Amazon wins court order blocking New York’s new labor law
A federal judge has granted Amazon a preliminary injunction blocking New York State from enforcing a new labor law that the company argues illegally interferes with private-sector labor relations.
The ruling, issued by U.S. District Judge Eric Komitee in Brooklyn, marks the first major test of a law that allowed the New York Public Employment Relations Board to hear private-sector labor disputes while the National Labor Relations Board remained unable to issue decisions due to a lack of quorum, News.Az reports, citing Reuters.
New York approved the law in September to address a growing backlog of cases at the NLRB, which expanded after President Donald Trump removed Democratic board member Gwynne Wilcox in January. California passed a similar law in October, and the NLRB has moved to strike down both.
Komitee said Amazon is likely to succeed in its argument that federal labor law prevents states from regulating these disputes, citing a 1959 Supreme Court precedent. He added that Amazon could face irreparable harm without an injunction, including the risk of conflicting rulings between state and federal agencies.
The case stems from the firing of Brima Sylla, a union vice president at Amazon’s JFK8 warehouse in Staten Island — the company’s only unionized U.S. facility. PERB sought to take up the complaint, but the injunction halts the process for now.
The NLRB backlog includes numerous disputed union elections, and Wilcox is suing to be reinstated. Meanwhile, Trump has nominated two lawyers to fill NLRB vacancies and restore the board’s quorum.
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