President Appoints Lauren McFerran NLRB Chairman

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January 20, 2021

Washington DC – President Joseph R. Biden has named Board Member Lauren McFerran Chairman of the National Labor Relations Board.

“It is a tremendous honor to assume the Chairmanship of the NLRB,” McFerran said. “I am deeply grateful for the opportunity to continue serving with our extraordinary agency staff in this new capacity. In these turbulent times for working people, the mission of the Board and the rights we protect are more important than ever. I look forward to this new chapter in the Board’s work, redoubling our efforts to serve the Act’s goals -- ‘encouraging the practice and procedure of collective bargaining and . . . protecting the exercise by workers of full freedom of association.’”

McFerran served as a Member of the NLRB from December 17, 2014 until December 16, 2019. On July 29, 2020, the Senate confirmed her renomination as a Board Member for a term expiring on December 16, 2024.

The NLRB also consists of Member John F. Ring (previously NLRB Chairman), whose term expires on December 16, 2022; Member Marvin E. Kaplan, whose term expires on August 22, 2025; and Member William J. Emanuel, whose term expires on August 27, 2021. One Board member seat is currently vacant.

Prior to her appointment to the NLRB, Ms. McFerran served as Chief Labor Counsel for the Senate Committee on Health, Education, Labor, and Pensions (HELP Committee) and also previously served the Committee as Deputy Staff Director under Senator Tom Harkin. She began working on the HELP Committee as Senior Labor Counsel for Senator Ted Kennedy. Before her work in the United States Senate, Ms. McFerran was an associate at Bredhoff & Kaiser, P.L.L.C. and served as a law clerk for Chief Judge Carolyn Dineen King on the United States Court of Appeals for the Fifth Circuit. Ms. McFerran received a B.A. from Rice University and a J.D. from Yale Law School.

Established in 1935, the National Labor Relations Board is an independent federal agency that protects employees, employers, and unions from unfair labor practices and protects the right of private sector employees to join together, with or without a union, to improve wages, benefits and working conditions. The NLRB conducts hundreds of workplace elections and investigates thousands of unfair labor practice charges each year.