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Labor & Employment Principal Meredith Kirshenbaum is quoted in “The Shutdown’s Over, But the NLRB Is Still in a Bind,” published in the Nov. 17, 2025, edition of POLITICO. In the article, Meredith shares her perspective on the unprecedented developments affecting the National Labor Relations Board and the uncertainty about how it will operate moving forward. Her insights reflect her deep understanding of labor and employment law and her ongoing leadership in conversations about the NLRB’s evolving role.
The article concerns the NLRB and its lack of a quorum necessary to rule on cases, resulting in threats to its authority as states seek to expand their power to intervene in labor disputes. The NLRB’s operations have been severely limited since shortly after President Donald Trump took office in January and fired former Chair Gwynne Wilcox. Since then, it has been left without a quorum, leading to a slowdown in work.
The Senate is set to vote on the nomination of Boeing chief labor counsel Scott Mayer to serve on the board, putting him and fellow NLRB nominee James Murphy on track for full Senate confirmation before the end of the year.
Nevertheless, even as the NLRB moves closer to a quorum and a return to normal business, California and New York have attempted to step in for the Board, leading to several court battles. A lawyer for New York Attorney General Letitia James argued that the state needs to take charge due to the current status of the NLRB.
On Friday, a federal judge in Brooklyn heard oral arguments in a lawsuit brought by Amazon challenging New York’s law authorizing a state agency that typically adjudicates public-sector labor disputes to do the same for the private sector. The judge didn’t issue a decision or indicate how he might rule in the Amazon case, though he acknowledged “we are most certainly living in interesting times as to the lack of precedent.”
In addition to Amazon’s challenge, the NLRB itself has sued New York and California for encroaching on its jurisdiction.
Even when the NLRB regains a quorum, it won’t necessarily be able to significantly pare back the Biden-era shift away from employers’ interests without at least one more GOP appointee, based on a longstanding tradition requiring at least three votes in support of major decisions. The Board might face pressure to junk that tradition if it must proceed with just three members for an extended duration.
“A lot of what we’ve seen over the last 12 months has been unprecedented, so it will be hard to say that it would continue,” says Meredith Kirshenbaum about the longstanding tradition.
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The article is also published in this week’s edition of the Weekly Shift, POLITICO’s labor and employment newsletter.
