Nevada’s Culinary Union won a decision last week in its ongoing battle with Station Casinos over federal labor laws, as a federal administrative judge ordered the company to negotiate a union contract for workers at the Red Rock Casino.
United States Administrative Law Judge (ALJ) Jeffrey D. Wedekind issued a 138-page decision and proposed order requiring Station Casinos’ Red Rock Casino to bargain with the Culinary and Bartenders Unions. This decision follows the temporary order issued by the U.S. District Court and affirmed by the Ninth Circuit.
The ALJ decision orders Station Casinos to (among other things):
Cease and desist from:
- Threatening employees that selecting union representation would be futile.
- Promising employees benefits and improved terms and conditions of employment in order to discourage them from supporting or selecting union representation.
- Granting employees benefits and improved terms and conditions of employment in order to discourage them from supporting or selecting union representation.
- Threatening employees with loss of benefits if they select union representation.
- Threatening employees with reprisals if they select union representation.
- Threatening employees with less favorable terms and conditions of employment by indicating that they will no longer be treated like “family” if they select union representation.
- Coercively questioning employees about their union sympathies.
- Posting its employees’ images on an anti-union website without their consent and without a disclaimer stating that the website is not intended to reflect the views of the employees appearing on it.
- Disciplining employees because they support union representation.
- Assigning employees more onerous work because they support union representation.
- Refusing to recall or reinstate laid-off employees because they support union representation.
- Rescind an unlawful disciplinary warning issued to one worker and offer another worker full reinstatement to her former job, including back pay, expenses, and benefits from her layoff June 4, 2020.
- Post a notice to employees that reads in part: “The National Labor Relations Board has found that we violated federal labor law and has ordered us to post and obey this notice. Federal law gives you the right to form, join, or assist a union. Choose representatives to bargain with us on your behalf. Act together with other employees for your benefit and protection. Choose not to engage in any of these protected activities.”
“Just like the Ninth Circuit and Judge Navarro, the Administrative Law Judge also saw Station Casinos’ grant of benefits right before the election at Red Rock for what it was—a poorly disguised effort to discourage workers from unionizing,” said Ted Pappageorge, secretary-treasurer for the Culinary Union.
“This is yet another victory for workers who stood up and organized to have a union and a union contract at Red Rock Casino. We commend Red Rock Casino workers for their continued courage and resilience in the face of the massive anti-union campaign that Station Casinos shamefully waged against them.”
“Here, as fully discussed above,” wrote Wedekind in the decision, “there is abundant evidence—both direct (e.g., the previous unlawful promise of such benefits, and other recorded statements, PowerPoints, emails, and text messages) and circumstantial (e.g., the suspicious and rushed timing and the false, evasive, and inconsistent testimony noted above regarding the relevant facts and circumstances)—that the company’s motive for developing, approving, and ultimately announcing the new benefits and programs at the Red Rock on December 10 and 11 was to undermine the Culinary Union campaign there. Indeed, it is hard to imagine a stronger evidentiary record supporting the General Counsel’s and the Union’s allegations.”
