President Donald Trump names Marvin Kaplan to executive labor position.
By Andrew Carlo
The International Franchise Association (IFA) said it backs President Donald Trump’s move to appoint Marvin Kaplan as the chairman of the National Labor Relations Board (NLRB).
Kaplan has served as a member of the board since August 2017. In December 2017, Trump named Kaplan as chairman. Kaplan served in that capacity through April 15, 2018. Last July, the Senate confirmed Kaplan for another term of five years expiring August 27, 2025.
The appointment by Trump was made official on Jan. 21.
“Congratulations to Marvin Kaplan on ascending to NLRB Chairman,” said Michael Layman, IFA’s Chief Advocacy Officer. “During his tenure at the NLRB, Chair Kaplan has proven himself as an impartial arbiter of labor law who provides legal clarity to the 830,000 small businesses and 9 million workers our model supports.”
Before his appointment to the NLRB, Kaplan served as chief counsel to the chairman of the Occupational Safety and Health Review Commission, as counsel for the House Committee on Oversight Government Reform, and as policy counsel for the House Committee on Education and the Workforce. Kaplan also worked at the U.S. Department of Labor’s Office of Labor Management Standards and with the law firm McDowell, Rice, Smith & Buchanan.
“The President’s announcement is an honor and privilege, and I look forward to serving as Chairman of the National Labor Relations Board,” Kaplan said in a statement issued by the NLRB.
As a member of the NLRB, Kaplan dissented from the October 2023 final rule on joint employer. In March 2024, an IFA-led lawsuit defeated the previous NLRB’s joint employer rule, which when implemented from 2015-2020, cost franchises $33.3 billion per year, eliminated hundreds of thousands of jobs, and increased lawsuits by 93 percent.
“We stand ready to work with Chair Kaplan and the entire Administration toward rebalancing federal policies to meet the needs of both small businesses and workers, including preserving the previous Trump Administration’s commonsense standard of joint employment that will protect the franchise model for generations to come,” Layman said.
The IFA works through its government relations and public policy, media relations, and educational programs to protect, enhance and promote franchising and the approximately 806,270 franchise establishments that support nearly 8.7 million direct jobs.
