Feb 16( Reuters)-Amazon.com(AMZN.O), opens new tab has joined rocket maker SpaceX and grocery chain Trader Joe’s in claiming that aU.S. labor agency’s in- house enforcement proceedings violate theU.S. Constitution, as the retail giant faces scores of cases claiming it obtruded with workers’ rights to organize.
Amazon in a form made with the National Labor Relations Board( NLRB) on Thursday said it plans to argue that the agency’s unique structure violates the company’s right to a jury trial.
The company also said that limits on the junking of executive judges and the board’s five members, who are appointed by the chairman, are unconstitutional.
The form came in a pending case criminating Amazon of immorally revenging against workers at a storehouse in the New York City city of Staten Island, where workers suggested to unionize in 2022. Amazon, which has faced further than 250 NLRB complaints professing unlawful labor practices across the country in recent times, has denied wrongdoing.
SpaceX is making analogous claims against the board in a action filed last month, one day after the labor board indicted the company of firing eight masterminds for censuring CEO Elon Musk in a letter to company directors.
Trader Joe’s raised the arguments latterly in January at a hail in an NLRB case, and two Starbucks baristas seeking to dissolve their unions have challenged the board’s structure in separate suits.
An NLRB spokesman declined to note.
The board’s general counsel issues complaints against employers professing violations of civil labor law. Those cases are heard first by executive judges and also the five- member board, whose opinions can be appealed in civil court.
The growing number of challenges to the labor board make it more likely the issue will reach theU.S. Supreme Court, whose conservative maturity has gestured its dubitation
of otherU.S. agencies ’ in- house proceedings, said Seth Goldstein, a counsel who represents unions in the Amazon and Trader Joe’s cases.
Goldstein said the pending cases also could buoy other employers to refuse to bargain with unions on the belief that courts will strip the NLRB of its enforcement powers.
“ I ’m veritably concerned that this is going to beget real problems in collaborative logrolling for both new and established unions,” said Goldstein, a mate at law establishment Julien Mirer Singla and Goldstein in New York.
Reporting by Daniel Wiessner in Albany, New York; editing by Jonathan Oatis
