being merged into a multi-company unit covering about 24,000 workers in several states.

In West Virginia, John Reeves, an employee at McDowell County Commission on Aging, is challenging another NLRB policy called the “settlement bar.” This rule allows unions and employers to settle disputes in ways that prevent employees from voting out their union representation. Reeves and his coworkers voted in July 2024 to remove Service Employees International Union (SEIU) officials but are facing obstacles due to a settlement between SEIU leaders and management that could invalidate their ballots.

National Right to Work Foundation Vice President Patrick Semmens commented: “Ms. Hause’s and Mr. Reeves’ cases provide just a sampling of the grand buffet of privileges the NLRB has granted union bosses over the years,” said Semmens. “Union bosses and complicit employers should not be able to cut workers off from exercising their basic right to remove unpopular union bosses, yet that’s exactly what both the ‘merger doctrine’ and ‘settlement bar’ allow.”

Semmens added: “If members of the Trump NLRB are dedicated to defending the rights of all American workers, they will focus not only on countering the extensive damage done to individual worker rights by the Biden Labor Board, but also on digging deeper to undo the web of non-statutory coercive union boss powers that has been created over decades.”