Billionaire newspaper owners hit dead end at Supreme Court

PITTSBURGH—The U.S. Supreme Court had a two-word “message” for the rich right-wing Block brothers of Pittsburgh, former owners of the Pittsburgh Post-Gazette: Pay up.

To the tune of approximately $5 million. That’s how much Joseph Pass, the attorney for the News Guild of Pittsburgh, whose workers the Blocks stiffed for years, estimates the Blocks owe the paper’s former staffers—even including workers who crossed picket lines.

The court’s ruling in its October 5 orders list carried no explanation. That’s because it was buried among more than 100 similar decisions where the justices denied the final appeal by case losers. And at every step of the way in the long struggle between the Blocks and the Guild, plus the National Labor Relations Board on the News Guild’s side, the NLRB and the workers won and the Blocks lost.

Which means the Blocks will now have to make the workers whole, just as the NLRB got lower court judges to rule: Back pay, restored pay cuts, paid vacation time and sick days, health care coverage restored—or paid for—past credit card bills, rent, mortgage payments and car payments which the workers had to incur after the Blocks forced them to strike, and more.

The Blocks had no immediate comment. When they lost at the 3rd U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals in Philadelphia—which in turn upheld a lower court ruling for the workers and the NLRB—the Blocks retaliated in early 2026 by closing the paper and appealing to the Supreme Court. They later sold its name to a non-profit foundation which revived the Post-Gazette but refused to take the strikers back. 

When the Blocks forced the News Guild, and four other union locals, to strike, in October 2022, the strikers started their own strike paper, the Pittsburgh Union Progress. It concentrates heavily on local coverage. By the time the court in Philadelphia ruled for the board and the Guild, more than three years later, the four other locals had either settled or dissolved their PPG units.

When the Blocks closed the PPG, the Guild members, with help from other unionized shops in Pittsburgh, turned the Union Progress into the Pittsburgh Progress, an on-line publication owned as a cooperative by its workers and its readers. 

And when the Supreme Court ruled for the workers and the NLRB, both the News Guild of Pittsburgh and its parent News Guild, a Communications Workers sector, cheered.

“A lot of honest, determined people sacrificed more than most know to get this ruling enforced and finalized,” stated Andrew Goldstein, president of the News Guild of Pittsburgh. “The Blocks and their co-conspirators in company management and elsewhere knowingly and willfully broke federal law for years, bringing untold harm to not only their workers, but also the news industry more broadly. 

“We’re looking forward to getting quite literal payback and hoping this serves as a warning to similarly reckless owners. Shame on the Blocks.”

“I’ve actually lost count of the number of agencies, judges, courts and other authorities that have told the Blocks that the workers were right and the multimillionaires were wrong,” News Guild President Jon Schleuss said. “Our members were the first to tell them–more than nine years ago now.” That’s when the prior contract between the News Guild of Pittsburgh and the Blocks expired.

 “It’s staggering to think how much money and time the company wasted on losing when that could have been spent on dignified working conditions and improving the caliber of local journalism.

“The Block family’s efforts to delay accountability are finished. We look forward to seeing justice served so that our award-winning journalists can continue to focus on holding power to account.” 

Well, not quite. 

The Block brothers, who own a magnificent mansion next to Pittsburgh’s War Memorial, own another paper, the Toledo (Ohio) Blade. At one point, the Blocks held out for 17 years before negotiating a contract with the Guild covering those workers. The Blocks’ latest move: They announced on September 22 that unless they find a buyer, they’ll close the Blade with a December 31 edition. They blamed continuing red ink.

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