CPAW Applauds 6th Circuit's Landmark Cemex Ruling — A Major Win for Workers and Secret-Ballot Elections
WASHINGTON, D.C. — The Coalition to Protect American Workers (CPAW) applauds the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Sixth Circuit's March 6 decision in Brown-Forman Corp. v. NLRB — the first federal appeals court to reject the Biden NLRB's deeply flawed Cemex standard, and a major step forward for workers' most fundamental right: the secret ballot.
The Washington Post Editorial Board said it plainly: the Biden NLRB's Cemex ruling was "boneheaded." We agree. For years, the Cemex framework gave the NLRB a backdoor to impose union bargaining on workers without a fair election — regardless of what those workers actually wanted. That's not worker empowerment. It's the opposite.
The Brown-Forman case said everything you need to know about how Cemex worked in practice. Woodford Reserve gave its workers a $4-per-hour raise, better merit pay, more vacation, and free bottles of bourbon. Workers voted 45-14 against unionizing. The Biden NLRB ordered the company to bargain with the union anyway. The 6th Circuit put a stop to it, and American workers are better off for it.
"The Biden NLRB weaponized the Cemex standard to strip workers of the secret ballot — the most fundamental protection workers have in deciding their own future in the workplace," said Gene Hamilton, Senior Advisor to CPAW. "President Trump has made clear that the era of bureaucrats overriding worker choice is over. The 6th Circuit's ruling reinforces that direction, and it's a clear signal to the NLRB: clean up the mess and restore the democratic process American workers deserve."
This ruling is a reflection of something bigger. American workers are pushing back — and the system is responding. Unions that fight for real wages, real safety, and real dignity have nothing to fear from a fair vote. A secret ballot is not a threat to good representation. It is the foundation of it. What workers have rightly rejected are the tactics that short-circuit their voice, using procedural maneuvers to override elections, imposing representation workers never chose, and substituting political ambition for the bread-and-butter work of actually improving members' lives.
This is what a pro-worker administration looks like in action. President Trump has consistently put worker choice at the center of labor policy, and the momentum is showing. When workers get a free, fair, anonymous vote — they use it. And that's exactly how it should be.