Roberts Denies Red Rock’s Stay Bid, Culinary Union Bargaining Order Stands
Chief Justice John Roberts on Friday denied Red Rock Resort’s emergency application to stay enforcement of a National Labor Relations Board order requiring the Summerlin casino to recognize and bargain with the Culinary union, according to the Las Vegas Review-Journal and CDC Gaming.
Roberts, who handles emergency applications arising from the U.S. Court of Appeals for the District of Columbia Circuit, issued the denial without explanation, the Review-Journal reports. The ruling does not block Red Rock from filing a formal petition for certiorari, nor does it signal whether the Supreme Court will ultimately take up the case. It does mean the NLRB’s bargaining order remains enforceable in the meantime.
The order requires Red Rock, which is wholly owned by Station Casinos LLC, to recognize and bargain in good faith with the Local Joint Executive Board of Las Vegas, affiliated with Culinary Local 226 and Bartenders Local 165, and to post notices informing employees of their federal labor rights, CDC Gaming reports.
A Station Casinos spokesperson said the company will comply with the court order but continues to object to the underlying NLRB decision, which the D.C. Circuit affirmed.
“The NLRB decision overturned the clear vote of Red Rock team members rejecting the Culinary Union,” the spokesperson said. “The decision prevents any company from granting benefits to its employees if it is aware of union interest in unionizing the company’s employees and nullifies the Red Rock team members’ vote to be union-free, all because Station Casinos treated its team members too well.”
The path through the D.C. Circuit
The D.C. Circuit upheld the NLRB’s 2024 decision in June, denied Red Rock’s request for rehearing en banc in August, and later rejected the casino’s bid to stay the mandate while it sought Supreme Court review. Red Rock then turned to Roberts on August 29, arguing it would suffer irreparable harm if forced to comply before the justices could weigh in.
The NLRB’s order is what’s known as a Gissel bargaining order, based on the Supreme Court’s 1969 ruling in NLRB v. Gissel Packing Co., which allows the board to compel bargaining even when employees have not voted to unionize, if the agency finds employer misconduct tainted the election process.
A dispute dating to a failed 2019 vote
The case traces back to a union election at Red Rock in December 2019, which the Culinary union lost. According to CDC Gaming, the union filed unfair labor practice charges alleging Station Casinos had unlawfully influenced the vote by rolling out improved employee benefits beginning November 19, 2019, days before the union petitioned to represent Red Rock workers. In 2022, the NLRB concluded a fair rerun election could not be held at the property because of employer interference.
David Dorey, an attorney with Fisher & Phillips who represented Station Casinos in the Supreme Court filing, argued there was nothing unusual about the company improving benefits for its roughly 14,000 employees across ten properties, nine of which were not Red Rock. The Station Casinos spokesperson said the company does not believe it is consistent with the NLRB’s stated mission to penalize it for providing what it called best-in-class benefits.
Red Rock has complied with the NLRB’s interim order while its legal challenge proceeded. The company is now expected to file its petition for a writ of certiorari with the Supreme Court, though no filing deadline has been reported.
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