Andy Puzder, former CEO of CKE Restaurants, discusses how angry New York Times employees were at being asked to return to the Fox Business Tonight desk.
After the editorial staff of The Athletic, which is owned by The New York Times They declared their wish To join the newspaper’s newsroom union, management told the Times Guild on Thursday it would not honor her request.
He added: “The administration’s decision does not come as a surprise New York Times“A long history of union busting,” the Times Guild said in response to the news. “We have filed for an election with the National Labor Relations Board (NLRB) and that process is moving forward. Sports jobs are Times Guild jobs. It’s that simple.”
“Instead of doing the right thing by sports workers, Times management continues the charade of pretending to run separate newsrooms in an effort to maintain a two-tier system that disenfranchises sports workers,” the union said.
The New York Times acquired the online sports news outlet in 2022, and while management originally claimed The Athletic’s operations would be separate, it has been integrated into the newsroom, the union explained in a press release.
Failed negotiations led to union members withdrawing from their jobs in the media in 2024
The New York Times Building in Manhattan, New York, United States, August 3, 2020.
The Athletic was founded in 2016 as a subscription-based, ad-free sports site that would attract die-hard fans of various teams, but ultimately struggled to become profitable without ads and searched for a buyer. Acquired by The New York Times for $550 million.
Times management is closed The New York Times Sports Desk in September 2023 and the work was assigned to Times staffers assigned to The Athletic. Now, about 200 editorial staff at The Athletic, which now serves as the de facto sports section of The New York Times, have organized themselves to be part of the Times Guild.
When a reader opens the print sports section, they will see sports stories, Stacey Cawley, a business reporter at The New York Times and a Times Guild elected official, told Fox News Digital.
“The way the administration interacted with them built support for unionization and for them to join the Times Guild,” she said. “We often hear the joke that management is the best regulator we have, and that proved true in this case.”
“I think the Athletic staff felt very much the erosion of their independent identity and the growth of their treatment as a unit at The New York Times, and that built real momentum among their staff to say, ‘Okay, if we are New York Times staffers who work at the New York Times, we should be a part of it,’” she added. From the New York Times Union Guild we get the benefits and protections of this contract.”
The NewsGuild of NY has three “bargaining units” or unions at The New York Times, which include The Times Guild, which includes about 1,500 newsroom, business and support employees, the Wirecutter Union, which consists of about 100 editorial employees, and the Tech Guild, which includes about 700 industry workers. Technology.
Cawley said the News Guild is confident it has a strong case to present to the NLRB. She also criticized members of management who told The Athletic they would be good partners in their efforts to unionize.
Forbes editorial staff quit on the same day the company’s “30 Under 30” list was released.
The New York Times office in midtown Manhattan (iStock/iStock)
“They’ve never been good partners in this,” she said. “When they bought The Athletic, the initial response was that they would operate completely independently.” “They waited until three weeks after that, I think it was three or four weeks right after our contract closed for 2023, and then they turned around and closed the sports office, and we were all very aware of that timing.”
She added: “It was a very clear move. They did not bring this up in the contract negotiations. They waited until we closed the contract and then dropped this news on us a month later.” When newsroom members confronted them about this in a heated meeting, their response was: “Oh, we had no plans to do that.”
She said members now had no choice but to consider the possibility that they had sincerely made the decision to close the news office in two weeks without any previous plans to do so, “which is not a great sign of their ability to do so.” “They expected” or “They lied to us and they knew all along that this is what they were going to do and they waited until we closed the contract to do it.”
“They haven’t built a lot of credibility with their employees about how they interact with the union,” she added.
NYT TECH GUILD has reached an agreement with leadership after years of bargaining
Cawley said they are now waiting to see what the NLRB has to say. The athlete’s hearing is scheduled for next week.
New York Times Guild members on the picket line. (Getty Images)
“The period where there is a big question mark is what comes next, because how long it takes for the board to make its ruling is very variable,” she said.
Cawley also took aim at the Times editorial board, which has consistently taken extremely pro-union positions.
“The New York Times is a large, publicly traded company that has a lot of very highly paid executives, and they understand that union contracts transfer some power to workers, and very few companies agree to that voluntarily,” she said.
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Sports publisher David Perpich told staff On Thursday he believed the best approach would be for the site’s journalists to have a separate bargaining unit within the NewsGuild.
“The Athletic’s newsroom is completely independent from The Times, with separate leadership,” he wrote. “This difference has allowed us to maintain policies and practices for sports coverage needs at the national and local levels, with a workforce across the country. This has enabled us to maintain our unique workplace culture and deliver at our best.” Class journalism for the masses.
“Furthermore, The Athletic needs to be an economically sustainable business that can financially support what has become one of the largest newsrooms, with more than 500 journalists. We have made progress towards this ambition, but we still have a long way to go.” The Contracts Unit Separate bargaining is the best path to maintaining the size and strength of our newsroom and achieving further growth.
Fox News Digital has reached out to The New York Times for comment.
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