
“When we declined to host the event, Tikvah resorted to threats, saying we had created an enemy. The museum penned an op-ed of its own, saying its charter forbids it from renting space for purely political or religious reasons. The Coalition for Jewish Values, which says it represents more than 2,000 Orthodox rabbis, scolded the museum for denying DeSantis a platform. “The new czars of cancel culture seem to have little such moral imagination or civic tolerance,” they wrote.
NYC RADAR IN MOTION FREE
The op-ed asserted that protecting free speech was more important than concerns over protests or a potential backlash from donors. “We know things are bad when a Jewish institution - in this case, a museum whose purpose is to keep Jewish heritage alive by remembering the Holocaust - turns on its own and tries to make a virtue of its own intolerance,” wrote Tikvah CEO Eric Cohen and its chairman, Elliott Abrams.
NYC RADAR IN MOTION PLUS
The museum cited security issues among its key concerns, plus a desire not to host political speakers, but in an op-ed in the Wall Street Journal, the leaders of the Tikvah Fund, the group organizing the conference, accused the museum of having a political litmus test. The Museum of Jewish Heritage had been set to host the annual gathering of conservative thinkers, but backed out earlier this spring. The Jewish Leadership Conference has already lost one venue in New York City after adding DeSantis to its list of speakers. He said he was satisfied that the hearing officer has implemented safeguards to maintain the integrity of the hearing, adding that “there exists no extraordinary circumstances to deviate from the Board’s longstanding policy of allowing public observation of the Board’s proceedings.He called DeSantis an “outspoken opponent of LGBTQ equality who is trying to foist his agenda on LGBTQ families, and it’s extremely hurtful and distressing.”ĭeSantis campaign spokesman Dave Abrams did not respond directly to that criticism, but said the governor “will always stand up for what is right and will not be deterred by the radical Left.”ĭeSantis, who is widely believed to be weighing a bid for the White House in 2024, inflamed ire among LGBTQ groups when in March he signed into law a bill that forbids Florida schools from teaching about sexual orientation and gender identity to public school students from kindergarten through the third grade.Īt the time of the bill signing, DeSantis said schools were a place for “an education, not an indoctrination.” Overstreet noted in his order that a hearing officer has issued instructions to not record the hearing. The company says it wants to redo the election, but pro-union experts and labor organizers argue it’s a method to delay negotiations for a union contract. The e-commerce juggernaut has sought to overturn the union victory at one of its New York City warehouses since April, saying organizers with the nascent Amazon Labor Union and the Brooklyn office of the NLRB, which oversaw the election, acted in a way that tainted the results. Accordingly, preventing the public from viewing its important processes is not an option,” Overstreet wrote.Īmazon has pointed to “unprecedented national media coverage” as one of the reasons access to the hearing should be limited, arguing it makes it difficult to sequester witnesses.īut the fact that the union election “has garnered national and international attention from outside parties only further solidifies the importance of allowing public observation,” Overstreet wrote.

He wrote in a filing that the company hasn’t “put forward any compelling reason” to depart from long-standing policy of holding public hearings. On Thursday, Cornele Overstreet, a regional director with the NLRB field office who will oversee the hearing, denied the company’s request. The hearing, which begins Monday, is expected to last several days. But the Seattle-based company filed a motion Tuesday arguing the agency should make the hearing on the Staten Island union vote private because it will be held over Zoom.Īmazon argued that a Zoom hearing makes difficult to know if witnesses who aren’t supposed to observe the hearing are listening in, or whether the hearing is being recorded and shared with others, which the labor board prohibits. Hearings by the National Labor Relations Board are typically held in person and open to the public.

A federal labor board has denied Amazon’s request to bar the public from a hearing on the company’s bid to overturn a historic union win at one of its Staten Island, New York, warehouses.
