Amazon, SpaceX, Starbucks, and Trader Joe’s have all responded to allegations that they have violated labor laws with the same bold argument. The National Labor Relations Board, they assert in several ongoing legal proceedings, is unconstitutional.
SpaceX, for example, says that the NLRB is engaging in “an unlawful attempt … to subject Space X to an administrative proceeding whose structure violates Article II, the Fifth Amendment, and the Seventh Amendment of the Constitution of the United States.”
If these companies prevail, the entire process for holding union elections and for prosecuting employers who break labor laws – in place since the days of the New Deal – could collapse. That would leave U.S. workers more vulnerable to exploitation.
