 This is a really pivotal moment for the labor movement in the United States We haven't seen this much labor activity in this country for decades and certainly there's been some setbacks But there's been enough momentum To finally let workers know that they can take back their power and they can be victorious The problem is that they could See a catastrophic blow if the Supreme Court decides to side with corporations as opposed to workers Now the case in question that I want to talk about is Glacier the Teamsters This is a case that is of enormous Consequence so let's get to the details for that We're gonna go to Ellie Mustal who is a justice correspondent for the nation who concisely broke down this case on Twitter And he writes here cement drivers went out on strike some of the cement in their trucks hardened as cement is known to do After the strike the company sued the workers for destruction of property The issue is whether they can if the company wins It will vitiate the ability of workers to strike in this country, which has been happening quite a bit Don't you know there was an actual ruling from the National Labor Relations Board that said the workers did take reasonable Precautions to avoid the destruction of property now the reason why the National Labor Relations Board made that ruling is Because the workers before they went on strike they left the trucks running So that way the concrete wouldn't harden But the reason why Ellie decided to emphasize the word labor is because they are the ones That handle labor disputes not the Supreme Court The fact that they're even getting involved here is a red flag in and of itself so there's a couple of questions that We're gonna get answered with this case first and foremost is kind of a rhetorical question and it's whether or not the Supreme Court even cares about the authority of the NLRB and We kind of have an answer because they're taking up the case rather than just letting the NLRB decide second of all What are the broader implications that this case can have on workers once you open the door to? Companies being able to sue workers for striking That's a whole can of worms that could lead to really dark places now Sharon Block a professor at Harvard Law Explained some of the potential implications of this if the court sides with the concrete company in a video for more perfect union And what she says is genuinely chilling Imagine you're a newly unionized Starbucks barista discussing whether to strike you've got lots to think about But what you probably wouldn't expect to have to consider is whether your union busting boss Howard Schultz is going to sue you for the impact of your strike on Starbucks For the coffee that gets wasted or milk that goes sour or lost revenue from customers who get tired of waiting in line But if a Seattle concrete mixing company and the US Chamber of Commerce Get their way before the Supreme Court this year That's the crazy position that American unions are going to be in if they want to strike Yeah, so the Supreme Court is choosing to take up this case Which is a matter squarely in the jurisdiction of the National Labor Relations Board and in the event they green light company suing workers this could lead to a Horrifying even darker dystopia than we're living if you can believe it So the question is based on oral arguments Who is the Supreme Court going to side with well? We can't know for sure until we see the actual case itself in the decision But based on oral arguments, I'm sure you won't be surprised to learn that the Supreme Court Seems poised to side with the concrete company here NBC News reports the Supreme Court on Tuesday indicated It would rule in favor of a concrete company in Washington state Seeking to revive a lawsuit it filed against the International Brotherhood of Teamsters Alleging that a strike damaged its product based on questions of the justices during the oral argument It appears the court will say that the Washington Supreme Court was wrong to dismiss the lawsuit It could however be a narrow ruling adopting the middle ground position Taken by the Biden administration that could mean that even though the lawsuit is revived It could be put on hold until the National Labor Relations Board which handles labor conflicts Finishes its own investigation into whether the strike action and the alleged damage was an activity protected by federal labor law Now that last paragraph seems really unlikely I doubt that the court will say actually let's give this to the NLRB and let them decide because They already issued a ruling here. The case was closed. So to reopen it They're just gonna have to do their own investigation when they already had made a decision That just seems really unlikely, right and the reason why this was dismissed by the Washington State Supreme Court is because The NLRB is there for these types of things. Do you understand? So the only time when state law is able to sanction strikes is in the event those striking workers lose federal protections Because they're doing violence, but there's no allegation of violence here and that's the thing so that's why this all reeks of The Supreme Court just doing the bidding of corporations to the detriment of unions once again Now it's so bad that according to Mistal even the liberal justices are seemingly surrendering here He points out this is all going even worse than I figured and I figured it would go pretty badly Essentially Contagious Brown Jackson and Sonia Sotomayor have abandoned the best arguments for unions And are now focused on limiting the scope of the eventual corporate victory. So this is really bad But it's not necessarily surprising considering this isn't the first time that the Robert's court has Stuck it to unions remember back in 2018 the Supreme Court ruled in a five to four decision that employees and public sector unions Could not be compelled to pay their union dues So the likely outcome isn't that surprising in retrospect But the silver lining is that the Supreme Court thankfully does seem to be making a distinction between Economic loss and loss of property which means that the worst-case scenario outcome that professor Sharon block speculated about from that more perfect union video that we saw Doesn't seem likely But still this is problematic and I'll explain why after we get to this next portion of the article here NBC News continues during the argument justice is wrestled with the distinction between economic loss caused by a strike action Which is generally considered not to be the responsibility of workers and intentional destruction of property which would not be protected Chief Justice John Roberts used milk production as an example of harm caused by a strike Noting the difference between the milk spoiling and killing the cow Darren Dalmat a lawyer representing the union conceded that there are limits to what conduct should be protected We absolutely agree that you can't burn down the factory He said now I should be clear that just because the Supreme Court is making a distinction between economic loss and Damage to property doesn't necessarily mean that they'll explicitly lay that out Right because they could release the decision where they sided with a concrete company And they leave that vague opening the door to future lawsuits where companies do sue workers in the event They strike because that's a loss in profits or revenue So we don't necessarily know but the fact that they're making that distinction is really important But ultimately it doesn't seem like this is gonna go well for workers now Hypothetically speaking, let's say that these workers did just leave the trucks didn't leave them running they turned them off and they knew that that would cause damage to property it would destroy the trucks basically I mean it's not the Responsibility of workers or unions to try to minimize the economic loss or the Nature the destructive nature potentially of these strikes the strikes are supposed to be a disturbance They're supposed to inflict pain on these companies so as to create an economic incentive for these companies To cave to the demands of their workers to not let it get to the point where the workers have to strike because these Companies aren't taking into account what their workers want. So even if the workers were at fault here, I Mean, it's not like they were Intentionally trying to cause destruction to property But the mere fact that this is even being considered and the Supreme Court took up this case It's just is absurd and it's a really bad sign in of itself So again, I want to emphasize as I always do when we talk about the oral arguments in the Supreme Court cases that we Won't know until a decision is released, but based on what we're seeing here. It's really not good now down below I'll link you to the oral arguments if you want to hear them yourself But ultimately you kind of have the crux of this and what to expect not that we needed to hear from the justices to kind of deduce That they would rule in the favor of corporations and against unions But either way this is really worrying and if it really does go south as it seems like it will This is gonna be a massive setback to workers and unions in particular So we'll just have to wait and see but it doesn't look good, but this isn't surprising