More Employment Coverage

  • February 03, 2026

    XAI Fights Uphill To Keep Alive OpenAI IP Theft Suit

    Elon Musk's xAI urged a California federal judge Tuesday to change her tentative decision to toss its suit accusing OpenAI of poaching its workers to steal trade secrets, arguing that when considered together, the "whole gestalt" of xAI's allegations against individual employees is enough to state viable claims against OpenAI.

  • February 03, 2026

    House Dems Press Bessent About IRS Retirement Pay Delays

    Democrats on the House Ways and Means Committee demanded answers Tuesday about substantial delays in processing retirement applications for Internal Revenue Service employees who participated in the government's deferred resignation program.

  • February 03, 2026

    Pharma Co. Stole Secrets For LSD Medical Trials, Suit Says

    A clinical trial services company is suing Definium Therapeutics Inc. in Delaware federal court, alleging that it stole trade secrets during Phase 2 trials of LSD treatments for psychiatric disorders, then passed those secrets on to a rival services company for Phase 3 trials.

  • February 03, 2026

    Baker McKenzie Describes Client Fallout After Assault Claims

    Several clients asked the leader of Baker McKenzie's Washington, D.C., office to stop handling work for them after he was accused of sexual assault, according to a new filing in a defamation case against the former firm associate who made the allegations.

  • February 03, 2026

    Del. High Court Revives Noncompete Over Forfeited Equity

    The Delaware Supreme Court on Tuesday revived a fire and life-safety services company's bid to enforce postemployment restrictive covenants against a former executive, rejecting a lower court's conclusion that those covenants became unenforceable once the executive forfeited his incentive equity after being fired for cause.

  • February 02, 2026

    Staffing Agencies Beat Ill. Workers' BIPA Revival Bid

    An Illinois Third District Appellate Court panel has refused to reverse two staffing agencies' pre-trial win over manufacturing workers' claim that the agencies illegally collected their time-clock fingerprint data, saying simply helping another entity obtain such data cannot trigger liability under a statutory provision requiring informed consent to collect it.

  • February 02, 2026

    Honeywell Faces Bid For Fee Advancement In Russia Case

    The Delaware Chancery Court on Monday heard a sharply contested argument over whether a former Honeywell executive is entitled to advancement of legal fees tied to Russian insolvency and customs proceedings, as well as "fees on fees," in a dispute that turned less on the underlying foreign matters than the mechanics of Delaware advancement law.

  • February 02, 2026

    State Dept. Accused Of Overreach With 75-Country Visa Pause

    A group of U.S. citizens, nonprofits and foreign workers sued the Trump administration on Monday over its pause of immigrant visas for applicants from 75 countries over public charge concerns, arguing that the executive branch can't rewrite federal immigration law.

  • February 02, 2026

    Tracy Anderson Workouts Are Copyrightable, 9th Circ. Told

    Celebrity fitness trainer Tracy Anderson urged the Ninth Circuit on Monday to reverse a ruling that invalidated copyrights to her "Tracy Anderson Method" workout routines, arguing that her routines are expressive protectable works distinct from yoga poses at issue in the Ninth Circuit's Bikram ruling.

  • February 02, 2026

    Judge Skeptical Of XAI's Claims In OpenAI Trade Secrets Suit

    A California federal judge has said she's inclined to grant OpenAI's motion to dismiss a trade secrets complaint from Elon Musk's xAI "in full," saying the plaintiffs have not provided enough facts to support claims that OpenAI poached employees and stole source code.

  • January 30, 2026

    'Inferential Leap' Kills Academic Researchers' Conspiracy Suit

    A New York federal judge took a proposed class of academic researchers to task Friday, permanently dismissing their lawsuit accusing six of academia's largest journal publishers of colluding to stifle their leverage and eliminate pay for peer review work, finding that the publishers' rules being contested do nothing of the sort.

  • January 30, 2026

    DOL Adds More H-2B Visas For Imperiled Employers

    The U.S. Department of Labor issued a temporary rule Friday making another 64,716 H-2B visas for seasonal, non-agricultural workers available for fiscal year 2026, but only to employers facing severe financial hardship.

  • January 30, 2026

    Schlumberger Sues Ex-Employees Alleging Trade Secrets Theft

    Oil field services firm Schlumberger Technology Corp. sued two former longtime employees and two companies, alleging that its trade secrets were stolen during a business collaboration.

  • January 29, 2026

    Apple Aims To Boot Anti-Moonlighting Suit To Arbitration

    Apple Inc. urged a Seattle federal judge to throw out a former employee's proposed class action accusing the company of unlawfully barring lower-wage workers from taking second jobs, arguing that plaintiff Gabriel Fisher gave up his right to sue when he signed an arbitration agreement included in his job offer.

  • January 29, 2026

    4th Circ. Wary Of Kicking Up 'Sandstorm' On Deferred Comp.

    The Fourth Circuit appeared reluctant Thursday to revive a proposed class action brought against Bank of America and Merrill by an ex-financial adviser who said he was shorted deferred compensation, as judges questioned whether federal benefits law applied to payments that looked like bonuses.

  • January 28, 2026

    Trade Secret Filings Hit Record High In 2025, Report Finds

    Trade secret litigation reached an all-time high in 2025, with more than 1,500 federal cases filed for the first time ever, according to a new report by legal analytics firm Lex Machina, which also highlights trends about damages, the busiest courts and the law firms most frequently involved.

  • January 28, 2026

    Biogen Can't Escape Amended Antitrust Suit Over MS Drug

    Biogen Inc. must face health plans' claims that it bribed pharmacy benefit managers to stifle generics competition for its multiple sclerosis drug Tecfidera, after an Illinois federal judge found Wednesday that the plans' latest amended complaint in their consolidated antitrust litigation corrects her prior concerns with the pleadings.

  • January 28, 2026

    Washington State University Ignored Red Flags Before Murders, Suit Says

    Despite numerous red flags, Washington State University failed to take appropriate steps to prevent criminology teaching assistant and doctoral candidate Bryan Kohberger from murdering four University of Idaho students, parents of the slain students claim in a lawsuit removed to federal court in Seattle on Tuesday.

  • January 28, 2026

    Chancery Awards $50M To Arxada In Trade Secrets Case

    Chemicals company Arxada on Wednesday was awarded more than $50 million in damages and expenses in its lawsuit in Delaware's Court of Chancery claiming the owner of a company it bought took its trade secrets with his family to form a competitor.

  • January 28, 2026

    Krispy Kreme Reaches $1.6M Deal Over Employee Data Breach

    Krispy Kreme has agreed to a $1.6 million settlement to resolve a consolidated proposed class action that accused the doughnut chain of failing to protect current and former employees' personal information from a November 2024 data breach, according to a filing in North Carolina federal court.

  • January 28, 2026

    No Class Cert. For Ex-NFL Players In Benefits Challenge

    Ten former NFL players suing the league's disability plan for denying them benefits were turned down for class certification on Wednesday by a Maryland federal judge, who said the group failed to show the commonality of the proposed class' claims.

  • January 28, 2026

    Employee Exodus Prompts CEO Defamation Lawsuit

    Employees moving from one Turkish company to another has led to a $5.5 million defamation lawsuit between the CEOs of their American affiliates, according to a complaint filed in a federal court in Pennsylvania.

  • January 28, 2026

    Fed. Circ. Won't Revive MasterCard Trade Secret Claims

    The Federal Circuit declined to revive trade secret theft claims Wednesday brought by a MasterCard unit against two former McKinsey consultants, agreeing with a lower court that the company had failed to identify the alleged trade secrets with enough specificity.

  • January 28, 2026

    Carter Ledyard Taps Litigator As Next Managing Partner

    Carter Ledyard & Milburn LLP announced Tuesday that it has chosen an employment litigator who joined the firm in 2023 to lead the firm.

  • January 27, 2026

    'Dirty Little Secret': Airbus Sued Over Toxic Cabin Air

    Airbus is putting profits over the wellbeing of flight crews and passengers by refusing to take simple actions that could mitigate the potential for engine contaminants to leak into cabin air through the plane manufacturer's air system design, according to a lawsuit filed Tuesday in New York federal court.

Expert Analysis

  • NYC Bar Opinion Warns Attys On Use Of AI Recording Tools

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    Attorneys who use artificial intelligence tools to record, transcribe and summarize conversations with clients should heed the New York City Bar Association’s recent opinion addressing the legal and ethical risks posed by such tools, and follow several best practices to avoid violating the Rules of Professional Conduct, say attorneys at Smith Gambrell.

  • The Biz Court Digest: Dispatches From Utah's Newest Court

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    While a robust body of law hasn't yet developed since the Utah Business and Chancery Court's founding in October 2024, the number of cases filed there has recently picked up, and its existence illustrates Utah's desire to be top of mind for businesses across the country, says Evan Strassberg at Michael Best.

  • 4 Quick Emotional Resets For Lawyers With Conflict Fatigue

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    Though the emotional wear and tear of legal work can trap attorneys in conflict fatigue — leaving them unable to shake off tense interactions or return to a calm baseline — simple therapeutic techniques for resetting the nervous system can help break the cycle, says Chantel Cohen at CWC Coaching & Therapy.

  • Navigating Trade Secret Exceptions In Noncompete Bans

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    Recent and ongoing developments in the noncompete landscape, including a potential decision from the Tenth Circuit in Edwards Lifesciences v. Thompson, could offer tools for employers to bring noncompete agreements within trade secret exceptions amid an era of heightened employee mobility, say attorneys at Sullivan & Cromwell.

  • Playing Tennis Makes Me A Better Lawyer

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    An instinct to turn pain into purpose meant frequent trips to the tennis court, where learning to move ahead one point at a time was a lesson that also applied to the steep learning curve of patent prosecution law, says Daniel Henry at Marshall Gerstein.

  • Judges On AI: How Judicial Use Informs Guardrails

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    U.S. Magistrate Judge Maritza Dominguez Braswell at the U.S. District Court for the District of Colorado discusses why having a sense of how generative AI tools behave, where they add value, where they introduce risk and how they are reshaping the practice of law is key for today's judges.

  • Navigating The New Wave Of Voluntary Benefit ERISA Suits

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    Four recent complaints claiming that employees pay unreasonable premiums for voluntary benefit programs contribute to a trend in Employee Retirement Income Security Act class actions targeting employers and benefits consultants over such programs, increasing scrutiny of how the programs are selected, priced and administered, say attorneys at Holland & Knight.

  • Law School's Missed Lessons: How To Start A Law Firm

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    Launching and sustaining a law firm requires skills most law schools don't teach, but every lawyer should understand a few core principles that can make the leap calculated rather than reckless, says Sam Katz at Athlaw.

  • Key False Claims Act Trends From The Last Year

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    The False Claims Act remains a powerful enforcement tool after some record verdicts and settlements in 2025, and while traditional fraud areas remain a priority, new initiatives are raising questions about its expanding application, says Veronica Nannis at Joseph Greenwald.

  • Reel Justice: 'Die My Love' And The Power Of Visuals At Trial

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    The powerful use of imagery to capture the protagonist’s experience of postpartum depression in “Die My Love” reminds attorneys that visuals at trial can persuade jurors more than words alone, so they should strategically wield a new federal evidence rule allowing for illustrative aids, says Veronica Finkelstein at Wilmington University.

  • Hosting Exchange Students Makes Me A Better Lawyer

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    Opening my home to foreign exchange students makes me a better lawyer not just because prioritizing visiting high schoolers forces me to hone my organization and time management skills but also because sharing the study-abroad experience with newcomers and locals reconnects me to my community, says Alison Lippa at Nicolaides Fink.

  • How A 1947 Tugboat Ruling May Shape Work Product In AI Era

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    Rapid advances in generative artificial intelligence test work-product principles first articulated in the U.S. Supreme Court’s nearly 80-year-old Hickman v. Taylor decision, as courts and ethics bodies confront whether disclosure of attorneys’ AI prompts and outputs would reveal their thought processes, say Larry Silver and Sasha Burton at Langsam Stevens.

  • Navigating Privilege Law Patchwork In Dual-Purpose Comms

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    Three years after the U.S. Supreme Court declined to resolve a circuit split in In re: Grand Jury, federal courts remain split as to when attorney-client privilege applies to dual-purpose legal and business communications, and understanding the fragmented landscape is essential for managing risks, say attorneys at Covington.