Federal Court judge denies temporary restraining order to striking Charter/Spectrum workers
Union employees of Charter Communications/Spectrum, who have been on strike since March 28, suffered a setback when Judge Jack Weinstein, of the U.S. District Court, Eastern District of New York, denied a temporary restraining order (TRO) seeking a stay of arbitration on Monday.
Charter/Spectrum, formerly Time Warner, is seeking to go to arbitration with IBEW Local No. 3 members, and the union in turn filed for a preliminary injunction staying the arbitration hearing. Weinstein denied the injunction because he felt that the union “had not fulfilled its burden of demonstrating irreparable harm” that would occur to them by going into arbitration.
“It has decided not to participate in the arbitration, so it will not expend time or resources arbitrating the dispute in the absence of a preliminary injunction,” Weinstein wrote in his order. “Even if it chose to participate, the cost of adjudicating a dispute on its own does not constitute irreparable injury.”