In bizarre case, NLRB ALJ forces Amazon to rehire an employee who used a bullhorn to call a female coworker a “gutter b*tch,” “ignorant and stupid,” “crack-head a*s,” “crack ho,” and “queen of the swamp” and accuse her of being “high” and on “fentanyl”

Washington, DC – The Coalition for a Democratic Workplace (CDW), composed of more than 500 major business and trade organizations, released the following statement today in response to the ruling issued by a National Labor Relations Board (NLRB) Administrative Law Judge forcing Amazon to reinstate a former male employee who shouted degrading obscenities at a female coworker over a bullhorn outside the Staten Island Amazon. A friend of the terminated employee captured the incident on video and posted it on Facebook. The video shows the terminated employee using a bullhorn to call a female coworker a “gutter b*tch,” “ignorant and stupid,” “crack-head a*s,” “crack ho,” and “queen of the swamp” and accuse the female employee of being “high” and on “fentanyl.” The terminated employee noted that posting the video would make the victim “look stupid.”

The following statement is attributable to CDW Chair Kristen Swearingen:

“This outrageous decision again demonstrates this administration’s unrelenting efforts to push unionization at all costs – even to the point of excusing sexual harassment and abusive behavior by unions and labor activists. The fired employee’s behavior in this case was indefensible and should not be tolerated in any workplace or in any context.

“The Biden administration is doing everything they can to tip the scales in favor of unions. A few weeks ago, President Biden insinuated he was coming after Amazon, and now federal agencies are contorting the law to excuse unacceptable workplace misconduct committed by unions or their supporters. The Biden administration is sending the wrong message to workers and employers across the nation.

“Rather than protecting harassers, the Biden administration should focus on what it can do to help workers by requiring the Amazon Labor Union to file the disclosure and financial reports it is legally required to share with its members and submit to the Department of Labor.

“The administration should examine why only 58% of the over 8,325 eligible voters participated in the recent election at the Amazon facility and only about 32% (2,654) supported the union. This shockingly low level of voter turnout is not a model for long-term industrial democracy or stability. The Board needs to focus on increasing voter participation and ensure that the decision to enlist a union as an exclusive workplace representative is supported by the majority of employees.”

 

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About The Coalition for a Democratic Workplace

CDW is a broad-based coalition of hundreds of organizations representing hundreds of thousands of employers and millions of employees in various industries across the country concerned with a long-standing effort by some in the labor movement to make radical changes to the National Labor Relations Act without regard to the severely negative impact they would have on employees, employers, and the economy. CDW was originally formed in 2005 in opposition to the so-called Employee Free Choice Act (EFCA) – a bill similar to the PRO Act – that would have stripped employees of the right to secret ballots in union representation elections and allowed arbitrators to set contract terms regardless of the consequence to workers or businesses.

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