NLRB precedents face judicial review

During the Biden administration, the National Labor Relations Board (NLRB) has issued a series of decisions that remade the field of labor law for all employers, regardless of union status. In a group of precedent-breaking rulings, the Board altered when unions must be recognized, how severance agreements must be written, and even when workers are joint-employees. Each of these judgments overturned decades of precedents, and each of them was certain to be challenged in an appellate court. Those challenges are now being heard.

Cemex

In Cemex Construction Materials Pacific LLC, the Board fundamentally changed the rules on when employers must recognize and bargain with a union. Under Cemex, an employer that receives a demand from a union claiming to have the support of its workers must either recognize the union and begin contract negotiations or file a petition in short order seeking an election to test the union’s claim. Under prior law, employers had no obligation to recognize a union’s demand or seek an election, absent signed authorization cards from 30% of a unit appropriate for bargaining.