New Process Steel – The Supreme Court Sends The NLRB Back To The Drawing Board
Client Alert | 1 min read | 06.17.10
The Supreme Court invalidated today almost 600 decisions issued by the two members of the National Labor Relations Board (NLRB) who served for a 27-month period beginning in December, 2007. The Court, in a 5-4 opinion, ruled that the two member panel did not constitute a "quorum" authorized to decide cases under Section 3(b) of the National Labor Relations Act. Section 3(b) is the statutory provision that sets forth the familiar three member panel quorum provisions used by the NLRB in deciding cases. The majority opinion was authored by Justice Stevens, and joined by Chief Justice Roberts, and Associate Justices Scalia, Thomas and Alito. Justice Kennedy, joined by Justices Ginsburg, Breyer and Sotomayer, dissented, agreeing with the government's proposed reading of the statutory provision.
The practical effect of New Process Steel will be significant. The NLRB now has four members, as a result of two recess appointments made by President Obama in March of this year. Those appointments, which include Craig Becker, a former lawyer for the SEIU and the AFL-CIO, are widely expected to change the ideological make-up of the NLRB. The almost 600 decisions vacated by the Court's decision in New Process Steel are now fair game for reconsideration by the new Democratic-controlled majority of the NLRB.
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Client Alert | 3 min read | 11.21.25
On November 7, 2025, in Thornton v. National Academy of Sciences, No. 25-cv-2155, 2025 WL 3123732 (D.D.C. Nov. 7, 2025), the District Court for the District of Columbia dismissed a False Claims Act (FCA) retaliation complaint on the basis that the plaintiff’s allegations that he was fired after blowing the whistle on purported illegally discriminatory use of federal funding was not sufficient to support his FCA claim. This case appears to be one of the first filed, and subsequently dismissed, following Deputy Attorney General Todd Blanche’s announcement of the creation of the Civil Rights Fraud Initiative on May 19, 2025, which “strongly encourages” private individuals to file lawsuits under the FCA relating to purportedly discriminatory and illegal use of federal funding for diversity, equity, and inclusion (DEI) initiatives in violation of Executive Order 14173, Ending Illegal Discrimination and Restoring Merit-Based Opportunity (Jan. 21, 2025). In this case, the court dismissed the FCA retaliation claim and rejected the argument that an organization could violate the FCA merely by “engaging in discriminatory conduct while conducting a federally funded study.” The analysis in Thornton could be a sign of how forthcoming arguments of retaliation based on reporting allegedly fraudulent DEI activity will be analyzed in the future.
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