Minneapolis Labor Board Reports Home Depot Allegedly Fired An Employee For Wearing A BLM Logo

The National Labor Relations Board has filed a complaint against Home Depot after a former Minneapolis employee claimed he got fired because of his Black Lives Matter activism at work.

In the complaint, the Minneapolis branch of the NLRB said that the friction between the company and the employee began around August 2020 when the latter started wearing a Black Lives Matter (BLM) logo on his apron.

The employee also wrote emails, engaged in various conversations with his coworkers and supervisors about subjects such as ongoing racial discrimination and harassment and engaged in other “BLM-related protected concerted activity,” according to the NLRB’s complaint, which is public.

Although the months detailing exactly when the following events happened are redacted, the complaint highlighted the BLM lettering on the employee’s apron was a particular point of contention between him and his Home Depot employers.

The employee was suspended. After he returned, he was asked to choose between wearing the BLM logo or his employment at that Home Depot location.

After all the escalation, he was ultimately was terminated.

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The complaint further detailed that in February, management at that same location “threatened employees with unspecified consequences” if they engaged in conversations surrounding BLM and racial discrimination.

The NLRB’s filing was issued on August 12.

On August 16, the organization released a statement in which they highlighted that the employee “raising issues of racial harassment with coworkers and managers and displaying a Black Lives Matter slogan on his apron” were both all “protected actions under the National Labor Relations Act.”

In short, it reiterated the NLRB’s argument that Home Deport “unlawfully enforced its otherwise lawful dress code and apron policies and threatened employees not to engage in activity regarding racial harassment.”

Insider reported that a Home Depot representative said that the NLRB’s complaint “misrepresents the relevant facts” of the situation that led to the termination of that Minneapolis employee.

“The Home Depot does not tolerate workplace harassment of any kind and takes all reports of discrimination or harassment seriously, as we did in this case,” the spokesperson said. “We disagree with the characterization of this situation and look forward to sharing the facts during the NLRB’s process.”

As outlined in the NLRB’s filings, the home improvement company has until August 26 to respond to the complaint.

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Insider additionally noted that while Home Depot’s dress code prohibits its employees from wearing “causes or political messages unrelated to workplace matters” along with their aprons, workers are allowed to bring up discriminatory practices happening in the workplace — racial or otherwise — in light of the aforementioned National Labor Relations Act.

Many companies made public statements in solidarity with BLM last year following George Floyd’s murder.

In a statement released on June 01, 2020, Home Depot’s CEO Craig Menear said on the company’s behalf, “we must stand with all who are committed to change that will bring us closer to realizing an end to discrimination and hatred.”

Still, the home improvement retailer’s various other sociopolitical stances have made waves in the past.

11 Alive reported that in April, various faith-based leaders representing over 1,000 churches in Georgia called for a nationwide Home Depot boycott after they claimed the company — which is headquartered in Atlanta — showed no interest in their concerns regarding the then-new restrictive voting laws put in place by Governor Brian Kempt.

In comparison to other big corporations run out of the state like Coca-Cola and Delta, which the religious coalition highlighted were more open to a discussion on the changes happening to the state’s voting system, Home Depot’s absence from their virtual conference on the issue came across to them as the company being in support of Kempt’s law.

NPR reported back in 2019 that Home Depot faced threats of boycott then too, after its billionaire co-founder Bernie Marcus “pledged to back President Trump’s bid for re-election in 2020.”