Marathon Pundit: End of week NLRB overreach roundup

Friday, June 10, 2011

End of week NLRB overreach roundup

Boeing headquarters, Chicago

The week ends, the overreach continues.

From the Everett Herald:

Sixteen state attorneys general called a federal labor charge against the Boeing Co. a "job-killing" action that ultimately will hurt unionized workers.

The attorneys general filed a legal brief on Thursday in response to allegations by the National Labor Relations Board that Boeing retaliated against Machinists for strikes in Washington when the jet maker picked South Carolina for a second assembly site.

The labor board "has misconstrued federal law in its complaint," said Alan Wilson, South Carolina's attorney general. "In fact, the federal government's actions contradict federal law, which allows states to enact right-to-work laws without fear of retaliation from the NLRB."

An administrative law judge is set to hear the labor board's complaint against Boeing, beginning Tuesday in Seattle.

The Charleston Post and Courier:

A judge has denied a request by three Boeing workers seeking to formally join and fight a labor lawsuit the company is facing, a group representing the employees said today.

The National Right to Work Legal Defense Foundation said it would immediately appeal the ruling, which was handed down by a San Francisco judge from the National Labor Relations Board.

The NLRB also is the agency that's suing Boeing. Its complaint alleges that the company's 2009 decision to build a secondary 787 aircraft assembly line in North Charleston was an illegal form of retaliation against the International Association of Machinists & Aerospace Workers for previous strikes in Washington state.

The labor board's acting general counsel, Lafe Solomon, is seeking an order that would force the company to move the South Carolina assembly line to the Puget Sound area.

NPR:

In April, the top lawyer for the NLRB issued a formal complaint against Boeing. Soon after, the issue erupted in the nation's capital. Republican leaders introduced federal legislation and began a campaign against the machinists union. South Carolina Sen. Lindsey Graham was one of them.

"Nobody's pay was cut. Nobody's benefits were reduced because they moved to South Carolina, so this complaint is just frivolous," Graham said in a Senate floor speech.

The NLRB says all of Boeing's work on the Dreamliner should be done in Washington state. But Graham and others say no one should be able to tell a company where it can do business.

South Carolina Gov. Nikki Haley, a Republican, criticized the union's complaint. "It really is very offensive," she said on Fox News. "It's an assault on everything that we know to be American and they have to stop this."

Wichita Business Journal (free registration required):

The ongoing public feud between the Boeing Co. and its machinists union regarding a second 787 Dreamliner plant in South Carolina won’t keep the aerospace giant from cutting the ribbon on the new factory.

According to a report from the News Tribune, Boeing executives and South Carolina officials will celebrate the completion of the new plant in Charleston, S.C., on Friday.

The Dreamliner program has long been dogged by costly, headline-making delays.

However, as Boeing prepares to finally deliver the first 787 later this year, the national focus on the program has shifted following a complaint brought in April by the National Labor Relations Board that claims Boeing built the new site outside of the state of Washington to get back at its machinists union for past strikes.