Document ID: s3://data.kl3m.ai/documents/govinfo/USCOURTS/USCOURTS-caDC-14-01231/USCOURTS-caDC-14-01231-0/pdf.json

Parties Involved:
National Labor Relations Board
Respondent
Quicken Loans, Inc.
Petitioner

Document Text:

United States Court of Appeals

FOR THE DISTRICT OF COLUMBIA CIRCUIT

Argued March 8, 2016 Decided July 29, 2016

No. 14-1231

QUICKEN LOANS, INC.,

PETITIONER

v.

NATIONAL LABOR RELATIONS BOARD,

RESPONDENT

Consolidated with No. 14-1265

On Petition for Review and Cross-Application 

for Enforcement of an Order of

 the National Labor Relations Board

William M. Jay argued the cause for petitioner. On the 

briefs were William D. Sargent, Robert J. Muchnick, 

Christopher R. Kazanowski, and S. Libby Henninger.

Gregoire F. Sauter, Attorney, National Labor Relations 

Board, argued the cause for respondent. On the brief were 

Richard F. Griffin, Jr., General Counsel, John H. Ferguson, 

Associate General Counsel, Linda Dreeben, Deputy Associate 

General Counsel, and Kira D. Vol, Supervisory Attorney.

USCA Case #14-1231 Document #1627640 Filed: 07/29/2016 Page 1 of 16
2

Before: SRINIVASAN, MILLETT, and WILKINS, Circuit 

Judges.

MILLETT, Circuit Judge: Quicken Loans, Inc., a 

company that provides mortgage loan services, imposes a 

number of workplace rules on its mortgage bankers. As 

relevant here, Quicken forbids its mortgage bankers to use or 

disclose a broad range of personnel information without 

Quicken’s prior written consent or to criticize publicly the 

company and its management. The National Labor Relations 

Board determined that those rules run afoul of the National 

Labor Relations Act, 29 U.S.C. § 151 et seq., because they 

unreasonably burden the employees’ ability to discuss 

legitimate employment matters, to protest employer practices,

and to organize. Because there was nothing arbitrary or 

capricious about that decision and no abuse of discretion in 

the Board’s hearing process, we deny Quicken’s petition for 

review and grant the Board’s cross-application for 

enforcement.

I

A

Section 7 of the National Labor Relations Act guarantees 

employees “the right to self-organization, to form, join, or 

assist labor organizations, to bargain collectively through 

representatives of their own choosing, and to engage in other

concerted activities for the purpose of collective bargaining or 

other mutual aid or protection[.]” 29 U.S.C. § 157. Those 

rights “necessarily encompass[]” employees’ rights to 

communicate with one another and with third parties about 

collective action and organizing a union, Beth Israel Hospital 

v. NLRB, 437 U.S. 483, 491 (1978), as well as to “seek to 

improve terms and conditions of employment or otherwise 

improve their lot as employees through channels outside the 

USCA Case #14-1231 Document #1627640 Filed: 07/29/2016 Page 2 of 16
3

immediate employee-employer relationship,” Eastex, Inc. v. 

NLRB, 437 U.S. 556, 565 (1978). Section 7 thus protects 

employees’ rights to discuss organization and the terms and 

conditions of their employment, to criticize or complain about 

their employer or their conditions of employment, and to 

enlist the assistance of others in addressing employment 

matters. See, e.g., Beth Israel Hospital, 437 U.S. at 491;

Stanford Hospital and Clinics v. NLRB, 325 F.3d 334, 343 

(D.C. Cir. 2003); Tradesmen, Int’l, Inc. v. NLRB, 275 F.3d 

1137, 1141 (D.C. Cir. 2002). Employers that “interfere with, 

restrain, or coerce employees in the exercise of the rights 

guaranteed” by Section 7 commit an unfair labor practice, 29 

U.S.C. § 158(a)(1), and are subject to civil sanction by the 

Board, id. § 160(a).

Whether workplace rules run afoul of Section 7’s 

protections turns on an objective inquiry into “‘whether the 

rules would reasonably tend to chill employees in the 

exercise’ of their statutory rights.” Adtranz ABB DaimlerBenz Transp. v. NLRB, 253 F.3d 19, 25 (D.C. Cir. 2001)

(quoting Lafayette Park Hotel, 326 NLRB 824, 825 (1998)). 

Unreasonable chilling of lawful employee activities can take 

two forbidden forms. First, a rule could on its face restrict 

protected Section 7 activity by, for example, explicitly barring 

employees from complaining to third parties about their 

working conditions. Guardsmark, LLC v. NLRB, 475 F.3d 

369, 374–375 (D.C. Cir. 2007). 

Second, even if facially unobjectionable, a rule is invalid 

if (i) “‘employees would reasonably construe the language to 

prohibit Section 7 activity’”; (ii) the rule “‘was promulgated 

in response to union activity’”; or (iii) “‘the rule has been 

applied to restrict the exercise of Section 7 rights.’” 

Guardsmark, 475 F.3d at 374 (quoting Martin Luther 

Memorial Home, 343 NLRB 646, 647 (2004)). 

USCA Case #14-1231 Document #1627640 Filed: 07/29/2016 Page 3 of 16
4

In asking whether a workplace rule either expressly 

infringes Section 7 rights or would reasonably be understood 

to do so, courts “focus[] on the text of the challenged rule.” 

Guardsmark, 325 F.3d at 379. That means that the “‘mere 

maintenance’ of a rule likely to chill section 7 activity, 

whether explicitly or through reasonable interpretation, can 

amount to an unfair labor practice ‘even absent evidence of 

enforcement’” of the rule by the employer. Id. (quoting 

Lafayette Park Hotel, 326 NLRB 824, 825 (1998), enforced

sub nom. Lafayette Park Hotel v. NLRB, 203 F.3d 52 (Table) 

(D.C. Cir. 1999)).

B

Quicken provides mortgage loan services through branch 

offices located across the United States. The company 

employs approximately 1,700 mortgage bankers who process 

loan applications, negotiate the terms of mortgage loans, and 

provide other financial services to Quicken’s clients. As a 

condition of employment, each Quicken mortgage banker is 

required to sign a “Mortgage Banker Employment 

Agreement” that contains several mandatory rules and 

restrictions. Two of those rules are at issue here: the 

Proprietary/Confidential Information Rule (“Confidentiality 

Rule”) and the Non-Disparagement Rule.

As relevant here, the Confidentiality Rule defines 

“Proprietary/Confidential Information” to include “non-public 

information relating to or regarding the Company’s business, 

personnel, customers, operations or affairs.” J.A. 32. The 

Rule further defines confidential “Personnel Information” as 

“including, but not limited to, all personnel lists, rosters, 

personal information of co-workers, managers, executives and 

officers; handbooks, personnel files, personnel information 

USCA Case #14-1231 Document #1627640 Filed: 07/29/2016 Page 4 of 16
5

such as home phone numbers, cell phone numbers, addresses, 

and email addresses.” Id. at 33. 

For all of that information, mortgage bankers must 

“agree that” they will (i) “hold and maintain [it] in the 

strictest of confidence”; (ii) “not disclose, reveal or expose” 

that information to “any person, business or entity”; (iii) not 

use “any [of that] [i]nformation for any purpose except as 

may be authorized by the Company in writing”; and (iv) “take 

all necessary precautions to keep [that] [i]nformation secret, 

private, concealed and protected from disclosure[.]” J.A. 22. 

The Non-Disparagement Rule, for its part, provides that:

The Company has internal procedures for complaints 

and disputes to be addressed and resolved. You 

agree that you will not (nor will you cause or 

cooperate with others to) publicly criticize, ridicule, 

disparage or defame the Company or its products, 

services, policies, directors, officers, shareholders, or 

employees, with or through any written or oral 

statement or image (including, but not limited to, any 

statements made via websites, blogs, postings to the 

internet, or emails and whether or not they are made 

anonymously or through the use of a pseudonym). 

You agree to provide full cooperation and assistance 

in assisting the Company to investigate such 

statements if the Company reasonably believes that 

you are [the] source of the statements. The 

foregoing does not apply to statutorily privileged 

statements made to governmental or law 

enforcement agencies.

J.A. 29.

USCA Case #14-1231 Document #1627640 Filed: 07/29/2016 Page 5 of 16
6

C

Lydia Garza began working as a mortgage banker in 

Quicken’s Scottsdale, Arizona office in 2006, and signed a 

copy of the Employment Agreement containing both the 

Confidentiality and Non-Disparagement Rules. In 2011, she 

resigned and took a job with one of Quicken’s competitors. 

Quicken then sued Garza for violating no-contact/no-raiding 

and no-competition provisions of the Employment 

Agreement. Garza responded by filing an unfair labor 

practice charge with the National Labor Relations Board 

alleging that the Confidentiality and Non-Disparagement 

Rules interfered with Quicken employees’ Section 7 rights, in 

violation of the National Labor Relations Act. The Board’s 

Regional Director accepted Garza’s charge, and filed an 

unfair labor practice complaint against Quicken alleging that 

the challenged Rules violated Section 8(a)(1) of the Act, 29 

U.S.C. § 158(a)(1).

A Board administrative law judge conducted an 

evidentiary hearing on the Regional Director’s complaint. 

During that hearing, the ALJ excluded as irrelevant certain 

evidence that Quicken wanted to introduce concerning

Garza’s understanding of the challenged rules. Specifically, 

Quicken sought to introduce evidence about (i) whether Garza 

had read the Employment Agreement prior to signing it, (ii) 

what conduct Garza believed the Agreement prohibited, (iii) 

whether Garza believed that she had violated the contested

Rules, and (iv) whether Garza had discussed the Agreement 

with her managers or supervisors at the company. The ALJ 

also barred as irrelevant evidence concerning the process by 

which Quicken recruited employees and the types of 

personnel information that were available on the Company’s 

internal website.

USCA Case #14-1231 Document #1627640 Filed: 07/29/2016 Page 6 of 16
7

The ALJ subsequently sustained the Regional Director’s 

complaint, finding that both of Quicken’s Rules violated 

Section 8(a)(1) of the National Labor Relations Act, 29 

U.S.C. § 158(a)(1), because they interfered with Quicken 

employees’ Section 7 rights. With respect to the 

Confidentiality Rule, the ALJ had “no doubt” that the Rule’s

prohibition against disclosing personnel information, 

including “all personnel lists, personal information of coworkers * * * [and] personnel information such as home 

phone numbers, cell phone numbers, addresses and email 

addresses” would “substantially hinder employees in the 

exercise of their Section 7 rights.” J.A. 160. That is because 

the rule flatly forbade employees “to discuss with others, 

including their fellow employees or union representatives, the 

wages and other benefits that they receive,” and “the names, 

wages, benefits, addresses or telephone numbers of other 

employees.” Id.

The ALJ also concluded that the Non-Disparagement 

Rule was invalid because it prohibited employees from 

“publicly criticiz[ing], ridicul[ing], disparag[ing] or 

defam[ing] the Company or its products, services, [or] 

policies * * * through any written or oral statement.” J.A. 

160. “[E]mployees are allowed to criticize their employer and 

its products as part of their Section 7 rights,” the ALJ 

explained. Id. So any mortgage banker reading those 

restrictions “could reasonably construe them as restricting his 

rights to engage in protected concerted activities.” Id. 

The ALJ accordingly ordered Quicken to rescind both the 

Confidentiality and Non-Disparagement Rules. 

The Board affirmed the ALJ’s ruling as to the NonDisparagement Rule, but amended the remedy for the 

Confidentiality Rule. With respect to the latter, the Board 

USCA Case #14-1231 Document #1627640 Filed: 07/29/2016 Page 7 of 16
8

required that Quicken “rescind only the offending language” 

on which the ALJ had relied—that is, the portions of the Rule 

prohibiting disclosure of “non-public information relating to 

or regarding * * * personnel” and “personnel information, 

including * * * all personnel lists, rosters, personal 

information of co-workers, * * * handbooks, personnel files, 

personnel information such as home phone numbers, cell 

phone numbers, addresses, and email addresses[.]” J.A. 156, 

162. The Board did not disturb the ALJ’s evidentiary rulings.

II

Our review of the Board’s decision is limited. Congress 

has entrusted the Board with implementing Sections 7 and

8(a)(1) of the Act and determining, in the first instance, when 

an employer’s workplace rules run afoul of those provisions. 

See Adtranz, 253 F.3d at 25. The Board’s determinations 

accordingly “are entitled to considerable deference,” id., and 

will be sustained as long as the Board “‘faithfully applies’” 

the legal standards, and its textual analysis of a challenged 

rule is “‘reasonably defensible’” and adequately explained, 

Guardsmark, 475 F.3d at 374 (quoting Adtranz, 253 F.3d at 

25). See Cintas Corp. v. NLRB, 482 F.3d 463, 467 (D.C. Cir. 

2007).

A

The Board properly determined that Quicken’s

Confidentiality Rule, as applied to personnel information, 

directly impinged upon employees’ Section 7 rights. The 

very information that portion of the Rule explicitly forbids 

employees to share—personnel lists, employee rosters, and 

employee contact information—has long been recognized as

information that employees must be permitted to gather and 

share among themselves and with union organizers in 

exercising their Section 7 rights. See, e.g., International 

USCA Case #14-1231 Document #1627640 Filed: 07/29/2016 Page 8 of 16
9

Union of Electrical, Radio and Machine Workers v. NLRB, 

502 F.2d 349, 351 (D.C. Cir. 1974) (Board may require 

company to provide union “with a list of names and addresses 

of its employees” as “necessary and appropriate to guarantee 

that rights conferred by section 7 will not be denied[.]”); see 

also Albertsons, Inc., 351 NLRB 254, 259 (2014) 

(confidentiality rule cannot prevent employee from providing 

list of employee names to union organizers); HTH Corp., 356 

NLRB 1397, 1421 n.19 (2011) (“[T]he names and addresses 

of fellow employees cannot” be “held confidential” because 

that would “inhibit[] employees from engaging in conduct 

protected by Sec. 7.”), enforced sub nom. Frankl v. HTH 

Corp., 693 F.3d 1051 (9th Cir. 2012); Ridgley Manufacturing 

Co., 207 NLRB 193, 196–197 (1973) (“[M]emorizing the 

names of fellow employees from the timecards for the 

purpose of contacting them concerning union representation” 

was “protected activity” under the Act.), enforced sub nom.

Ridgley Manufacturing Co. v. NLRB, 510 F.2d 185 (D.C. Cir. 

1975).

So too for “handbooks” and other types of workplace 

information contained in “personnel files.” J.A. 33. 

Quicken’s blanket prohibition directly interferes with 

mortgage bankers’ ability to discuss their wages and other 

terms and conditions of employment with their fellow 

employees or union organizers, which is a core Section 7 

right. See, e.g., Cintas Corp., 482 F.3d at 467–468; Flex Frac 

Logistics, LLC v. NLRB, 746 F.3d 205, 208 (5th Cir. 2014) 

(“A workplace rule that forbids the discussion of confidential 

wage information between employees * * * patently violates 

[the Act.]”) (internal quotation marks and alterations omitted);

NLRB v. Northeastern Land Services, Ltd., 645 F.3d 475, 478, 

483 (1st Cir. 2011) (striking down rule that prevented 

discussion of the “terms of * * * employment, including 

compensation”); Lily Transportation Corp., 362 NLRB No. 

USCA Case #14-1231 Document #1627640 Filed: 07/29/2016 Page 9 of 16
10

54, 1 & n.3 (2015) (barring confidentiality rule prohibiting 

disclosure of “employee information maintained in 

confidential personnel files” because “employees would 

reasonably conclude that this language barred them from 

disclosing information about wages and other terms and 

conditions of employment”).

Quicken’s objections to the Board’s determination all 

fail. First, Quicken contends that the Board should have 

considered whether (i) Quicken employees actually construed 

the Confidentiality Rule to prohibit Section 7 activity, (ii) 

Garza herself had understood the Rule that way during her 

employment, or (iii) Quicken had ever enforced the Rule to 

interfere with Section 7 activity. See Pet. Br. 24–25. Those 

arguments, however, fail to come to grips with the governing 

law. The validity of a workplace rule turns not on subjective 

employee understandings or actual enforcement patterns, but 

on an objective inquiry into how a reasonable employee 

would understand the rule’s disputed language. Thus “[t]he 

Board is merely required to determine whether ‘employees 

would reasonably construe the [disputed] language to prohibit 

Section 7 activity, * * * and not whether employees have thus 

construed the rule.” Cintas Corp., 482 F.3d at 467; see 

Guardsmark, 475 F.3d at 375–376; Lafayette Park Hotel, 326 

NLRB at 824, 825 (1998) (“[T]he mere maintenance” of rules 

that “are likely to have a chilling effect on Section 7 rights” 

violates the Act “even absent evidence of enforcement.”), 

enforced sub nom. Lafayette Park Hotel v. NLRB, 203 F.3d 52 

(Table) (D.C. Cir. 1999). 

That objective inquiry serves an important prophylactic 

function: it allows the Board to block rules that might chill 

the exercise of employees’ rights by cowing the employees

into inaction, rather than forcing the Board to “wait[] until 

that chill is manifest,” and then try to “undertake the difficult 

USCA Case #14-1231 Document #1627640 Filed: 07/29/2016 Page 10 of 16
11

task of dispelling it.” Flex Frac Logistics, LLC, 358 NLRB 

1131, 1132 (2012), enforced sub nom. Flex Frac Logistics,

746 F.3d 205. And the Board’s concern about discouraging

protected employee activities exists just the same “whether or 

not that is the intent of the employer.” Id. Quicken’s 

complaints about the Board’s analysis thus ignore the 

National Labor Relations Act’s proactive role in safeguarding 

employees’ rights. See id. (noting the “Act’s goal of 

preventing employees from being chilled in the exercise of 

their Section 7 rights”).

Second, Quicken argues (Pet. Br. 26–28) that the Board 

overlooked the company’s “substantial and legitimate 

interest” in protecting its non-public information in a business 

that is “highly-regulated, competitive, and involves 

substantial and significant confidential and proprietary 

information.” Id. at 28. But by carefully confining its 

decision to the Confidentiality Rule’s operation on the types 

of personnel information protected by Section 7, J.A. 162, the 

Board left portions of the Rule protecting proprietary 

information intact, and it afforded Quicken adequate room to 

revise and “narrowly tailor[] the * * * rule to achieve its goal 

without interfering with section 7 activity,” Guardsmark, 475 

F.3d at 376. See Cintas Corp., 482 F.3d at 470; see also 

Community Hospitals of Central California v. NLRB, 335 

F.3d 1079, 1088 (D.C. Cir. 2003) (upholding rule that was 

narrowly tailored to achieve the employer’s purpose without 

chilling protected activity). Indeed, the Board openly invited 

Quicken to revise its Confidentiality Rule to contain “the 

language of lawful rules.” J.A. 162. In any event, Quicken’s 

claim that some sub-portion of the covered information could 

properly be protected does nothing to legitimate the 

blunderbuss sweep of its existing rule.

USCA Case #14-1231 Document #1627640 Filed: 07/29/2016 Page 11 of 16
12

Third, Quicken argues that the Board ignored that the 

Rule’s “disputed language only protects non-public

information of co-workers.” Pet. Br. 29. That matters, 

Quicken says, because the company “widely publicize[d]

information related to what it pays employees, its 

compensation structure, benefits plans, and virtually all other 

terms and conditions of employment,” so (in Quicken’s view) 

no employee would construe the Rule as preventing the 

disclosure of similar information to co-workers or union 

organizers. Id. at 30. The problem with that argument is that 

the so-called “widely publicized” personnel information to 

which Quicken refers is little more than a general description 

on its recruiting website of the mortgage banker position and 

the generic salary and benefits packages that might be 

available to successful applicants. See id. at 4–6. It beggars 

belief—or so the Board could reasonably find—that 

Quicken’s mortgage bankers would view the company’s 

publication of such generalized information as relaxing the 

Rule’s explicit and absolute prohibition against employees 

disclosing all manner of “personnel information,” including 

actual employee pay and benefits. J.A. 33.

Quicken also claims that contact information for 

mortgage bankers would not be understood to be “non-public” 

because it is available on an internal company website. Pet. 

Br. 3–4. That makes no sense. Information that is only 

available internally is, by definition, not “public.” 

Quicken next argues that identities, work addresses, and 

work phone numbers of its mortgage bankers are available 

through publicly accessible third-party databases. See Pet. Br. 

3–4. That misses the point. The Section 7 problem is that 

Quicken cannot forbid employees to themselves discuss and 

disclose personnel information bearing on their investigation 

and discussion of employment conditions or organizational 

USCA Case #14-1231 Document #1627640 Filed: 07/29/2016 Page 12 of 16
13

efforts. Nor can Quicken compel employees to hazard 

potentially career-imperiling guesses about whether the 

Employment Agreement—that Quicken unilaterally drafted 

and required them to sign—means what it says and says what 

it means.

B

The Non-Disparagement Rule similarly flies in the teeth 

of Section 7. That Rule, by its plain terms, bars mortgage 

bankers from “publicly criticiz[ing], ridicul[ing], 

disparag[ing] or defam[ing] the Company or its products, 

services, policies, directors, officers, shareholders, or 

employees” in any written or oral statement, including on the 

internet or even in private emails. J.A. 29. The Board quite 

reasonably found that such a sweeping gag order would 

significantly impede mortgage bankers’ exercise of their 

Section 7 rights because it directly forbids them to express 

negative opinions about the company, its policies, and its 

leadership in almost any public forum. See Guardsmark, 475 

F.3d at 374–375 (striking down rule that only allowed 

employees to complain internally); Hills and Dales General 

Hospital, 360 NLRB No. 70, 2 (2014) (invalidating a 

workplace rule requiring employees to represent the company 

“in a positive and professional manner” because it would 

“discourage employees from engaging in protected public 

protests of unfair labor practices, or from making statements 

to third parties protesting their terms and conditions of 

employment”); KSL Claremont Resort, Inc., 344 NLRB 832, 

832 (2005) (invalidating rule that prohibited “negative 

conversations about associates or managers” because

employees would reasonably construe it to bar “discussing 

with their coworkers complaints about their managers that 

affect [their] working conditions”). 

USCA Case #14-1231 Document #1627640 Filed: 07/29/2016 Page 13 of 16
14

Quicken claims (Pet. Br. 38) that employees would read 

the Rule as welcoming public complaints because the Rule

references the company’s “internal procedures for complaints 

and disputes to be addressed and resolved,” J.A. 29. Quite the 

opposite. Pointing employees to an internal process for 

venting their complaints underscores that—as the Rule plainly 

says—employees may not air their grievances in public. 

Quicken also notes that the Rule contains an exception 

for “statutorily privileged” statements that are “made to 

government or law enforcement agencies.” J.A. 29. That 

only digs the hole deeper. The very narrowness of the 

exception emphasizes to employees that disclosures to nongovernmental personnel—like co-workers and union 

officials—are forbidden. 

Quicken’s next argument is that mortgage bankers are 

supposed to know that they can pursue their disputes with the 

company “in public forums” because another section of the 

Employment Agreement contains a clause identifying the 

courts in which suits relating to the Agreement and other 

employment matters must be brought. Pet. Br. 38 (citing J.A. 

30). It should go without saying that an employer’s selection 

of the courts in which it can be sued is not the same at all as 

permitting workers to voice their employment complaints

publicly.

Finally, Quicken stresses the absence of evidence that 

Quicken actually enforced the Non-Disparagement Rule to 

restrict mortgage bankers’ rights under the National Labor 

Relations Act. That is beside the point. The absence of 

enforcement could just as readily show that employees had 

buckled under the Employment Agreement’s threat of 

enforcement. “[H]aving concluded that employees would 

reasonably read the rule to prohibit [the exercise of Section 7 

USCA Case #14-1231 Document #1627640 Filed: 07/29/2016 Page 14 of 16
15

rights], the Board had no need to consider the absence of 

enforcement” in concluding that the rule violates the Act. 

Guardsmark, 475 F.3d at 377; see id. at 374 (The “mere 

maintenance” of a challenged rule can violate Section 8(a)(1) 

“even absent evidence of enforcement[.]”).

III

Quicken also lodges a procedural complaint, arguing that 

the Board erroneously excluded its evidence about whether 

Garza (i) actually read the Employment Agreement prior to 

filing her charge; (ii) subjectively believed that the Agreement 

forbade protected conduct; (iii) believed she had violated the 

Confidentiality and Non-Disparagement Rules; or (iv) 

discussed the Agreement with her managers or supervisors at 

Quicken. Quicken also sought to introduce evidence of its 

recruitment methods for mortgage bankers and the types of 

employment information available on the internal company 

website.

The Board’s evidentiary rulings must be sustained unless 

they were an abuse of discretion and unduly prejudiced the 

complaining party. See Salem Hospital Corp. v. NLRB, 808 

F.3d 59, 67–68 (D.C. Cir. 2015). Reversible prejudice exists 

only if admission of the excluded evidence would have 

“‘compel[led] or persuade[d] to a contrary result.’” Reno 

Hilton Resorts v. NLRB, 196 F.3d 1275, 1285 n.10 (D.C. Cir. 

1999) (quoting Cooley v. FERC, 843 F.2d 1464, 1473 (D.C. 

Cir. 1988)). 

The Board’s evidentiary determination was not even 

close to an abuse of discretion. Because the governing legal 

inquiry was whether Quicken’s Rules on their face or as 

understood by a reasonable employee would chill the exercise 

of Section 7 rights, Quicken’s proffered evidence about how 

Garza in particular understood the Rules or reacted to them 

USCA Case #14-1231 Document #1627640 Filed: 07/29/2016 Page 15 of 16
16

was off the mark. See Cintas Corp., 482 F.3d at 467 

(Evidence of “employees’ actual interpretation of the 

confidentiality rule” is not “required to support the Board’s 

conclusion that the rule is overly broad and thus unlawful[.]”). 

Likewise, Quicken’s argument about the relevance of its 

recruitment methods and the availability of some personnel 

information on its internal website simply recycles the 

already-rejected claim that those crumbs of information cured 

the Confidentiality Rule’s plain prohibition on protected 

employee communications. 

In sum, because Quicken’s arguments misconceive the 

relevancy of information under the governing legal test, the 

evidence’s exclusion was both proper and entirely nonprejudicial. 

IV

The Board appropriately determined that employees 

would reasonably construe the sweeping prohibitions in 

Quicken’s Confidentiality and Non-Disparagement Rules as 

trenching upon their rights to discuss and object to 

employment terms and conditions, and to coordinate efforts 

and organize to promote employee interests. Accordingly, the 

Board properly concluded that Quicken’s adoption and 

maintenance of those Rules ran afoul of Sections 7 and

8(a)(1) of the National Labor Relations Act, 29 U.S.C. 

§§ 157, 158(a)(1). The Board’s evidentiary rulings were also 

well within the bounds of its discretion. We therefore deny 

Quicken’s petition for review and grant the Board’s crossapplication for enforcement.

So ordered.

USCA Case #14-1231 Document #1627640 Filed: 07/29/2016 Page 16 of 16