Eight Years, Zero Contract: How Rieth-Riley Ran a Union Busting Playbook in Federal Court, and Lost
A Company That Refused to Talk to Its Own Workers
In May 2018, workers at Rieth-Riley Construction decided they wanted something different. Their union, Local 324 of the International Union of Operating Engineers, AFL-CIO, pulled out of a multi-employer bargaining agreement that covered several companies at once. They wanted to negotiate a contract directly with Rieth-Riley, one-on-one, worker to employer.
That request kicked off eight years of retaliation, legal warfare, and a strike that is still happening right now.
Rieth-Riley’s response was not to bargain in good faith. Instead, the company deployed a law firm, manufactured procedural excuses, gave unauthorized raises to undercut the union’s leverage, and eventually just told the union flat-out: we refuse to negotiate. A federal appeals court reviewed all of it and, on April 13, 2026, told Rieth-Riley it broke the law. Repeatedly.
Judge Mathis, U.S. Court of Appeals, Sixth Circuit, April 13, 2026
The Playbook: A Chronology of Stalling
It started simple. Local 324 wanted its own deal. Rieth-Riley refused to accept that and triggered a lockout. From there, the company turned every procedural tool available into a delay tactic. The NLRB filed a complaint in 2019. Instead of settling or bargaining seriously, Rieth-Riley kept litigating, kept appealing, and in 2021 and 2022 gave workers raises it never ran by the union first, which is precisely the kind of move the National Labor Relations Act (NLRA) forbids.
In June 2022, the company sent an actual letter to the union saying it “refuse[d] to bargain.” Not subtext. Not slow-walking negotiations. A formal declaration. The company also stopped fulfilling information requests the union was legally entitled to receive.
The Four Violations: What Rieth-Riley Actually Did
Violation #1: Unauthorized Wage Increases (2021 and 2022)
On June 1, 2021, Rieth-Riley raised wages for its union workers without running it by the union first. Then it did the same thing again in 2022. That sounds counterintuitive at first. The company gave workers more money, so what is the problem?
The problem is power. Under the NLRA, wages are a “mandatory subject of bargaining.” The union exists precisely to negotiate over raises, benefits, and conditions. When a company gives unilateral raises, it signals to workers: “We decide your pay, not your union.” It undermines the union’s reason for existing. The court confirmed the NLRB was right: Rieth-Riley committed an unfair labor practice both times.
Rieth-Riley’s defense was that the Davis-Bacon Act (a federal law requiring prevailing wages on government projects) forced their hand, and the union had been put on notice during a 2020 hearing. The court looked at that argument and rejected it. General testimony about past raises is not the same as clear notice of future specific raises. The union had no idea of the timing or exact amounts, and the court said so plainly.
San Juan Teachers Association, 355 NLRB 172, cited in the ruling
Violation #2: Withdrawing Recognition from the Union
Rieth-Riley did not just slow-walk negotiations. The court found the company completely cut off its relationship with the union. Federal labor law says you cannot stop recognizing a union as the workers’ representative unless workers themselves vote to get rid of it, and the vote clears legal scrutiny. Rieth-Riley never had that. The union retained its majority support status throughout. Yet the company acted as if the union simply did not exist.
The combination of illegal wage hikes, the June 2022 refusal letter, and stonewalling information requests was enough for the court: the company had made clear it considered the bargaining relationship over.
Violation #3: Flat-Out Refusing to Bargain
The company tried to dress up its refusal in legal clothing. It called it a “technical refusal to bargain,” a real legal doctrine that lets employers refuse to negotiate temporarily in order to challenge a certification decision in federal court. Rieth-Riley claimed it was using this doctrine to get judicial review of a decision to dismiss decertification petitions filed by an employee named Rayalan Kent.
The court said: that is not how this works. The technical refusal doctrine applies when a court order changes the bargaining relationship. Dismissing a decertification petition just kept things exactly the same as before. Rieth-Riley still had the same legal duty to bargain that it always had. Refusing to do so was just breaking the law.
“Until a union is decertified following an election, the company’s obligations to it are the same as they had been before the election and if it spurns those obligations it is guilty of an unfair labor practice.”Heartland Human Services v. NLRB, 746 F.3d 802 (7th Cir. 2014), cited in ruling
Violation #4: Blocking the Union’s Information Requests
For a union to negotiate effectively, it needs information. Wages paid to workers. Benefits data. Payroll records. The NLRA requires companies to hand this over when unions ask for it. Rieth-Riley had a pending information request from the union dated May 25, 2022. When the company sent its refusal-to-bargain letter in June, it also announced it would not be complying with that request, or any future ones.
Blocking information is not a technical legal dispute. It is a practical way of kneecapping the union’s ability to represent workers at the table. The court upheld the NLRB’s finding on this too.
The Non-Financial Ledger: What the Court Documents Do Not Add Up
Federal court decisions count violations. They do not count what it costs a person to spend eight years on a picket line. Here is what the legal record does not show you.
Lost Time and Lost Income
The strike is ongoing as of April 2026. That is 130 to 170 operating engineers in Michigan who have spent years without a stable contract. No contract means no guaranteed wages, no predictable health coverage, no certainty about retirement benefits. These are skilled tradespeople who run heavy equipment on construction sites. They did not go on strike for fun. They did it because their employer refused to sit across a table from them.
The Psychological Weight of Being Ignored
There is a specific kind of exhaustion that comes from being told, legally and formally, that your employer does not consider your representative legitimate. When Rieth-Riley sent that June 2022 letter saying it refused to bargain, it was not sending it to a union bureaucracy. It was sending it to the people whose labor built the roads and structures those executives drive on. The message was: your voice does not count. A federal court said it does. But eight years of that message takes a toll that no court order undoes.
The Manufactured Decertification Play
In 2020, an employee named Rayalan Kent filed a petition to decertify the union. The court record makes clear that the NLRB’s own policies flagged a “causal nexus” between Rieth-Riley’s unfair labor practices and worker dissatisfaction with the union. When you spend years undercutting a union through illegal unilateral actions, some workers will lose faith in it. That manufactured cynicism becomes evidence for decertification. The company created the distrust and then tried to use that distrust as a legal weapon. The court blocked it.
The Law Firm as a Blunt Instrument
Rieth-Riley was represented by Faegre Drinker Biddle and Reath LLP, a large national law firm. The workers had Local 324. The asymmetry is the point. A construction company with the resources to run eight years of federal litigation against 130-170 workers is not fighting for legal principle. It is grinding people down. Each appeal, each new argument, each procedural detour is a year the workers do not have a contract. The legal system became the punishment.
Legal Receipts: What the Court Actually Said
“Rieth-Riley committed several serious [unfair labor practices]. Unilateral changes, a refusal to bargain, and a failure to provide information demonstrated a withdrawal of recognition.”Sixth Circuit, citing Arbah Hotel Corp., 371 NLRB No. 126 (2022)
“The NLRA does not grant us jurisdiction to provide the judicial review Rieth-Riley seeks. And because Rieth-Riley’s refusal to bargain cannot confer us with jurisdiction over the Board’s affirmance of the dismissal of the decertification petitions, there is nothing technical about it. It is simply a violation of the NLRA.”Judge Mathis, Rieth-Riley Construction Co. v. NLRB, Nos. 24-2105/25-1073 (6th Cir. April 13, 2026)
“The company’s obligations to the Union were ‘the same as they had been before the election’ and ‘it spurn[ed] those obligations,’ making Rieth-Riley ‘guilty of an unfair labor practice.'”Sixth Circuit, citing Heartland Human Services v. NLRB, 746 F.3d 802 (7th Cir. 2014)
“Such general statements, without essential details like timing and amounts, are too broad to qualify as adequate notice.”Sixth Circuit, affirming NLRB finding on Violation #1 (Unilateral Wage Hikes)
Societal Impact Mapping: Why This Case Is Bigger Than One Company
Economic Inequality: The Union Busting Business Model
Rieth-Riley’s strategy was not unique. It is a documented playbook: delay negotiations through litigation, make unilateral changes to show the union is powerless, manufacture decertification campaigns, and exhaust workers financially and emotionally until the union collapses or settles for scraps.
The construction industry is one of the last sectors where union membership provides genuine wage premiums. Weakening unions in construction means weaker safety standards, lower wages, and more workplace injuries for the skilled tradespeople who build public infrastructure. This is not abstract. It is roads, bridges, and public buildings built by people who cannot negotiate a fair wage.
When companies win through attrition, they signal to every other employer in the industry that this strategy works. Rieth-Riley lost, eventually, after eight years. The workers spent those eight years without a contract. That is the hidden subsidy the law provided Rieth-Riley: time.
Public Health: Worker Safety Without Contracts
Operating engineers run heavy equipment on construction sites. These are among the most dangerous jobs in the United States. Union contracts are not just about wages; they include safety protocols, mandatory rest periods, equipment maintenance requirements, and grievance procedures when those standards are violated.
When a company destabilizes a union through years of unfair labor practices, it does not just affect paychecks. Workers in industries with weakened collective bargaining report higher rates of workplace injury and are less likely to report unsafe conditions out of fear of retaliation. A company willing to break federal labor law to avoid bargaining is not a company investing heavily in worker safety culture.
Environmental Degradation: The Race to the Bottom
Construction companies that suppress labor costs through union busting do not stop there. They also tend to cut corners on environmental compliance, waste disposal, and site remediation. Lower labor costs do not get reinvested into cleaner practices; they become shareholder returns or executive compensation. The communities around construction sites, often lower-income and communities of color, bear the environmental cost. This case does not document specific environmental violations, but the pattern across the construction industry is consistent: where unions lose, environmental accountability erodes alongside wages.
Democratic Erosion: When the Law Is Used as a Delay Tactic
Perhaps the most corrosive societal impact here is what this case teaches about access to justice. Rieth-Riley had a major national law firm and unlimited corporate resources. The workers had a union. The company ran eight years of federal litigation and the workers still have no contract. The court ruled correctly. But the ruling came eight years in. Every worker who left the industry, every family that struggled financially during the strike, every union member who lost faith is a cost the legal system cannot reimburse.
When corporations can use legal procedures as punishment, the formal victory for workers means less than it should.
The “Cost of a Life” Metric: What Eight Years Buys You
Operating engineers in Michigan earn a median wage in the range of $30-$45 per hour under union contracts. Multiply that by the difference between a fully bargained contract and what workers get during a contested strike period, multiplied by 130-170 workers, multiplied by eight years of uncertainty: the economic harm to these families runs into the tens of millions of dollars in lost bargaining power alone.
What does that money buy when it is not going to workers? It funds attorneys at national law firms billing at $400-$800 per hour to file appeal after appeal. It funds lobbyists pushing for weakened labor protections. It funds executive compensation that continues regardless of the strike. The math is brutal: the cost of union busting is paid by workers, and the profits flow up.
The court ordered Rieth-Riley to bargain in good faith, recognize the union, stop the unfair labor practices, and provide the requested information. It did not order financial restitution for eight years of harm. Federal labor law does not work that way. That gap, between the violation and the remedy, is where corporations live.
What Now: Who Is Responsible and What You Can Do
The People Who Made These Decisions
Corporate decisions to litigate, refuse to bargain, and undermine unions do not happen by accident. They are made by executives and boards. The source documents do not name specific executives or board members beyond the legal team. What the record does name:
Rieth-Riley Construction Co., Inc.: Indiana-based. Employs 130-170 operating engineers in Michigan. Subject to NLRB enforcement order as of April 13, 2026.
Corporate Officers (Roles): Chief Executive Officer, Chief Operating Officer, Vice President of Human Resources. These are the roles responsible for labor relations strategy. Names were not identified in the court record reviewed.
Outside Counsel: Faegre Drinker Biddle and Reath LLP, Indianapolis, Indiana. Lead attorney: Brian J. Paul. This firm designed and executed the eight-year litigation strategy.
Regulatory Bodies With Authority Here
The Bills That Could Change This
There are ongoing legislative efforts to strengthen the NLRA, reduce the time gap between violations and remedies, and increase penalties for repeat offenders. The court record does not cite specific pending bills. [REDACTED – Not in Source: Specific bill numbers for pending federal labor reform legislation were not provided in the source material. Research current Congressional activity on the Protecting the Right to Organize Act or similar labor reform legislation for current status.]
Calls to Action
For workers in Michigan: If you are employed at Rieth-Riley or a similar employer and believe your labor rights are being violated, contact NLRB Region 7 directly. You have the right to file unfair labor practice charges without retaliation.
For everyone: Local 324, International Union of Operating Engineers represents these workers. Unions survive through solidarity and public support. Research their current status, amplify their story, and support labor-friendly candidates at every level of government who will appoint NLRB board members who enforce the law with speed, not delay.
Mutual aid and organizing: The formal legal system took eight years to deliver a ruling with no financial remedy. Grassroots mutual aid for striking workers, community pressure on employers, and local political organizing to elect officials who care about worker rights are not replacements for legal protection, but they are the only things that operate on a human timescale.
Watch the compliance: The NLRB order requires Rieth-Riley to bargain in good faith. That means nothing without monitoring. Follow Local 324’s public communications and hold this company accountable to the court’s order.
💡 Explore Corporate Misconduct by Category
Corporations harm people every day — from wage theft to pollution. Learn more by exploring key areas of injustice.
- 💀 Product Safety Violations — When companies risk lives for profit.
- 🌿 Environmental Violations — Pollution, ecological collapse, and unchecked greed.
- 💼 Labor Exploitation — Wage theft, worker abuse, and unsafe conditions.
- 🛡️ Data Breaches & Privacy Abuses — Misuse and mishandling of personal information.
- 💵 Financial Fraud & Corruption — Lies, scams, and executive impunity.
