Participants in the Netflix show Love Is Blind are legally employees, not independent contractors, the National Labor Review Board (NLRB) determined today. This decision grants them the right to form unions amid their ongoing disputes with the show’s producers.

The decision by the NLRB emerges during a tense divide between the show’s producers and some participants who claim they have been mistreated while on the popular reality series. These complaints include facing legal challenges when they voice their grievances. According to a report in The New York Times, the producers, including Kinetic Content, have consistently treated contestants as contractors, thereby denying them certain legal protections. However, the NLRB’s regional office in Minnesota has now countered this stance by recognizing the contestants as employees, which affords them federal employment protections, and has cited the producers for several labor violations related to unfair contractual clauses that impose confidentiality and non-compete restrictions.

This ruling marks a significant escalation in the ongoing disputes between reality TV show producers and their casts. This issue gained considerable attention last year when Bethenny Frankel, a former Real Housewife, began advocating for better compensation and protections for reality TV participants, who help generate significant profits for networks like Bravo. Notably, Frankel’s attorney, Bryan Freedman, who also represents Love Is Blind contestant Renee Poche, responded to the NLRB’s decision by highlighting the severe conditions faced by cast members. “Cast members are deprived of basic rights, silenced, denied legal remedies, compensated poorly, constantly threatened with severe financial penalties, and restricted from pursuing opportunities elsewhere,” Freedman stated. “These abusive practices need to end.”