Angie Cowan Hamada v. Laborforce, LLC, 25-3110 (7th Circuit)
A divided appeals panel refused to order a trucking employer to reinstate union recognition while unfair labor practice proceedings continue, finding that federal labor officials failed to show the kind of irreparable harm needed for emergency relief.
The dispute arose after employees at a Summit, Illinois truck dealership operated by Laborforce, LLC circulated petitions to decertify their longtime union. When the first petition fell short of a majority, the company withdrew recognition anyway for its Parts Department workers and improved their pay and benefits. A second petition later secured majority support from both the Parts and Service Departments combined, and the company withdrew recognition entirely. The union filed unfair labor practice charges, and while those charges were still working through the Board's internal process, the regional director asked a federal district court for a preliminary injunction under Section 10(j) of the NLRA to force the company to resume bargaining and undo the unilateral changes.
The court held that such injunctions are an extraordinary remedy that courts should grant only on a genuine showing of irreparable harm, not something the Board is entitled to as a matter of course. Citing Starbucks Corp. v. McKinney, the majority explained that the mere existence of a plausible unfair labor practice claim does not create a presumption of irreparable harm. The director had pointed only to generalized harms common to many labor disputes, such as diminished union support and lost bargaining benefits, without identifying anything specific to this case. The panel also noted that the workers' right under the NLRA to refrain from union activity cut against ordering relief, especially since employees had received real wage and benefit improvements after leaving the union. The court further found the director's delay of many months before seeking court intervention undercut any claim of urgency, given that the underlying administrative case was already fully briefed before the Board.
The majority also flagged, without deciding the underlying merits, that the district court had wrongly believed it lacked jurisdiction to assess the scope of the bargaining unit when weighing the union's likelihood of success.
In dissent, one judge argued the majority departed from the circuit's longstanding approach to Section 10(j) harm analysis, which has traditionally focused on injury to the union's organizing efforts rather than to individual employees' pay. The dissent contended that allowing an employer to defeat an injunction by raising wages after allegedly unlawful conduct rewards the exact strategy the Supreme Court condemned in Medo Photo Supply Corp. v. NLRB, and that the majority's new "extraordinary circumstances" gloss on the irreparable harm standard has no basis in the statute or in Starbucks.
Significant Cases Cited
Starbucks Corp. v. McKinney, 602 U.S. 339 (2024): Held that the Board's regional director must satisfy the traditional four-factor preliminary injunction test for Section 10(j) relief, with no presumption of irreparable harm from a likely unfair labor practice finding.
Medo Photo Supply Corp. v. NLRB, 321 U.S. 678 (1944): Held that an employer cannot justify refusing to bargain with a union by pointing to defections it induced through unlawful wage increases.
NLRB v. Gissel Packing Co., 395 U.S. 575 (1969): Addressed an employer's duty to recognize a union based on authorization cards and discussed the limited, temporary nature of bargaining orders.
Kerwin v. Trinity Health Grand Haven Hospital, 174 F.4th 942 (6th Cir. 2026): Held that after Starbucks, courts may not artificially lighten the director's burden to show specific irreparable harm in Section 10(j) cases.
Franks Bros. Co. v. NLRB, 321 U.S. 702 (1944): Held that a bargaining order does not permanently fix a bargaining relationship and works no injustice on employees who may later seek a different representative.
Nexstar Media Corporation D/B/a NewsNation, 375 NLRB No. 40, 05-CA-367812 (Published Board Decision)
The Board granted summary judgment against Nexstar Media Corporation, which operates NewsNation, finding that the company unlawfully refused to bargain with IBEW Local 1200 after the union's certification as the exclusive bargaining representative of a unit of technical employees, including audio operators, photographers, videographers, and engineers at the company's Washington, D.C. facility.
Nexstar had admitted refusing to bargain but argued it had no duty to do so because the underlying certification was invalid. The company raised several objections, including that the Regional Director improperly overruled its election objections without a hearing, that the Board's decision in Amazon.com Services LLC barred it from holding captive audience meetings in violation of Section 8(c) and the First Amendment, and that the investigation into alleged supervisor taint was incomplete. The Board found that all of these representation issues had already been litigated, or could have been litigated, in the prior representation case, and that Nexstar offered no newly discovered evidence or special circumstances justifying reconsideration. It therefore treated the objections as foreclosed under settled precedent governing test-of-certification cases.
The Board also rejected constitutional arguments raised by Nexstar. It found no merit in the claim that adjudicating the case without a jury trial violates the Seventh Amendment, citing longstanding Supreme Court precedent upholding the Board's authority to adjudicate public rights created by the NLRA. It likewise rejected the argument that removal protections for Board members and administrative law judges violate Article II, noting Nexstar had not shown it suffered any actual harm from those protections.
Having found the refusal to bargain unlawful under Section 8(a)(5) and (1), the Board ordered Nexstar to bargain with the union on request, post a remedial notice, and, if an agreement is reached, sign it. It also ordered that the certification year run from the date bargaining actually begins in good faith. Member Prouty wrote separately to reiterate his view, previously expressed in dissent, that broader remedies, including make-whole relief for bargaining delay, union access, a bargaining schedule, and notice-reading requirements, should apply in test-of-certification cases.
Significant Cases Cited
NLRB v. Jones & Laughlin Steel Corp., 301 U.S. 1 (1937): Held that NLRA adjudication does not implicate the Seventh Amendment right to a jury trial.
Atlas Roofing Co. v. OSHRC, 430 U.S. 442 (1977): Reaffirmed that Congress may assign adjudication of public rights to an administrative agency without violating the Seventh Amendment.
Pittsburgh Plate Glass Co. v. NLRB, 313 U.S. 146 (1941): Held that representation issues already litigated, or that could have been litigated, in a prior representation proceeding cannot be relitigated in a subsequent unfair labor practice case absent new evidence.
Collins v. Yellen, 594 U.S. 220 (2021): Held that a party challenging an agency official's removal protections must show actual harm resulting from those protections to obtain relief.
Mar-Jac Poultry Co., 136 NLRB 785 (1962): Established that the certification year begins running only once an employer actually begins bargaining in good faith, where the employer had unlawfully refused to bargain.
National Nordic Museum, 19-UC-390170 (Regional Election Decision)
A regional director has ruled that two disputed job positions at the National Nordic Museum in Seattle, a Facilities Supervisor and a Guest Services Manager, should be included in a bargaining unit represented by Communications Workers of America, Local 7800, after finding that the museum failed to prove either position was supervisory.
The dispute traced back to a neutrality agreement the museum and union signed when the union sought voluntary recognition. Most job titles were placed on an agreed list, but the two positions at issue were set aside on a separate list as disputed, with both sides reserving the right to bring the question to the Board. After a card check led to recognition and the parties began contract bargaining without resolving the two positions, the union filed a unit clarification petition. The museum argued that placing the jobs on the disputed list had already resolved the matter and that the union had waived its right to seek clarification by bargaining and by withdrawing an earlier petition, but the regional director rejected both arguments, finding the agreement itself preserved Board review and that ongoing bargaining without a finalized contract did not waive the union's right to seek clarification.
On the merits, the museum bore the burden of showing the two positions met the supervisory test under Section 2(11) of the NLRA, which turns on whether an employee can hire, discipline, assign, or responsibly direct others using independent judgment. For the Guest Services Manager, the evidence showed the incumbent sat in on hiring interviews but did not make independent hiring decisions, made only minor day-to-day task assignments based on availability, was not held accountable for coworkers' performance, and occasionally served as the highest-ranking employee on Saturdays without exercising any supervisory authority during those shifts. Employee evaluations she conducted also did not affect wages or job status. For the Facilities Supervisor, the museum relied mainly on a written job description describing supervisory duties, but testimony from its own HR director confirmed the position did not actually perform those functions in practice, with the Director of Operations and Facilities handling that direction instead. Because paper job descriptions carry little weight without evidence of actual supervisory practice, the regional director found the museum had not met its burden for either position and ordered the bargaining unit clarified to include both.
Significant Cases Cited
Oakwood Healthcare, Inc., 348 NLRB 686 (2006): Establishes the framework for determining supervisory status, including definitions of independent judgment, assignment, and responsible direction under Section 2(11).
NLRB v. Kentucky River Community Care, Inc., 532 U.S. 706 (2001): Holds that possessing any one of the enumerated supervisory authorities exercised with independent judgment is sufficient to confer supervisory status.
Croft Metals, Inc., 348 NLRB 717 (2006): Confirms that the party asserting supervisory status bears the burden of proving it.
Ryder Truck Rentals, Inc., 326 NLRB 1386 (1998): Holds that participation in interviews alongside a higher-level official who also makes hiring decisions does not establish authority to effectively recommend hiring.
Aladdin Hotel, 270 NLRB 838 (1984): Sets the test for supervisory status based on substitution, requiring that the substitution be regular, substantial, and involve actual exercise of supervisory authority.
DHC SD Holdings LLC, as Operator of Paradise Point Resort & Spa, 21-RC-367465 (Regional Election Decision)
A Regional Director has ordered an election for a proposed bargaining unit limited to banquet department workers at Paradise Point Resort & Spa in San Diego, rejecting the hotel operator's bid to fold in more than one hundred additional employees from other departments.
UNITE HERE Local 30 petitioned to represent banquet servers, banquet bartenders, banquet captains, banquet housepersons, and lead banquet housepersons. The hotel, operated by DHC SD Holdings LLC, argued the unit needed to include a much broader range of classifications, including outlet restaurant staff, cooks, stewards, front desk agents, housekeeping, laundry, maintenance, and recreation employees, contending the smaller unit was inappropriate given the hotel's integrated operations.
Applying the Board's standard from American Steel Construction, the regional director found the petitioned-for banquet employees were readily identifiable as a group, sharing internal community of interest, and sufficiently distinct from the excluded classifications. The decision emphasized that the Banquet Department has its own manager, operates on an event-driven schedule distinct from the hotel's other departments, and derives much of its income from a service charge rather than tips, unlike most other hotel employees. The director found little evidence of regular interchange, frequent contact, or functional integration between banquet employees and the broader hotel workforce the employer sought to add.
The decision also rejected the employer's reliance on older hotel industry cases finding broader "wall-to-wall" units appropriate, distinguishing those cases on their facts and noting that Board law does not impose any fixed unit-scope standard for the hotel industry. Because the employer failed to show an "overwhelming community of interest" between the petitioned-for banquet employees and the excluded classifications, the director directed an election in the narrower unit as proposed by the union.
Significant Cases Cited
American Steel Constr., Inc., 372 NLRB No. 23 (2022): Set the current standard for evaluating petitioned-for "subdivision" units, requiring internal community of interest, ready identifiability, and sufficient distinctness, with an "overwhelming community of interest" showing needed to force inclusion of additional employees.
Specialty Healthcare & Rehabilitation Ctr. of Mobile, 357 NLRB 934 (2011): Established the community-of-interest framework that American Steel reinstated after it had been overruled.
PCC Structurals, Inc., 365 NLRB 1696 (2017): The prior standard, overruled by American Steel, that had made it easier for employers to expand petitioned-for units.
Atlanta Hilton & Towers, 273 NLRB 87 (1984): Found a broader unit appropriate at a hotel built specifically for convention business with a high degree of operational integration, distinguished here because that level of integration was absent.
Ramada Beverly Hills, 278 NLRB 691 (1986): Found a broader unit appropriate where employees frequently interchanged across job classifications and shared common supervision, distinguished here because no such interchange or shared supervision existed.
CPC Retail Products, LLC, 16-RC-393156 (Regional Election Decision)
A regional director for the NLRB dismissed a petition seeking to represent route drivers at a freight company's Tyler, Texas lot, finding that the company's planned closure of the location made holding an election pointless.
The International Brotherhood of Teamsters, Local 745, had petitioned to represent about 11 full-time and part-time route drivers employed by CPC Retail Products, LLC at its Tyler facility. The company failed to timely serve its statement of position on the union, which under Board rules ordinarily bars a party from raising unaddressed issues at hearing. Even so, the regional director held a hearing to gather evidence on the company's claim that it intended to permanently lay off all drivers at the location, reasoning that such evidence could not simply be disregarded.
The evidence showed that before the petition was filed, the company and its client, Procter & Gamble, had already decided to reroute freight lanes that would eliminate the need for the Tyler location. In the weeks that followed, the company took concrete steps toward the change: testing a new drop lot in Texarkana, Arkansas, securing a lot in Memphis and hiring drivers there, and ultimately notifying Tyler employees by email that the lot would close around September 15, about three weeks after the hearing.
Applying Board precedent, the regional director explained that a petition may be dismissed, even where a question of representation exists, when an employer's cessation of operations is both imminent and definite. Citing cases such as Hughes Aircraft Co. and Davey McKee Corp., the decision noted that closures expected within three to four months of the hearing, paired with concrete steps like securing new facilities and notifying employees, typically satisfy that standard. The director found no evidence, unlike in American Bottling Co. v. NLRB, that the company had a history of announcing and then delaying layoffs, which supported treating its plans as genuine.
The decision declined to address the union's argument that the company's actions were motivated by its organizing campaign, noting that such a claim belongs in an unfair labor practice proceeding rather than this representation case. The petition was dismissed without prejudice, meaning the union may move to reinstate it if the company does not actually close the Tyler location as planned.
Significant Cases Cited
Hughes Aircraft Co., 308 NLRB 82 (1992): An employer's execution of letters of intent with subcontractors and notice of layoffs to employees established that a cessation of operations was both definite and imminent, warranting dismissal of an election petition.
Davey McKee Corp., 308 NLRB 839 (1992): No useful purpose is served by directing an election where an employer's operations are scheduled to terminate within three to four months.
Am. Bottling Co. v. NLRB, 992 F.3d 1129 (D.C. Cir. 2021): An employer failed to prove cessation was imminent and definite because it had a history of announcing layoff dates and then significantly delaying them.
Martin Marietta Aluminum, 214 NLRB 646 (1974): A petition was properly dismissed where the employer had already begun closing the plant and laying off employees before the petition was filed, with definite plans to continue.
Norfolk Maintenance Corp., 310 NLRB 527 (1993): An election was ordered where the employer was not expected to cease operations in the petitioned-for unit for at least seven months after the decision issued.
Inland Waters Pollution Control, Inc., 07-CA-277239 (Unpublished Board Decision)
The Board denied the employer's motion for reconsideration of its earlier decision, finding that the company had not identified any material error or shown the extraordinary circumstances required under the Board's rules to revisit the ruling.
In the underlying case, the Board had reversed an administrative law judge's finding that the employer's statements at the bargaining table violated the NLRA, but it upheld the judge's separate finding that employee Shinar Reed was unlawfully discharged. Because the Board's finding of unlawful discharge did not rely on the bargaining-table statements as evidence of anti-union animus, the Board rejected the employer's argument that reversing the bargaining-table violation required it to redo its motive analysis under Wright Line. The Board explained that the remaining evidence cited by the judge was sufficient on its own to support a finding that the discharge was unlawfully motivated, and that the employer's objection amounted to disagreement with how the evidence was weighed rather than identification of an actual error.
Member Prouty wrote separately to note he would have upheld the finding that the bargaining-table statements were unlawful and would have counted them as further evidence of animus, but he agreed the majority's reversal on that point did not require a fresh motive analysis of the discharge.
The order also addressed the employer's challenge to the remedies imposed, which followed the Board's approach in Thryv, Inc. Chairman Murphy and Member Mayer noted they had not yet taken a position on whether the compensatory remedies approved in Thryv are permissible under the NLRA, but said they would apply Thryv in this case for institutional consistency, as explained in Leo Marine Services. They found the employer's arguments against reconsidering Thryv did not meet the extraordinary-circumstances standard. Member Prouty reiterated his view that Thryv was correctly decided and remains within the Board's authority to ensure meaningful make-whole relief.
Significant Cases Cited
Wright Line, 251 NLRB 1083 (1980): Established the Board's framework for analyzing whether an employer's adverse action against an employee was motivated by unlawful anti-union animus.
Thryv, Inc., 372 NLRB No. 22 (2022): Expanded the Board's standard remedy to include compensation for all direct or foreseeable financial harms resulting from an unfair labor practice, not just traditional backpay.
Leo Marine Services, 375 NLRB No. 35 (2026): Explained the Board's rationale for continuing to apply the Thryv remedial framework for institutional consistency pending further review.
unWired Broadband, Inc., 32-RC-363784 (Unpublished Board Decision)
The Board denied an employer's request for review of a Regional Director's decision overruling its election objections and certifying a union as the employees' bargaining representative, finding the challenge raised no substantial issues.
The employer had objected to the election on grounds that union pickets engaged in misconduct and that union agents made threatening statements to company supervisors in a private conversation. The Board agreed with the Regional Director that neither objection warranted setting aside the election. On the picketing objection, the Board found the employer never claimed in its offer of proof that any of the alleged picket line misconduct was communicated to eligible voters, and concluded the conduct would not have justified overturning the results even if it had reached a decisive number of voters. The Board also noted that the Regional Director had mistakenly said the picketing occurred two weeks before the election rather than one week, but found this error did not change the outcome.
As for the claimed threats by union agents toward supervisors, the Board found the employer offered no evidence that any misconduct occurred, since the statements were not directed at eligible voters and were not shown to relate to any conduct toward them. Even evaluated under the standard for assessing objectionable conduct, the Board found nothing in the alleged statements severe or calculated enough to coerce voters, since they appeared to concern circumstances specific to the supervisors involved. The employer also failed to show the statements were disseminated to or known by eligible voters. The Board further pointed to the lopsided 10-1 vote margin in favor of the union as additional reason the alleged misconduct could not have affected the outcome absent evidence that voters were aware of it.
The Board separately denied a request by counsel for the General Counsel seeking to have the employer's request for review denied or held in abeyance, finding the request was filed after the deadline for opposing a request for review and that the General Counsel, not being a party to the case, had no basis for relief.
Significant Cases Cited
Taylor Wharton Division, 336 NLRB 157 (2001): Sets out the factors used to evaluate whether picket line conduct is severe enough to warrant setting aside an election.
Avis Rent-a-Car, 280 NLRB 580 (1986): Holds that where an election was not close and there is no evidence voters knew of or were affected by alleged misconduct, objections to the election should be overruled.
Crown Bolt, Inc., 343 NLRB 776 (2004): Holds that when dissemination of coercive statements must be shown, the objecting party bears the burden of proving dissemination and its impact on the election.
Patient Care, 360 NLRB 637 (2014): Addressed Board agent misconduct in the conduct of an election, a circumstance the Board found not present in this case.