When Connor Hovey began talking to his co-workers at Trader Joe’s in Louisville about forming a union, he knew it wouldn’t be easy. What he didn’t expect was that the campaign would transform from a marathon into a race without a finish line.
Two years after Hovey and his co-workers won a union election in Louisville, their fight for union representation remains in limbo. The grocery chain with a progressive reputation filed six objections with the National Labor Relations Board after workers voted 48 to 36 to join Trader Joe’s United, an independent union. Every objection was tossed twice — first by an NLRB hearing officer and later by a regional director. But last month, the workers’ path to certification stalled again when President Donald Trump abruptly fired Gwynne Wilcox, a Biden appointee, leaving the board unable to rule on the company’s final appeal.
