Last night President Obama addressed the nation and outlined his long awaited Executive Order to begin the process of immigration reform. His speech emphasized the policy imperative to improve the system, and encourage economic growth consistent with our values respecting and protecting individual rights. The President, anticipating the Republican response, reiterated that it is the

When we left off, numerous business groups had lobbed the first attack at President Barack Obama’s three recess appointments to the National Labor Relations Board (“NLRB”) by adding it to their pending lawsuit challenging the NLRB’s highly controversial “Notice Posting Rule,” set to take effect on April 30, 2012.
Continue Reading The Saga Continues…While the NLRB Fights Back and Gets Hit Once Again, Congress Gets in on the Action

On Friday, January 13, 2012, a number of business groups, including the National Federation of Independent Business, National Right to Work Foundation, Coalition for a Democratic Workplace, lodged the first legal challenge seeking to block President Barack Obama’s January 4, 2012 recess appointments to the National Labor Relations Board (“NLRB”).

Procedurally, the groups bootstrapped their challenge to a lawsuit pending in the U.S. District Court for the District of Columbia challenging the NLRB’s highly controversial “Notice Posting Rule” that would require businesses to post notices and inform employees right to bargain collectively, distribute union literature, and engage in other union activities without reprisal under the National Labor Relations Act (“NLRA”), which is set become effective April 30, 2012.

As we more fully discussed here on January 6th, the NRLB lost its quorum when former Member Craig Becker’s term expired on January 3, 2012. President Obama then appointed Terence Flynn, Sharon Block, and Richard Griffith to the NLRB. The business groups argue in their motion and accompanying legal memorandum that these appointments are “unconstitutional, null and void,” because they were done while the Senate was in session, leaving no “recess” during which time President Obama could make appointments “without seeking or obtaining the advice and consent of the Senate.” As a result, the NLRB, with only two members, lacks the necessary quorum and ultimately “authority to implement or enforce” the Notice Posting Rule pursuant to New Process Steel, L.P. v. NLRB, 130 S.Ct. 2635 (2010).Continue Reading And So It Begins: President Obama’s Recess Appointments Face Their First Attacks

It’s only Wednesday and already this is proving to be a potentially huge week for organized labor. In moves long sought by organized labor and opposed by business groups, the Obama Administration issued two proposed federal regulations this week that could significantly impact union elections.
Continue Reading Obama Administration Issues Two Proposed Regulations Designed to Promote Pro-Union Agenda

On January 29, the Lilly Ledbetter Fair Pay Restoration Act was the first bill signed into law by President Obama. As discussed in prior blog entries, the new law gives a employee or former employee the right to file a charge of discrimination within 180 days (or 300 days in some states, including Ohio) of their most recent paycheck.
Continue Reading Obama Signs First Bill Into Law: The Lilly Ledbetter Fair Pay Act