Topics: Union-Management Relations

By: Tashayla “Shay” Billington, Mark S. Spring

Earlier this week, on November 13, 2024, the National Labor Relations Board (NLRB) issued its decision in Amazon.com Services LLC, ruling that employers violate the National Labor Relations Act (NLRA) by requiring employees to attend “captive-audience meetings” under threat of discipline or discharge. In doing so, the Board overruled its 1948 decision in Babcock & Wilson Co. Historically, mandatory captive-audience meetings have served as a powerful tool, which allowed employers to share their views with all members of the bargaining unit on why the workplace should remain union-free.

The decision is not surprising. In April 2022, General Counsel Abruzzo issued a memorandum announcing that she planned to ask the Board to find that mandatory meetings where employers provide their outlook on unionization where unlawful under the NLRA. In Amazon, the Board followed through holding that Babcock was poorly reasoned and that captive audience meetings “have a reasonable tendency to interfere with and coerce employees in the exercise of their Section 7 right to freely decide whether or not to unionize…”

A number of states, including California, have recently enacted legislation banning, at least in part, captive audience meetings. Under California’s AB 399, effective January 1, 2025, California employers can no longer discharge, discriminate, retaliate against, or threaten to carry out such...

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