WASHINGTON – Today, the International Franchise Association (IFA) issued the following statement after President Donald Trump named Marvin Kaplan the next chairman of the National Labor Relations Board (NLRB):

“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. 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.”

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.

About the International Franchise Association

Celebrating over 60 years of excellence, education, and advocacy, the International Franchise Association (IFA) is the world’s oldest and largest organization representing franchising worldwide. 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, $858.5 billion of economic output for the U.S. economy, and almost 3 percent of the Gross Domestic Product (GDP). IFA members include franchise companies in over 300 different business format categories, individual franchisees, and companies that support the industry in marketing, law, technology, and business development.

Press Contact

Katherine Knight Patterson
Katherine Knight Patterson

VP, Communications

202.662.0783

kpatterson@franchise.org

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