Al Jazeera America’s digital newsroom became the latest new media organization to unionize on Tuesday.
Staff voted in favour 32 to 5, the National Labor Relations Board declared after counting the ballots cast by eligible employees.
Al Jazeera America is the latest of a number of newsrooms to unionize this year. Guardian US editorial staff, Gawker, Salon and Vice have all had internal votes or petitions and were voluntarily recognized by their management. So far, Al Jazeera America has been the only new media outlet that has organized its vote through the National Labor Relations Board.
Peter Szekely, president of the News Guild, said he was “disappointed” that the management did not voluntarily recognize the unionization efforts, but was confident that the NLRB vote would go in the workers’ favor.
“Our priority was to ensure that every employee of Al Jazeera America’s Digital Department could have a say about union representation and we respect the decision they have reached through this democratic vote,” an Al Jazeera America spokeswoman said in a statement on Tuesday. “We look forward to concluding a collective bargaining agreement and will continue to work closely with all of our staff to make working at AJAM a positive experience.”
Nine editors, who are part of the digital newsroom at Al Jazeera America, were not eligible to cast their vote because the company argued that their positions were supervisory in nature. The union, which pointed out that these editors do not have power to hire or fire, planed to fight their exclusion from the bargaining unit.
Yet, just hours after the results of the vote were announced, the company issued another statement that it “will not maintain our challenge to the status of the nine individuals in question”.
The News Guild of New York, which will now represent Al Jazeera America digital staff, is part of the Communications Workers of America (CWA) union. CWA also includes the News Media Guild, which represents Guardian US editorial staff. Gawker, Salon and Vice have recently voted to unionize under Writers Guild of America.
