10 Aug 2026

New NLRB Majority Asked to End ‘Successor Bar’ Policy Used to Block Employees Seeking Votes to Oust Unwanted Unions

Posted in News Releases

Majority of Senior Living center employees want to remove union, but non-statutory ‘successor bar’ traps them under the SEIU

Washington, DC (August 10, 2026) – Edvard Guay, an employee at Sona Senior Living in Deerfield, Illinois, filed an appeal asking the National Labor Relations Board (NLRB) to overturn the so-called “successor bar,” which is being used to block him and his colleagues from holding a “decertification” election to remove Service Employees International Union (SEIU) Local 73 union bosses from their workplace. The employees’ Request for Review was filed with free legal assistance from National Right to Work Foundation staff attorneys.

The NLRB’s non-statutory successor bar forces a new owner of a business to recognize and bargain with incumbent union officials for up to a year, regardless of whether that union actually has the support of a majority of rank-and-file workers. This legal tactic prevents employees from exercising their statutory rights under the National Labor Relations Act (NLRA) to hold elections to remove unwanted unions.

Guay’s request for the NLRB to scrap the successor bar follows the decision of the NLRB Region 13 Director to apply the bar to the Sona Senior Living workers’ case, dismissing their decertification petition to remove SEIU Local 73. A majority of Sona Senior Living employees signed the petition opposing the SEIU’s presence at their workplace.

The Request for Review states that the NLRB should overturn the successor bar because it conflicts with Sections 7 and 9 of the NLRA. Section 7 of the NLRA enshrines workers’ right to refrain from joining a union, and Section 9(c) directs that, when a “question of representation” exists, the Board “shall” conduct an election.

Foundation staff attorneys filed a formal rulemaking petition with the NLRB in June, asking the agency’s Board to overturn its non-statutory “bars,” as the NLRB’s pro-Big Labor policies have no grounds in federal labor law and are designed to disenfranchise workers. Notably, the Board will now have a new Trump-appointed Member, after the Senate confirmed the nomination of James Macy last week.

Last month, the D.C. Circuit Court of Appeals held—echoing the Foundation’s petition—that the NLRB does not possess the authority under the NLRA to stymie a decertification by invoking the successor bar, with the Court further suggesting that the NLRB’s other non-statutory bars are in violation of the NLRA. The Circuit’s decision was informed by the 2024 U.S. Supreme Court Loper Bright decision, which ended judicial deference to agencies’ interpretations of their statutory authority.

“We look to the new Trump NLRB members to finally bring the agency in line with the text of the law Congress charged them with enforcing, starting by ending the Obama-era ‘successor bar’ ruling that was recently rejected by the D.C. Circuit Court of Appeals,” said National Right to Work Foundation President Mark Mix. “This case gives the new Board majority a way to quickly demonstrate that it will prioritize defending workers’ statutory rights, not limiting those rights to protect the power of unwanted union officials.”

12 Jun 2026

National Right to Work Foundation Submits NLRB Rulemaking Petition: Overturn Biden-Era Rule and Expand Worker Free Choice

Posted in News Releases

Foundation petitions Labor Board to end non-statutory barriers to employees’ decertification rights, require incumbent unions prove majority status

Washington, DC (June 12, 2026) – The National Right to Work Legal Defense Foundation has filed a formal rulemaking petition with the National Labor Relations Board (NLRB) asking the new Board to initiate rulemaking to expand worker free choice and end various non-statutory policies that disenfranchise employees. In doing so, the NLRB would overturn changes made in a 2024 Biden-era rule that expanded the barriers workers face to exercising their legal right to vote out a union that lacks majority support.

The petition requests the agency overturn various NLRB-invented “bars” that deprive workers of their right to decertify incumbent unions that lack majority support. It also calls for the elimination of non-statutory policies used to delay or block worker-requested decertification elections and calls for the NLRB to require union officials to regularly prove worker support or else lose their extraordinary government-granted monopoly bargaining powers.

The series of reforms would bring NLRB rules in line with the actual text of the National Labor Relations Act (NLRA), the law the NLRB is charged with neutrally enforcing. This rulemaking is especially necessary following the Supreme Court’s 2024 Loper Bright decision, which curtailed judicial deference to an administrative agency’s ability to expansively interpret its statutory power.

NLRB-Invented “Election Bars,” “Blocking Charge” Policy, and “Merger Doctrine” Improperly Stifle Employees’ Right to Hold Decertification Votes

As the rulemaking petition points out, Section 9(c) of the NLRA commands that the Board “shall” conduct an election when a question of representation exists outside a one year period following a previous election. This means that the existing non-statutory “election bars,” along with the “blocking charge” policy, improperly nullify employees’ 9(a) right to an election.

The Foundation’s petition calls for the repeal of all of the NLRB’s informal “bars”—none of which are found in the text of the NLRA—that keep employees trapped in union ranks even when a majority want to vote to remove the union. This includes eliminating: (1) the “contract bar,” which disenfranchises workers for up to three years when a union contract is in place; (2) the “recognition bar,” which blocks decertification after union officials gain power without a secret-ballot election through an abuse-prone “card check” process; (3) the “successor bar,” which blocks workers’ right to decertify a union following a change in employer ownership; and (4) the “settlement bar,” which prevents worker-requested elections after the union and employer settle charges without an admission of wrongdoing.

The rulemaking request also asks the Board to overturn the other non-statutory policies that the NLRB currently applies to the detriment of employees’ 9(a) rights. For example, if employees can file their petition at a time when one of the various invented “bars” doesn’t apply, union officials frequently use the NLRB’s blocking charge policy to delay decertification elections from being held. This punishes employees seeking to exercise their legal rights on the basis of unproven allegations made by the union against an employer.

The petition also calls for the elimination of the NLRB’s “merger doctrine,” which lets union bosses merge smaller bargaining units into a massive multi-state and/or multi-employer unit, often comprised of thousands or tens of thousands of workers. This allows union officials to manipulate bargaining units in a way that makes it effectively impossible for workers to even gather the signatures needed to exercise their right to hold a decertification election.

NLRB Should End Presumption that a One-Time Union Organizing Win Warrants Perpetual Power Over Employees

Finally, the petition requests the NLRB update its standard for when union officials are entitled to presumption of majority status by requiring union officials periodically prove a majority of employees support their representation. As the petition notes, “over 90% of private-sector employees who are subject to union representation have never voted on that union representation,” a problem created by the fact that one vote or card check years or decades ago currently authorizes union officials to wield bargaining powers over workers without any further evidence of actual employee support.

To remedy this, the petition proposes that unions must prove majority employee support after certain time periods elapse after an election or recognition. The petition notes “[t]he Board’s ‘one-vote, one-time’ presumption is not required by the Act and so defies democratic norms as to be arbitrary and capricious,” meaning it is fully within the NLRB’s authority to implement such a commonsense change.

“For years, employees have sought to exercise their clear legal right in federal law to vote out incumbent unions they oppose, only for NLRB-invented policies to crush their efforts,” stated National Right to Work Foundation President Mark Mix. “Just as politicians must stand for regular election, union officials should have to regularly prove that they have the support of at least a bare majority of the workers they claim to ‘represent.’

“Especially after the Supreme Court’s Loper Bright decision, the NLRB has a duty to enforce the text of the law, not abrogate employees’ clear rights under the NLRA by perpetuating these non-statutory rules that leave employees trapped in unions that lack majority support,” added Mix. “Acting on this rulemaking petition would not only bring NLRB rules on elections better in line with the text of the law but would also send a powerful message that the new Board majority is prioritizing pro-worker policies by expanding employees’ legal rights to remove incumbent unions that don’t serve workers’ interests.”

3 Jun 2026

GWU Hospital Nurses Ask National Labor Relations Board to Overturn Policy Blocking Vote to Remove Union

Posted in News Releases

Appeal: ‘Blocking Charge Rule’ violates text of federal law and was wrongly applied to block election requested by hundreds of nurses

Washington, DC (June 3, 2026) – Following a petition signed by hundreds of registered nurses and healthcare professionals at George Washington University Hospital, the nurse who filed the petition has asked the National Labor Relations Board (NLRB) to stop using its non-statutory “blocking charge” policy to block the GWU Hospital employees from voting in an election to remove District of Columbia Nurses Association (DCNA) union officials from power at the facility.

In April the GWU hospital workers, led by nurse Elizabeth Abraha, filed a decertification petition with the NLRB to free themselves from DCNA representation. The NLRB is the federal agency responsible for enforcing the National Labor Relations Act (NLRA), a task that includes administering elections to install (or “certify”) and remove (or “decertify”) unions.

After Abraha’s petition was filed, DCNA union bosses moved to block the nurses’ election with unproven “unfair labor practice” charges against the Hospital. Abraha’s Request for Review argues that NLRB Regional officials accepted the DCNA’s charges without due process, stating that Abraha’s petition was suspended “based on ULP charge proceedings without holding a public hearing or even permitting Petitioner to review the charges.”

Abraha’s Request for Review contends the NLRB’s blocking charge policy is inconsistent with the text of the NLRA: “Allowing an interested, third party to unilaterally stop an election proceeding violates NLRA Section 9 [which] states that ‘whenever a petition shall have been filed’ ‘the Board shall investigate such petition’ and if the Board finds ‘a question of representation exists, it shall direct an election by secret ballot.’”

The Request for Review points out that the NLRA does not grant the NLRB the authority to invent rules to stymie worker-requested decertification elections. Moreover, it argues the NLRB Region denied the petitioner due process by refusing to hold a hearing or provide copies of the charges being used as pretext for blocking the decertification vote.

“The text of the NLRA unambiguously states that employees have the right to hold decertification elections to remove an unwanted union from their workplace,” commented National Right to Work Foundation President Mark Mix. “The NLRB should be defending employee free choice, not inventing policies that protect incumbent union bosses from being voted out by rank-and-file workers.

“Ending the biased Biden-era blocking charge policy would be one of the most pro-worker changes the new Board majority could and should take,” added Mix.