The National Labor Relations Board ruled Wednesday that popular retailer Home Depot violated the law by firing an employee for wearing a work apron with Black Lives Matter messaging.
The board ruled that by firing Antonio Morales, Home Depot violated Section 7 of the National Labor Relations Act. The section in question protects workers’ ability to wear and distribute paraphernalia with messages relating to conditions of employment.
According to the board, Mr. Morales wrote “BLM” on his work-issued apron in 2020 to bring attention to racism in his Minneapolis store. The board noted a manager had asked him to watch out for a Black customer because “people of Somali descent were more inclined than others to steal,” which outraged Mr. Morales.
The ruling requires that Mr. Morales be reinstated and that Home Depot pay him for any lost earnings. The home improvement giant has denied any wrongdoing and strongly disagrees with the decision.
The court’s ruling reverses a decision from a lower labor judge in 2022. In that decision, the judge ruled the BLM messaging on Mr. Morales’ apron wasn’t protected because it didn’t inherently address working conditions in the store, was not organized in a group setting and was tied to the Black Lives Matter movement going on at the time. Lower NLRB rulings can be appealed to the higher five-member board.
In its ruling this week, the NLRB did leave some questions unanswered. The board specifically didn’t rule that all protests by employees against workplace discrimination were protected, which the NLRB general counsel urged it to do.
• Vaughn Cockayne can be reached at vcockayne@washingtontimes.com.
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