Labor law

by Jeremy Leaming

Rep. Darrell Issa (R-Calif.) has moved ahead with his effort to force the National Labor Relations Board (NLRB) to release even more documents regarding its case charging Boeing with violating federal labor law. Yesterday, the House Oversight and Government Reform Committee, chaired by Issa, issued a sweeping subpoena for all documents related to the Boeing case, which is now before an administrative law judge.

Since lodging its complaint that Boeing moved production of its Dreamliner jet from its plant in Washington State to South Carolina in retaliation against workers in Washington for conducting strikes, the NLRB has come under withering attacks from lawmakers in Congress and right-wing activists. Some have suggested stripping the agency of its funding, or shuttering it, while others have pushed legislation to gut the agency’s ability to uphold provisions of the National Labor Relations Act (NLRA).

Responding to the Committee’s action, Acting NLRB General Counsel Lafe Solomon said in a press statement, “To the best of my knowledge, this is the first time since 1940 that the National Labor Relations board has been the subject of a Congressional subpoena. I am disappointed and surprised by this development. For months, my staff and I have diligently tried to satisfy the Committee’s desire for information while also preserving the integrity of our process and the rights of the parties in a case being actively litigated.”

The NLRB has also already released reams of material relating to the case, including posting its complaint against Boeing, along with other material, on its website.

Issa (pictured), perhaps not surprisingly, was not moved by a recent letter from more than 30 legal and labor policy experts, urging the Committee to refrain from interfering with the case.

“In our view,” the experts’ letter states in part, “independent federal law enforcers must be protected from undue interference by Congress. If the Committee continues to inappropriately interfere with this process, these serious charges of illegal behavior may never be properly adjudicated, thereby denying both parties the opportunity to tell their full story. Such a result would jeopardize our long held democratic principles and respect for the rule of law.”

Earlier this summer, ACS hosted a teleconference briefing on the Boeing case. The call featured law professors James J. Brudney and Catherine Fisk, both of whom signed the letter submitted to Issa. Audio of the call is available here.  

ACS Executive Director Caroline Fredrickson has also spoken out on the lawmakers’ actions surrounding the Boeing case. Fredrickson told Free Speech Radio News, “You’ve got a group of Republicans on the Hill who are trying to intimidate the National Labor Relations Board to make the decision based on what they want rather than doing the job they were appointed to do, which is to weigh the facts, look at the law, and figure out who is right in the particular case.”

Democratic House members blasted Issa’s subpoena of the NLRB, warning that it appears to be part of a campaign to influence the legal proceeding against Boeing.  

Rep. George Miller (D-Calif.), said the subpoena “threatens the integrity of an ongoing trial and the constitutional due process rights of the private parties involved in that trial. It ignores pleas from members of Congress and legal experts to be mindful of the line between proper oversight of an agency and improper interference with its proceedings. It is issued in the midst of troubling Republican attacks on the National Labor Relations Board and the workers’ rights that it enforces.”

Rep. Dennis Kucinich (D-Ohio), a ranking member on the Oversight Committee, in a press release called Issa’s subpoena “part of a pattern to attack the due process rights of union employees for the obvious benefit of a private party – Boeing. It is unacceptable that workers’ right to legal recourse would be subverted by a Congressional action.”

by Jeremy Leaming

A group of law professors and labor experts are bringing more attention to the ongoing efforts of House Republicans, and right-wing activists, to hobble the National Labor Relations Board (NLRB) and scuttle its complaint that Boeing violated a provision of the National Labor Relations Act (NLRA). The NLRB says Boeing violated federal law when it moved production of its 787 Dreamliner jet from its Washington State plant to South Carolina in retaliation against workers who had exercised their right to strike.

As noted here, lawmakers in the House have also pushed a bill that would gut the NLRB’s ability to hold corporations accountable for trampling workers’ rights, and specifically nullify the complaint lodged against Boeing. That complaint is now being considered by an administrative law judge in Seattle. The judge tossed aside Boeing’s motion to dismiss the case in June.

Rep. Darrell Issa (R-Calif.), chair of the House Oversight and Government Reform Committee, has also pressured the NLRB over its legal action against Boeing. The Hill reported last month on a letter Rep. Issa sent to NLRB Acting General Counsel Lafe Solomon requesting documents related to the case.

Recently more than 30 legal and labor policy experts in a letter to Issa urged him to back off.

“As national legal and labor policy experts, we are gravely concerned by the undue pressure that this letter, and its threats to compel disclosure of privileged documents, have placed on an independent law enforcement agency.

“We are particularly concerned,” the professors’ letter continues, “because the documents at issue relate to a case currently being tried before an Administrative Law Judge in Seattle, Washington. We therefore strongly urge the Committee to let this case proceed according to the policies established in the National Labor Relations Act without further interference.”  

The letter concludes, “In our view, independent federal law enforcers must be protected from undue interference by Congress. If the Committee continues to inappropriately interfere in this process, these serious charges of illegal behavior may never be properly adjudicated, thereby denying both parties the opportunity to tell their full story. Such a result would jeopardize our long-held democratic principles and respect for the rule of law.

Law professors Ellen Dannin and Ann C. Hodges, who joined the letter, have provided ACSblog with guest posts about the political interference with the NLRB’s complaint against Boeing. In her post, Hodges explains why the NLRB’s complaint “does not justify Congressional intervention in the legal process of an ongoing case, an appalling overreach by a coordinate branch of government.”

Dannin, in her post, says NLRB has been transparent about the case – posting its complaint on its website and “memoranda summarizing the facts of the case and information about the investigation and trial procedure. Despite this, Congressional representatives are demanding administrative capital punishment for the NLRB’s ‘crime’ of doing its job.”