PAGE 2 | August 6, 2021 | NORTHWEST LABOR PRESS
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Case dismissed: Scabby the rat beats the rap
By Don McIntosh
Scabby the Rat is 12 feet tall and
has red eyes, fangs, and claws. It
may be scary looking, but the
beloved union inflatable is not an
outlaw, the National Labor Rela-
tions Board (NLRB) has ruled.
In 2018, Peter Robb, the
Trump-appointed top lawyer at
the NLRB, argued in legal fil-
ings that Scabby is illegally “co-
ercive” when used to shame a
neutral party to a labor dispute.
But Joe Biden fired Robb the
day he took office, and on July
21 Robb’s case against Scabby
was dismissed in a 3-1 decision
of the Board.
Scabby’s legal trouble began
in September 2018 in Elkhart,
Indiana. There, Operating Engi-
neers Local 150 was in a dispute
with a company called MacAl-
lister Machinery, and an RV
parts maker, Lippert Compo-
nents, was renting MacAllister’s
equipment. Local 150 decided
to let the world know.
Outside a trade show hosted
by the huge RV manufacturer
Thor Industries, Scabby showed
up accompanied by two Local
150 reps and two eight-foot ban-
ners. One banner said, “Shame
on Lippert Components for Har-
boring Rat Contractors.” The
other said “OSHA Found Safety
Violations Against MacAllister
Machinery.” The rat, banners,
and reps stayed there all day
long, all four days of the trade
show.
It was embarrassing, a Lip-
pert executive told his in-house
attorney. And as the attorney
later complained in a charge
filed with the NLRB, the rat was
“quite menacing in its appear-
ance” and was “intended to be
scary.”
Seriously? The union reps
and their rat were on public land
bordering the road. They didn’t
block entry or exit. They didn’t
cause disruption, stop traffic,
make loud noises, or even ap-
proach patrons or employees.
They just stood there, rat and
reps, with banners, making a
point. Something called the First
Amendment is supposed to pro-
tect that, Scabby’s supporters ar-
gued. As the case progressed,
more than two dozen labor or-
ganizations filed legal briefs in
support of Scabby, including the
AFL-CIO, North America’s
Building Trades Unions, Brick-
layers, Carpenters, Operating
Engineers Laborers, SEIU,
United Association of Plumbers
and Fitters.
Robb argued that for Local
150 to show up with Scabby
was unlawful because Lippert
was a “neutral” employer―the
union’s members didn’t work
for Lippert. Thus having Scabby
at the RV show amounted to an
illegal “secondary boycott.”
That would go against previ-
ous interpretations of the law,
Board members wrote in dis-
missing the case.