Jewish group files federal complaint against lawyers union

A union representing lawyers, paralegals and other workers at legal organizations in New York is the target of a new federal complaint alleging it failed in its duty to represent Jewish members. But members of the union at the New York Legal Assistance Group, including Jewish members, deny the charges, saying the union, A Better NYLAG, hasn’t engaged in any antisemitism. 

The federal complaint was filed by the Louis D. Brandeis Center for Human Rights Under Law last week with the NLRB and federal Equal Employment Opportunity Commission alleging that the Association of Legal Advocates and Attorneys — A Better NYLAG’s parent union — discriminated against its Jewish members.  

The complaint is filed on behalf of some workers at NYLAG who support a policy instituted by management last year that banned workers from displaying posters about the ongoing conflict in the Gaza Strip. Workers at NYLAG put up posters in their workplaces about a variety of political topics, but after receiving complaints from Jewish and pro-Israel workers in early 2024, management banned all materials relating to the “Israel/Gaza conflict.” 

ABN, which represents around 250 workers, has resisted the ban. Its members, including some who are Jewish, have made a coordinated effort to replace the posters each time they’re torn down, insisting that the posters are not antisemitic. The union filed an unfair labor practice charge after management ordered the wholesale removal of “offensive material” last July and held a picket outside their lower Manhattan offices to protest the policy. 

But not all NYLAG members were happy with the union’s stance on the poster issue, or how it responded following Hamas' attack on Israel on Oct. 7 2023, according to the complaint filed last week. The posters “created a toxic environment for NYLAG’s Jewish employees,” the Brandeis Center’s complaint reads, which led one Jewish member to email NYLAG management urging them to “do something” about the posters. 

Just two weeks after that email was sent — management received at least three emails from members concerned about ABN’s stance on the conflict — the poster ban was instituted. The unfair labor practice charge the union filed after that ban was expanded in the summer was an action the union took to “undermine NYLAG’s efforts to protect Jewish employees,” the complaint alleges.  

“The ABN’s anti-Israel crusade at NYLAG has never abated, and the ABN has embraced the posters’ violent anti-Semitic rhetoric,” the complaint says. “In fact, the speech conveyed by those posters and imagery has absolutely nothing to do with working conditions at NYLAG; nothing to do with wages, benefits, job security, retirement, workload, discipline, promotion, opportunity for advancement, unequal treatment of employees, or anything that would conceivably improve any aspect of NYLAG’s workplace.” 

‘A sign of solidarity’

The posters do not discriminate against Jewish union members, said Maya Adelman Cabral, a NYLAG paralegal, on Monday. She pointed out that many of the employees who have posters up, such as Adelman Cabral, are Jewish. 

"Many of us would argue that these posters are not antisemitic," she said. "These posters are not a statement of bias or prejudice against a group of people; they are a sign of our commitment to solidarity and liberation. The Brandeis Center is weaponizing these claims to undermine the fight for free speech at our workplace.”  

ABN is looking to enshrine free speech protections for union members in their next union contract, currently being negotiated.

The workers’ contract expires in June, and the union is part of the Association of Legal Aid Attorneys’ first-ever round of sectoral bargaining with legal service providers. Free speech protections, especially on the issue of Palestine, is one of the central non-economic bargaining tenants that thousands of ALAA members agreed to at their sectoral bargaining convention last year.  

Leadership at the Brandeis Center insists that they are standing up for union members uncomfortable with ABN’s stance on Palestine and argue that the union has failed to represent its members. 

“Jewish American union members, like all other working people, are entitled to union representation that supports them fairly and equally against toxic environments,” Kenneth L. Marcus, chairman of the Brandeis Center, said in a statement. “In this case, the union made things worse, actively attempting to block management efforts to address a workplace that had been made inhospitable for Jewish workers. This is exactly the opposite of what unions should be doing. We must hold labor unions accountable when they exacerbate anti-Semitic environments, just as we do with universities, public schools, and other institutions.” 

Adrienne Neff, an attorney in NYLAG’s legal health unit, said that the only threats to union members’ rights or representation has come from NYLAG management, which she said has engaged in a “union busting campaign” by cracking down on union members expressing support for Palestinians through posters or other means. Most recently, Neff said that she and more than a dozen other coworkers were disciplined by management after posing for a photo in their office while wearing keffiyehs, traditional Palestinian headdresses. 

Management barred workers from taking photos or videos in the office after that incident, she said.  

A spokesperson for NYLAG did not respond to a request for comment.  

Neff argued that union members who supported NYLAG’s poster ban could have voiced their opinions at a union town hall held last summer or through other internal union channels instead of enlisting an outside organization like the Brandeis Center.  

“Supporting Palestine does not threaten anyone else's well-being,” she insisted. 

dfreeman@thechiefleader.com