Judge says NLRB's new election rules are unlawful

The US District Court for the District of Columbia has ruled "unlawful" several provisions of the NLRB's recent revision of rules governing NLRB elections. AFL-CIO v. NLRB (Dist DC 05/30/2020).

This comes one day before their effective date of May 31, 2020.

In a two-page order, the court said:

"[T]he challenged portions of the regulation at issue are not procedural rules that are exempted from the notice-and-comment rulemaking requirements of the APA, see 5 U.S.C. § 553(b)(3)(A), and because each of these specific provisions was promulgated without notice-and-comment rulemaking, each one must be held unlawful and set aside, see id. § 706(2). This Court will not vacate the remainder of the rule, however; instead, this matter will be remanded to the NLRB for reconsideration in light of this Court’s ruling."

The court promised an explanatory opinion “soon.”