Lawmakers pass bill banning ‘captive audience’ meetings

Captive audience meetings, the mandatory sessions typically called by employers when workers are on the cusp of unionizing, would be forbidden, according to legislation passed by both houses of the New York State legislature this weekend. 

Employers have for decades used mandatory staff meetings to push back on pro-union sentiments and to convince employees to vote against a unionization effort. The National Labor Relations Board’s general counsel, Jennifer Abruzzo, last year argued that requiring employees to attend the meetings constitutes an illegal unfair labor practice and called on the board to outlaw the practice. Unions have repeated that call and are also lobbying for Congress to ban the practice nationwide. 

“Across the country, large corporations have used ‘captive audience’ meetings as a means to disrupt worker-led organizing efforts and influence the political or social beliefs of their employees,” Bronx Assembly Member Karines Reyes, one of the bill’s sponsors, said in a statement. “These coercive tactics lead workers to feel trapped and even be penalized for standing up for their own personal religious, political beliefs and support of unionization efforts. With the passage of our bill, New York is one step closer to joining the growing chorus of states reaffirming and protecting the First Amendment rights of working people.”  

Captive audience meetings have been used as a tactic to slow nascent organizing campaigns at Amazon, Starbucks, Trader Joe’s and other high-profile companies as employers try to stamp out the spreading unionization push among a younger generation of workers. On occasion, workers have recorded parts of what they feel are captive audience meetings to show lawmakers and the public what kinds of statements their employers make about unions behind closed doors. 

‘Pressured and intimidated’ 

Queens State Senator Jessica Ramos, another one of the bill's sponsors, said in a statement that in passing the bill, lawmakers had taken unionizing workers’ complaints seriously. 

“You don’t check your First Amendment rights and freedom of conscience at the door when you clock in at work,” Ramos, chair of the Senate Committee on Labor, said in the statement. Ramos’ and Joyner’s bill prohibits employers from coercing workers from attending meetings if “the primary purpose of [the meeting] is to communicate the employer's opinion concerning religious or political matters,” including views on unions or unionization.  

A spokesperson for Governor Kathy Hochul said in a statement that the governor “will carefully review this legislation” before deciding whether to sign it into law.

Ramos highlighted workers at the REI Co-Op in SoHo who unionized in March 2022 and were forced to attend several sessions with management that workers have called captive audience meetings. The employees unionized with the Retail Wholesale and Department Store Union, whose president, Stuart Appelbaum, has called for the nationwide banning of captive audience meetings since at least last year. 

“Employers have become much more aggressive in using captive audience meetings to force workers into hearing the employer’s one-sided propaganda on unionization and other issues,” Appelbaum said in a statement following the legislation’s passage. “These meetings often leave workers feeling pressured and intimidated. It is time that the law catches up to the reality of the moment by allowing workers to refuse to attend these meetings without fear of retaliation.” 

Three states, Connecticut, Oregon and, most recently, Minnesota have banned the meetings. After the Connecticut ban passed, a coalition of U.S companies led by the U.S Chamber of Commerce sued the state in federal court, arguing that the law is preempted by the National Labor Relations Act and that it breached employers First Amendment-protected freedom of speech.