Bush's NLRB

Report Points to Unfair and Inconsistent Rulings in Favor of Employers

The Democratic staff led by Rep. George Miller (D-Calif.), ranking Democrat on the House Committee on Education and the Workforce, have produced a 25-page report detailing how the rulings of the National Labor Relations Board (NLRB) have either taken away or "severely restricted" the rights of millions of workers to organize into unions over the past five years.

"President Bush has filled the NLRB with anti-union members who have made it more difficult for workers to organize a labor union," Miller said in a statement releasing the report, Workers' Rights Under Attack by Bush Administration: President Bush's National Labor Relations Board Rolls Back Labor Protections. The NLRB has "used double standards, rationales, and unfair, inconsistent rulings to give employers more power over workers," he said.

The report lists several large groups of workers who have been excluded from the protection of the National Labor Relations Act (NLRA) by ruling that they are not employees.

Examples of hypocrisy and unfairness are highlighted as the NLRB applies double standards to supervisors' anti-union and pro-union conduct. In one such case, when a supervisor campaigned against a union, the NLRB deemed it free speech. When a supervisor campaigned for a union, however, the Bush Board overturned the entire union election.

The Bush Administration continues to undermine an already weak federal labor law, as Democrats fight to "strengthen workers' protections" through the Employee Free Choice Act (H.R. 1696, S. 842). The legislation, which would require employers to recognize a union through a "card-check" process that does not include a formal election, has 216 bipartisan co-sponsors in the House and 43 in the Senate, but the Republican leadership has refused to give the bill a hearing or a vote.

The summary concludes that "millions of workers have lost their right to organize into unions, their basic rights have been trampled, and businesses have essentially been given free rein to make it as difficult as possible for their employees to organize."
Source: USW website