🗞️ Fired for Speaking Up: Hotel Worker's COVID Complaints Win Federal Labor Ruling

In early January 2021, Diandra Marie Diaz was raising COVID-related safety concerns with her colleagues at a San Antonio hotel. Within days, she was fired.

On April 17, 2026, the National Labor Relations Board affirmed a ruling that RRI West Management, LLC, the operator of the Red Roof Plus on San Antonio's Riverwalk, had violated federal labor law by discharging Diaz on January 11, 2021. The Board's decision, originally written by Administrative Law Judge Arthur J. Amchan and affirmed by Chairman James R. Murphy and Members David M. Prouty and Scott A. Mayer, found that Diaz's termination was not the result of poor performance, as the company claimed, but of her protected concerted activity under the National Labor Relations Act.

Diaz had been reassigned from Assistant General Manager to a sales representative role in October 2020 after broader management changes at the property. During the roughly three months that followed, she raised COVID-related safety concerns with coworkers, discussed quarantine protocols, challenged a manager she believed had come to work while ill, and counseled front desk employees about their workplace rights and conditions. Hotel leadership, the record showed, had come to view her as an unsanctioned "alternative voice" for employees, one that complicated the authority of the new management team.

The timing of the termination decision proved central to the Board's analysis. No action against Diaz was under consideration until regional management began exchanging emails about her employee outreach in early January. Once those communications began, the record showed, executives moved to settle on a justification. HR Vice President Stephanie Dougherty, upon learning how long Diaz had been in the sales role, replied that the timing was "excellent" because the company could "chalk it up to 90 days." No such probationary condition had ever appeared in Diaz's offer letter or been communicated to her directly.

The Board applied the Wright Line burden-shifting standard, under which the General Counsel must first establish that an employee's protected activity was a motivating factor in the adverse employment action. Once that showing is made, the burden shifts to the employer to demonstrate it would have taken the same action regardless. The Board found the General Counsel's burden met: Diaz had never received negative performance feedback, her mentor had told her she was doing a good job, the company had set no sales targets for her role, and one of the employer's own witnesses acknowledged that traditional business travel had "all but ceased" during the pandemic period in question. The employer's stated performance rationale, the Board concluded, was pretextual.

The Board also found, as a separate and independent violation, that directing Diaz to stop counseling fellow employees about their workplace concerns ran afoul of Section 8(a)(1) of the Act. That finding was supported by contemporaneous emails from General Manager Carlos Ortiz and Regional Vice President Darryl Fenner.

On remedy, the Board applied the expanded make-whole standard it established in Thryv, Inc., 372 NLRB No. 22 (2022), which extended employer liability beyond standard backpay and reinstatement to cover all direct or foreseeable financial harms suffered by a discharged worker, including job search costs, interim employment expenses, and adverse tax consequences from receiving a lump-sum backpay award. The Board also declined to reduce Diaz's backpay by the amount of unemployment compensation she received under Texas's chargebacks program, citing the Supreme Court's 1951 ruling in NLRB v. Gullett Gin Co., which held that unemployment payments reflect state social policy and are not a sum to be deducted from a worker's recovery.

The ruling was not without internal tension. Chairman Murphy and Member Mayer applied the Thryv framework while explicitly reserving judgment on whether its expanded remedy is legally sound, noting openness to reconsidering it in a future proceeding. That caution tracks a deepening circuit split: the Third, Fifth, and Sixth Circuits have all rejected the Thryv standard as exceeding the Board's statutory authority, while the Ninth Circuit has upheld it, leaving the doctrine's long-term viability an open question.

Key Points

• No termination of Diaz had been under consideration before management began exchanging emails about her COVID safety counseling and employee outreach in early January 2021
• The employer's 90-day probationary rationale was never communicated to Diaz, never reflected in her offer letter, and was identified as a justification only after the decision to terminate had been made
• The NLRB found both the discharge and the directive to stop counseling employees were independent violations of Section 8(a)(1) of the NLRA
• Under the Wright Line burden-shifting framework, once the General Counsel showed protected activity was a motivating factor, the employer failed to demonstrate it would have terminated Diaz regardless
• Remedy was expanded under Thryv, Inc. (2022) to cover all direct or foreseeable financial harms beyond standard backpay and reinstatement
• Unemployment compensation received under Texas's chargebacks program was not deducted from the backpay award, consistent with NLRB v. Gullett Gin Co. and longstanding Board policy
• Two of the three Board members signaled openness to reconsidering Thryv in a future case; the Third, Fifth, and Sixth Circuits have rejected the standard while the Ninth Circuit has upheld it
• The order requires reinstatement, full backpay with compounded interest, compensation for adverse tax consequences, removal of the discharge from Diaz's personnel file, and a 60-consecutive-day employee notice posting at the facility

Primary Source Author: Arthur J. Amchan, Administrative Law Judge; affirmed by Chairman James R. Murphy, Member David M. Prouty, and Member Scott A. Mayer

Primary Source: RRI West Management, LLC, 374 NLRB No. 98 (April 17, 2026)

Primary Source Link: https://www.nlrb.gov/case/16-CA-278283

Supplemental References

• NLRB: What is Protected Concerted Activity?
• NLRB: Thryv, Inc. — Board Expands Make-Whole Remedy (2022)
• NLRB: Board Clarifies Wright Line Burden of Proof (2023)
• Holland & Knight: NLRB Expands Standard Remedies Under Thryv
• HR Law Watch: Circuit Split on Thryv Foreseeable Damages (2025)
• Jackson Lewis: Protected Concerted Activity and Totality of Circumstances Test
• Littler: NLRB Expands Make-Whole Remedy (Thryv Analysis)
• Fred Law: Thryv Remedies and Potential Supreme Court Review (2025)