In today’s news and commentary, the D.C. Circuit Court of Appeals enforces a NLRB order requiring a Las Vegas casino to bargain with a union and the House passes a bill to speed up contract negotiation.

On Wednesday, the US Court of Appeals for the DC Circuit endorsed the NLRB’s “Gissel” bargaining order against Red Rock Casino Spa under NLRB v. Gissel Packing Co., a 1969 Supreme Court decision authorizing bargaining orders when labor law violations make a fair rerun election unlikely. The NLRB had found that the casino ran an extensive anti-union campaign after Unite Here began organizing employees in 2018 and 2019. The 2024 Board had also issued a Cemex bargaining order — the first under a standard articulated in Cemex Construction Materials Pacific LLC, a 2023 Biden-era decision that empowers the Board to issue bargaining orders based on employer conduct prior to and immediately preceding an election, before any vote takes place. The DC Circuit today declined to endorse the Cemex order, upholding only the Gissel order. This marks the second time a circuit court has taken that approach: in April, the Ninth Circuit similarly affirmed the Gissel order while declining to reach the Cemex question.

On Tuesday, the House passed the Faster Labor Contracts Act 230-193, with broad Democratic support and 20 Republicans crossing the aisle. The bill would establish a structured timeline for stalled contract negotiations: if union and employer talks remain unresolved after 90 days, either side could request mediation, and after another 30 days without resolution, the dispute would move to binding arbitration producing a two-year contract. According to Bloomberg Law, it takes an average of 465 days for workers and their employers to reach a first contract after a successful union election. The Teamsters General President remarked, “This is one of the most consequential labor bills to come before Congress in generations.”