US Labor Board Withdraws Claims That Apple CEO Violated Workers’ Rights

(Bloomberg) -- The US labor board has abandoned its allegations that Apple Inc. Chief Executive Officer Tim Cook violated federal labor law, one of many cases where the agency is adopting a more business-friendly approach under President Donald Trump.

In a Friday letter viewed by Bloomberg News, the general counsel’s office of the National Labor Relations Board said it was withdrawing many of the claims in a complaint it had issued against Apple in January.

The allegations being dismissed include claims that Cook violated workers’ rights when he sent an email saying Apple was doing whatever it could to track down those who leaked information from a confidential meeting, and that “people who leak confidential information do not belong here.” That all-staff email, sent in September 2021, followed media reports about a companywide internal meeting the previous week at which management fielded questions about topics such as pay equity and Apple’s response to a Texas anti-abortion law.

The agency’s prosecutors are also withdrawing allegations that Apple broke the law by imposing confidentiality rules, firing activist Janneke Parrish, and surveilling workers or making them think they were under surveillance. In the January complaint, the labor board alleged that the company’s behavior, including Cook’s email, had been “interfering with, restraining and coercing employees in the exercise of their rights.”

In the letter Friday to the attorney representing Parrish, who had raised brought the allegations about the company’s actions and policies, a regional director said the agency had “carefully investigated and considered” the claims and, “upon further consideration,” determined many should be dismissed.

Apple, which didn’t immediately respond to requests for comment, has previously denied wrongdoing. An NLRB spokesperson declined to comment Friday.

US law protects employees’ right to take collective action or communicate with one another about working conditions, with or without a union. The NLRB is tasked with enforcing those rights. Its general counsel, appointed by the US president, has sweeping authority to dictate which cases it does or doesn’t pursue.

Under Biden administration appointee Jennifer Abruzzo, the agency’s prosecutors took an expansive view of workers’ rights, bringing cases that sought for example to stop companies from punishing workers for displaying “Black Lives Matter” insignia at work, and to abolish mandatory workplace “captive audience” anti-union meetings.

Trump fired Abruzzo in January, saying he wasn’t confident she could treat employers fairly. He replaced her on an acting basis with William Cowen, who has taken a narrower view of employees’ rights under the law. “The unfortunate truth is that if we attempt to accomplish everything, we risk accomplishing nothing,” Cowen told agency staff in a memo in February, the week after his appointment.

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