Mealey's Employment
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August 04, 2025
7th Circuit Rules Termination Notice Sufficient In Withdrawal Liability Row
CHICAGO — Ruling in part that an employer provided sufficient notice that it was terminating a collective bargaining agreement (CBA), the Seventh Circuit U.S. Court of Appeal vacated a $166,350.75 attorney fee award and reversed summary judgment that had been entered against an employer that withdrew from a multiemployer pension plan.
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August 04, 2025
9th Circuit Stays Preliminary Injunction In Collective Bargaining EO Case
SAN FRANCISCO — The Ninth Circuit U.S. Court of Appeals on Aug. 1 stayed pending appeal a trial court’s preliminary injunction issued in a case by six unions suing over a March executive order that limited certain federal workers’ rights to organize and bargain collectively.
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August 04, 2025
4th Circuit: Fired Meat Manager’s Food Safety Claims Could Have Led To Termination
RICHMOND, Va. — A fired Kraft Heinz Foods production manager has grounds to argue that complaints he raised about food safety in violation of the Food Safety Modernization Act (FSMA) at the South Carolina plant where he worked could have contributed to his termination, a Fourth Circuit U.S. Court of Appeals panel ruled in vacating a summary judgment order and remanding the case back to the trial court.
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August 01, 2025
D.C. Circuit Declines Reconsideration Of Stay In Collective Bargaining EO Case
WASHINGTON, D.C. — The District of Columbia Circuit U.S. Court of Appeals declined to reconsider its June 20 order staying a trial court’s preliminary injunction in a union’s case challenging a March executive order (EO) that eliminated the collective bargaining rights of various agencies and agency subdivisions.
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August 01, 2025
3rd Circuit Reverses Dismissal Of N.J. Farm’s Suit Over Migrant Worker Fines
PHILADELPHIA — A Third Circuit U.S. Court of Appeals panel reversed a trial court’s dismissal of a New Jersey family farm’s claims that the U.S. Department of Labor (DOL) unlawfully assessed hundreds of thousands of dollars in fines through in-house administrative proceedings for alleged violations related to the federal H-2A visa program for migrant workers, stating the case should be “decided by an Article III court” based on a 2024 U.S. Supreme Court decision.
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July 31, 2025
Maryland Legal Services Nonprofit Sues EEOC Over ‘Trans Exclusion Policy’
BALTIMORE — A Maryland nonprofit legal services organization that serves the LGBTQ+ community is suing the Equal Employment Opportunity Commission over its new “Trans Exclusion Policy” through which it has ceased to carry out charge investigations regarding all gender-identity discrimination claims outside of hiring, firing and promotion.
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July 31, 2025
Fired Copyrights Register Denied Preliminary Injunction For No Irreparable Harm
WASHINGTON, D.C. — The register of copyrights and director of the U.S. Copyright Office who was purportedly fired in May by President Donald J. Trump failed to show that she will be irreparably harmed without a preliminary injunction, a federal judge in the District of Columbia ruled July 30, denying a motion for that relief.
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July 31, 2025
Prima Facie Discrimination Case Not Established In COVID-19 Vaccine Refusal Suit
CHARLOTTE, N.C. — Finding that a former employee had failed to establish a prima facie case of failure to accommodate her religious beliefs or of racial discrimination, a North Carolina federal judge granted the summary judgment motion of her employer in the employee’s lawsuit stemming from her termination for declining to become vaccinated for COVID-19.
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July 30, 2025
Driver AI Surveillance Data Collection Class Suit Settled With Lytx For $4.25M
EAST ST. LOUIS, Ill. — A $4.25 million class settlement between a class of drivers and a technology company was granted final approval by a federal judge in Illinois ending a lawsuit that accused a transportation company and a machine vision and artificial technology company of collecting and holding truck drivers’ biometric data when scanning their faces via a camera that employs artificial intelligence to monitor drivers in violation of the Illinois Biometric Information Privacy Act (BIPA); the transportation company previously paid a settlement of $56,800 for the benefit of 71 settlement class members.
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July 30, 2025
Truck Drivers’ BIPA Claims Over In-Cab Cameras Partly Remanded
CHICAGO — Two truckers’ claims against their former employer under the Illinois Biometric Information Privacy Act (BIPA) were partly remanded for lack of jurisdiction under Article III of the U.S. Constitution, with an Illinois federal judge retaining jurisdiction over part of the claims while denying the trucking company’s motion to dismiss.
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July 30, 2025
5th Circuit Panel Orders Reinstatement Of Fired Mississippi School Worker
NEW ORLEANS — A fired Mississippi school district employee will be reinstated after a Fifth Circuit U.S. Court of Appeals panel found that a trial court failed to address future reinstatement opportunities and prior circuit decisions in reversing and remanding denial of the employee’s request for reinstatement or front pay.
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July 29, 2025
Trial Court Denies Stay Of Ruling For Removed FTC Commissioner
WASHINGTON, D.C. — A federal judge in the District of Columbia denied a motion by President Donald J. Trump and Federal Trade Commission officials to stay pending appeal a summary judgment ruling for one of two FTC commissioners purportedly removed from the FTC without cause in March, writing that “the court refuses to allow Defendants to continue breaking the law while this litigation proceeds.”
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July 29, 2025
1 Of 2 Suits Over USAID Layoffs Dismissed For Lack Of Jurisdiction
WASHINGTON, D.C. — A federal judge in the District of Columbia in a single opinion granted a motion to dismiss one complaint brought by two unions and one humanitarian group challenging the placement of U.S. Agency for International Development (USAID) employees on administrative leave, citing a lack of jurisdiction, and denied in a second similar complaint a union’s motion for preliminary injunction, citing a “likely” lack of jurisdiction.
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July 29, 2025
Judgment Against Fired State Farm Employee Who Aided Disabled Coworker Reversed
CINCINNATI — A Sixth Circuit U.S. Court of Appeals panel majority ruled that a fired State Farm employee who helped a disabled coworker seek an Americans with Disabilities Act (ADA) accommodation can pursue retaliation claims pursuant to the ADA and Ohio law “on a theory of vicarious liability” because of a “supervisor’s alleged bias,” reversing a trial court’s summary judgment order in favor of State Farm.
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July 29, 2025
Tow Truck Driver, Employer Stipulate To Dismissal Of Wage-And-Hour Class Suit
CENTRAL ISLIP, N.Y. — A tow truck driver and the employer he accused of violating New York Labor Law by failing to pay timely wages and unlawfully deducting wages stipulated to dismissal of the putative class complaint in a federal court in New York with prejudice following an undisclosed settlement.
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July 25, 2025
Judge Severs Fee Provision In Cruise Company’s Employment Arbitration
MIAMI — A Florida federal judge on July 24 granted in part and denied in part a cruise company’s motion to compel arbitration of an indigent Nicaraguan employee’s claims related to an injury sustained while aboard the company’s vessel, severing from the agreement fee-splitting provisions that would bar the employee from participating due to his inability to pay.
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July 24, 2025
Florida High Court Says Former Employee’s Complaint Against Employer Can Proceed
TALLAHASSEE, Fla. — A former employee’s failure to file a complaint with the Florida Commission on Human Relations and failure to reference that the discrimination and retaliation claims were brought under the Florida Civil Rights Act (FCRA) did not doom his right to file a civil suit against the employer because he filed the complaint with the Equal Employment Opportunity Commission, which has a work-sharing agreement with the commission, and the FCRA does not require a claimant to state the specific law that was violated when filing a complaint with the EEOC or commission, the Florida Supreme Court said in affirming an appellate court’s decision.
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July 24, 2025
D.C. Circuit: NLRB’s New Tenure Protections View Eliminates Controversy In Case
WASHINGTON, D.C. — The District of Columbia Circuit U.S. Court of Appeals affirmed a trial court’s dismissal of a case by two baristas challenging the constitutionality of National Labor Relations Board members’ statutory tenure protections, opining that the court lacks jurisdiction under Article III of the U.S. Constitution after the NLRB switched its position mid-appeal, resulting in full agreement on that issue by both sides.
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July 24, 2025
Split U.S. Supreme Court Stays Reinstatement Of CPSC Members
WASHINGTON, D.C. — A divided U.S. Supreme Court on July 23 granted a stay sought by the federal government after a trial court’s June 13 ruling reinstating three members of the U.S. Consumer Product Safety Commission who were terminated without cause in May by President Donald J. Trump.
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July 23, 2025
Cruise Rape Claim Can’t Be Arbitrated Under New York Convention, Judge Says
MIAMI — A Florida federal judge denied a cruise company’s motion to compel arbitration of an employee’s allegations that she was drugged and raped by another employee on a vessel at sea, ruling that the Ending Forced Arbitration of Sexual Assault and Sexual Harassment Act (EFAA) prohibits arbitration of the dispute under the Convention on the Recognition and Enforcement of Foreign Arbitral Awards (New York Convention).
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July 23, 2025
Union Seeks Rehearing After Stay Of Collective Bargaining EO Injunction
WASHINGTON, D.C. — American Foreign Service Association (AFSA) filed a petition for rehearing en banc in the District of Columbia Circuit U.S. Court of Appeals after an appellate panel stayed pending appeal a trial court’s preliminary injunction in the union’s case challenging a March executive order (EO) that eliminated the collective bargaining rights of various agencies and agency subdivisions.
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July 23, 2025
11th Circuit: APA’s ‘Good Cause’ Removal Procedure Applies To DOJ ALJs
ATLANTA — The Administrative Procedure Act’s (APA) “good cause” removal procedure does not violate the U.S. Constitution when applied to U.S. Department of Justice (DOJ) administrative law judges (ALJs), an 11th Circuit U.S. Court of Appeals panel ruled, reversing a trial court’s summary judgment ruling for Walmart Inc. in an immigration law violation case and vacating a permanent injunction barring the chief ALJ from adjudicating 20 Immigration and Customs Enforcement complaints against the retailer.
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July 23, 2025
Workers’ Religious Exemption Vaccine Claims Don’t Survive 6th Circuit A 2nd Time
CINCINNATI — A Sixth Circuit U.S. Court of Appeals panel that in 2024 reversed the dismissal of two of 46 hospital workers’ religious discrimination claims over exemption from a COVID-19 vaccine mandate ruled in subsequent appeals that the trial court’s grant of summary judgment in favor of the hospital against one of the workers and dismissal of the other’s claims with prejudice were the proper decisions.
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July 21, 2025
En Banc Reconsideration Of Stay Denied In Collective Bargaining EO Suit
WASHINGTON, D.C. — The District of Columbia Circuit U.S. Court of Appeals denied a motion for reconsideration en banc, which it noted was filed as a petition for rehearing en banc, filed by National Treasury Employees Union (NTEU) after a panel majority on May 16 stayed pending appeal a trial court’s preliminary injunction ruling in the NTEU’s lawsuit challenging a March executive order (EO) issued by President Donald J. Trump that the union says eliminates collective bargaining for approximately two-thirds of the federal workforce.
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July 21, 2025
Judge Dismisses Privacy Suits By FBI Agents Who Worked On Trump Cases
WASHINGTON, D.C. — Federal Bureau of Investigation agents and a nonprofit organization who in two complaints seek to stop the publication or dissemination of a list allegedly being compiled of FBI employees who were involved in investigating two events involving President Donald J. Trump have made claims that “are too speculative,” a federal judge in the District of Columbia ruled, granting a motion to dismiss filed by the U.S. Department of Justice (DOJ) and the United States.