Wal-Mart Illegally Intimidated, Disciplined Employees: NLRB 

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The managers of Wal-Mart Stores, Inc. (NYSE:WMT) in California illegally intimidated and disciplined employees who participated a strike, according to the ruling of a judge at the National Labor Relations Board (NLRB).

NLRB’s administrative ruling against Wal-Mart

Geoffrey Carter, the administrative judge at the NLRB issued a directive to Wal-Mart Stores, Inc. (NYSE:WMT) to stop the illegal intimidation of its employees in Richmond, California.  He also instructed the retail giant to remove any reference to disciplinary reports for the six employees who went on a strike.

In his ruling, the NLRB administrative judge said a manager at Wal-Mart Stores, Inc. (NYSE:WMT) illegally intimated workers after saying, “If it were up to me, I’d shoot the union.”   He added it was against the law to tell employees that their co-workers who will return from a one-day strike will lose their jobs.

Our Walmart, a group supported by employees and an affiliate of United Food and Commercial Workers Union filed a complaint against Wal-Mart Stores, Inc. (NYSE:WMT) with the NLRB alleging that its managers were intimidating workers.

Raymond Bravo, one of the employees illegally disciplined by the retail giant commented that the administrative ruling “reinforces the fact that we were doing nothing wrong. It shows that what we’re doing is right, and the government is taking our side.”

The NLRB emphasized that the federal law prohibits employers from retaliating against employees who are supporting a union. Employers are also prohibited from making threatening statements that would discourage employees from cooperating with a union.

Wal-Mart plans to appeal some parts of the ruling

In a statement, Kory Lundberg, a spokesperson for Wal-Mart Stores, Inc. (NYSE:WMT) said, “We do not agree with some of the administrative law judge’s conclusions.”  The retail giant plans to appeals parts of the ruling to the full labor board in Washington.

Last month, the executives of Wal-Mart Stores, Inc. (NYSE:WMT) boasted that no judge found that the company was guilty of the allegations of OUR Walmart.

The current ruling of the NLRB is separate from its previous decision that the retail giant “unlawfully threatened, disciplined, and/or terminated employees” who participated in legal strikes and protests” in different states on November 22, 2012.

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