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When the National Labor Relations Board’s Acting General Counsel William Cowen issued GC Memorandum 25-09 in early August 2025, he signaled a strategic shift in case handling—prioritize arbitration when possible, and reduce NLRB workload. The new directive encourages deferring unfair labor practice (ULP) charges when a grievance process exists, reshaping the agency’s enforcement posture. Cowen’s

In a recent decision, the Sixth Circuit ruled that a pension fund’s actuary must re-evaluate a Michigan paving firm’s withdrawal liability, rejecting the use of artificially low interest assumptions tied to policy goals rather than actuarial reality. Case Overview & Ruling The case centered on Ace-Saginaw Paving Co.’s partial exit from the Operating Engineers Local

A federal judge in Pennsylvania has tossed age bias and retaliation claims brought by a long-serving Teamsters member, who alleged his union and two film production companies colluded to bar him from a Tom Hanks film project. The ruling hinges on a failure to demonstrate a tangible adverse employment action. Background & Legal Ruling The

In a win for transparency advocates and investigative journalists, the Ninth Circuit Court of Appeals ruled that the U.S. Department of Labor (DOL) must hand over demographic workforce data from federal contractors to a nonprofit newsroom. The court’s decision affirms a lower court’s conclusion that this information is not protected as confidential commercial data and

A recent memo issued by the acting general counsel of the National Labor Relations Board (NLRB), William Cowen, could complicate how “salts”—union members who seek jobs with non-union employers to advocate for unionization—are protected under labor law. The guidance, which instructs regional offices to scrutinize the intent behind salts’ job applications, introduces a new obstacle

In a significant appellate decision, the Ninth Circuit partially revived wage claims brought by four former seasonal workers against United Parcel Service (UPS). The plaintiffs, who were temporarily employed during the busy holiday period, alleged they were not properly compensated during and after their employment. The court’s ruling allows several of their claims to proceed,

In a landmark 2024 ruling, Loper Bright effectively dismantled the doctrine of Chevron deference, which had required courts to uphold reasonable agency interpretations of unclear statutes. Under post-Chevron review, courts must now independently interpret legal questions—even in contexts like agency rulemaking and precedent-adopting decisions. This absent deference places the NLRB under much stricter scrutiny when

In January 2025, President Trump made history by becoming the first president since 1935 to remove an NLRB member—Democrat Gwynne Wilcox—over alleged performance issues, plunging the Board below its three-member quorum threshold. This decision halted hundreds of cases, leaving core labor protections, from unfair labor practice awards to union election rulings, in limbo. The Nominations

On June 25, 2025, NLRB Acting General Counsel William B. Cowen issued GC Memorandum 25‑07, declaring that secretly recording collective bargaining sessions constitutes a per se violation of the National Labor Relations Act (NLRA). Under Section 8(d) of the NLRA, both employers and unions have a statutory duty to bargain in good faith—a duty that Cowen argues is fundamentally undermined by clandestine

In early March, a federal judge in Maryland issued a preliminary injunction precluding Elon Musk‑backed “Department of Government Efficiency” (DOGE) from accessing Social Security Administration (SSA) data—blocking access to wage records, Social Security numbers, and related personal information. Unions Warn of Privacy Risks A coalition of labor unions (AFGE, SEIU, AFSCME) along with the Alliance