Appeals Court Sides With Home Depot Over NLRB in BLM Dispute (1)

Home Depot Inc. doesn’t have to rehire a Minnesota retail worker after a federal appeals court held that the National Labor Relations Board “improperly evaluated” the reasons for the company’s rule banning political slogans on employees’ uniforms.

The US Court of Appeals for the Eighth Circuit vacated and remanded a 2024 NLRB ruling Thursday that found the hardware giant violated federal labor law by enforcing the policy after an employee was fired for refusing to remove a “Black Lives Matter” insignia.

The decision marks a blow to efforts by former NLRB General Counsel Jennifer Abruzzo to extend labor law protections to civil rights protests in the workplace. The Home Depot case is one of several tackling the issue after the 2020 murder of George Floyd reinvigorated the Black Lives Matter movement. The NLRB ruled last year that workers at a Birmingham bar weren’t protected when they participated in BLM protests against racial discrimination, and an agency judge struck down similar allegations against Whole Foods Market Inc. in 2023.

Judge James Loken, who wrote Thursday’s opinion, rejected the board’s arguments that Home Depot didn’t have valid reasons for banning the BLM slogan at its store near Minneapolis, Minn. in the weeks after Floyd was killed. Loken said Home Depot hadn’t disparately applied its policy by firing Caro Linda Bo and had legitimate concerns about the safety of staff.

“The activity in dispute was not a display at a random location in the United States; it was not at a normal moment in time; and it was not a generic message for equal rights or employee protection,” the judge said. “This was a business decision made to preserve the store’s apolitical face to customers and safeguard employee safety in a risk-filled environment.”

Home Depot urged the all-Republican appeals panel during oral arguments in June to toss the NLRB’s rulings, arguing that the board had ignored its rights under the First Amendment.

Home Depot was represented by attorneys with Ogletree & Deakins and Latham & Watkins. NLRB attorneys represented the agency.

The case is Home Depot U.S.A. v. NLRB, 8th Cir., No. 24-01406, 11/6/25.