Since a federal district court invalidated a National Labor Relations Board (NLRB) regulation on joint employer liability under federal labor law, the board now faces potential ways to respond.
One of the possible courses of action includes exploring an essentially uncharted legal domain.
According to the details in a recent analysis on
Bloomberg Law, the NLRB’s possible paths include not only appealing the decision, but also initiating new notice-and-comment rulemaking in order to rescind the Trump-era joint employer rule that is currently in effect.
In addition, the board could refuse to acquiesce to the judge’s ruling outside of his judicial district, the Eastern District of Texas. Remarkably, these options are not mutually exclusive.
- The court’s invalidation was far from the end of the road for the NLRB. Though the path to recovering broader joint employer rule has become somewhat slippery, it is by no means removed.
- The NLRB’s next steps could have implications for other, ongoing cases.
These upcoming decisions come amidst legal battles over the NLRB’s joint employment test, significantly affecting franchisers and companies that rely on outsourced labor, which have the most at stake.