Crypto News: Trump’s reasons for firing NLRB leaders

The headlines about Donald Trump's administrative changes have come fast and furious—including some high-profile, possibly illegal firings in the labor sector. Bloomberg's Josh Eidelson, who broke the news of two big firings, got his hands on the email that spelled out why. There's more than a little Elon Musk in there. If this email was forwarded to you, click here to sign up.

Donald Trump has sometimes sent mixed messages on labor issues, choosing a Teamsters-blessed labor secretary even as he buddied up to Elon Musk, famously no friend of unions. But this week the president gave an unmistakable signal that, when businesses square off against their workers, his administration will give them a friendlier ear than they got under Joe Biden.

On Tuesday, I broke news that Trump had fired two top leaders of the National Labor Relations Board, the agency responsible for protecting the right to take collective action at work. (That can mean everything from baristas unionizing to software engineers doing walkouts over sexual harassment.) One of these fired employees was the NLRB's general counsel, Jennifer Abruzzo, whose role carries sweeping authority to dictate what sorts of cases the agency will or won't consider. As I've reported in Bloomberg Businessweek, her predecessor from Trump's first term nixed cases from Uber drivers, arguing that they didn't count as employees with labor rights; in sharp contrast, Abruzzo took an unusually expansive view of workers' rights under the law.

Abruzzo. Photographer: Al Drago/Bloomberg

The other, much more surprising NLRB appointee fired was Gwynne Wilcox, one of the two Democratic members of the independent agency. Federal law prohibits the president from canning board members absent negligence or malfeasance.

Trump hasn't publicly held forth on the firings. But in an email obtained through a Freedom of Information Act request, a point of view emerged that in important ways mirrored that of a close Trump ally—and one of the NLRB's most high-profile antagonists: Musk.

On Monday night, the Office of Presidential Personnel emailed Abruzzo and Wilcox "on behalf" of Trump, sharing a letter announcing their firings and his thinking. Trump's message first gave an expansive view of his authority, saying that President Franklin Delano Roosevelt's 1935 law limiting him from firing NLRB members is "inconsistent" with the power granted to him by the Constitution. "Of particular importance, heads of agencies within the Executive Branch must share the objectives of my administration and its commitment to serving the will of the American people," it said.

The letter then specified how Trump believed Abruzzo and Wilcox were off the program. It said they had "improperly cabined employers' rights to speak on the subject of unionization, raising serious First Amendment concerns about the censorship of important speech." It also faulted their efforts to expand the definition of a "joint employer," meaning a company that is legally liable for the treatment of workers whose paychecks it doesn't sign, such as franchised or subcontracted staff. Overall, Trump's message said he wasn't confident that Abruzzo or Wilcox could "fairly evaluate matters before them without unduly disfavoring the interests of employers large and small."

NLRB headquarters. Photographer: Andrew Harrer/Bloomberg

Under Biden, NLRB appointees ruled that it was illegal to force workers to attend anti-union "captive audience" meetings. They prosecuted cases against Amazon.com, Starbucks and Tesla alleging their executives made illegally coercive anti-union comments and alleged Alphabet and Amazon were legally bosses of contracted staff they claimed not to employ. (Tesla Inc. successfully got a ruling about one of Musk's tweets overturned in US appeals court on First Amendment grounds.) Trump's words and actions signal that, much like his first term, he'll take a far more management-friendly approach. And he's willing to test the boundaries of presidential power to reboot the NLRB ASAP, adopting the same legal theory Musk's SpaceX has been pushing in its lawsuit against the agency, namely that as the head of the executive branch, the Constitution lets the president replace appointees with or without cause.

It remains to be seen whether Trump's legal hardball pays off. The questionable legality of Wilcox's firing could provide grounds to challenge or overturn future pro-business NLRB rulings, depending on whether the increasingly Trumpified judiciary sides with FDR or Musk. Stay tuned on that: "I will be pursuing all legal avenues to challenge my removal, which violates long-standing Supreme Court precedent," Wilcox said in a statement.

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ICYMI

From the Dog Man movie. Photographer: Universal Pictures / DreamWorks Animation

Back in October, Felix Gillette wrote for Businessweek about the power the author Dav Pilkey has over the children's book market right now, and how he was about to add to his cinematic universe with the Dog Man movie. Now, opening weekend is here. Catch up on the story first:

Over the years myriad eccentric animals have thrived in children's publishing, from a gifted-and-talented arachnid (Charlotte) to a laconic bear suffering from acute honey dependence (Winnie-the-Pooh). These days, the industry's ascendant oddball is a slobbering, crime-fighting creature who's half Homo sapiens, half Canis familiaris. Parents, look out for Dog Man.

On Dec. 3, Scholastic Inc., the US publisher of the Harry Potter and Hunger Games books, will be rolling out Dog Man: Big Jim Begins, the 13th graphic novel in the comedic series from author Dav Pilkey. Weeks later, on Jan. 31, Dog Man, an animated movie from Universal Pictures and DreamWorks Animation, will arrive in theaters, featuring the voices of Pete Davidson, Isla Fisher and Ricky Gervais.

For parents of a certain age, the coming Dog Man cultural escalation may bring back childhood memories of the hysteria-inducing moment in 2001 when Harry Potter first flew off the page and onto the big screen. Ellie Berger, who oversees Scholastic's trade division, expects the Dog Man movie to send sales soaring. "Teachers and librarians have all embraced it, because it's getting kids reading," Berger says. "And there will be more people seeing the movie, most likely, than have ever read one of the books."

Keep reading: Dog Man Movie Is Here to Swoop In and Rescue the Children's Book Business

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14%

That's how much avocado prices are already up from last year, and Trump is likely to make them more expensive with his plan to slap 25% tariffs on Mexican imports beginning on Saturday. Mexico supplies upwards of 90% of the avocados Americans eat.

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Graham Steele

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