NLRB names three new Administrative Law Judges

The National Labor Relations Board today announced the appointment of three new administrative law judges.  The three new judges are sitting administrative law judges who are transferring to the Board from the Social Security Administration.  They are: Judges Charles Muhl, Ariel Sotolongo, and Amita Tracy. 
The National Labor Relations Board is an independent federal agency vested with the power to safeguard employee rights to organize and to determine whether to have unions as their bargaining representative.  The agency also acts to prevent and remedy unfair labor practices committed by private sector employers and unions. 
With offices in Washington, D.C., New York City, San Francisco and Atlanta, the Division of Judges is responsible for docketing unfair labor practice cases brought by the Board’s General Counsel on charges filed by unions, employers and individual employees.  The Division disposes of those cases by settlement or by conducting trials and issuing initial decisions, which may then be appealed to the five-member Board and thereafter to an appropriate United States Court of Appeals. 
Judge Muhl was a Social Security judge for the past year.  Before that, he spent 11 years as a trial attorney with the Board’s Chicago regional office, where he handled some of the region’s more significant cases.  He also spent some time in the private practice of law and as an economist with the U.S. Department of Labor.  Judge Muhl received his B.A. degree, magna cum laude, from Washington University of St. Louis and his J.D. degree from Georgetown University Law Center.  He will be assigned to the Division’s Washington office.            
Judge Sotolongo was a judge with the Social Security Administration for the past 13 years.   Before his appointment with Social Security, he spent 22 years as an NLRB senior trial specialist in both Region 21 in Los Angeles and Region 32 in Oakland, where he handled some of the more complicated and complex cases in those regions.  He also served a short stint as a senior trial attorney in the U.S. Department of Justice, specializing in immigration-related unfair employment practices.  Judge Sotolongo received his B.A. degree, with honors, from the University of California in San Diego and his J.D. degree from the University of California at Davis.  He will take his assignments from the Division’s San Francisco office.    
Judge Tracy was a judge with Social Security for 3 years, most recently as the hearing office chief judge in San Rafael, California.  Before her appointment as a judge, she spent 5 years litigating and handling employment law matters and presenting cases in Federal courts as an attorney and supervisory attorney for the General Counsel of the Social Security Administration.  Earlier, she spent 4 years as an attorney litigating unfair labor practice and related cases with the Federal Labor Relations Authority.  Judge Tracy received her undergraduate degree from Vanderbilt University and her J.D. degree from Case Western Reserve University School of Law.  Judge Tracy will be assigned to the Division’s San Francisco office.