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Mealey's Employment

  • April 02, 2026

    Ala. Federal Judge Upholds Most Of $3.6M Jury Award In Fired Motel Worker’s Suit

    ANNISTON, Ala. — In two orders and a memorandum opinion, a federal judge in Alabama partially granted a fired motel employee’s motion for attorney fees and costs and held that she is still entitled to the bulk of a jury’s more than $3.6 million award, minus a slight reduction in back pay, in compensatory and punitive damages for claims of retaliation, private intrusion and intentional infliction of emotional distress stemming from allegations of racial and sexual harassment by an executive at the company.

  • April 02, 2026

    Court: Pro Se Plaintiff Entitled To Protections, But Not Unfettered AI Use

    DENVER — Acknowledging the hard questions artificial intelligence raises in the legal field, a federal magistrate judge in Colorado said pro seplaintiffs enjoy the same privacy and work-product protections as lawyers under federal rules, but concluded that a protective order in the employment discrimination case before her must be amended to ensure confidential information does not end up in consumer AI models.

  • April 02, 2026

    Class Suit Alleges FBI Employees Were Fired For Perceived Political Affiliation

    WASHINGTON, D.C. — Three former Federal Bureau of Investigation employees seek reinstatement in a putative class complaint filed in a federal court in the District of Columbia in which they allege they were wrongly fired because FBI Director Kashyap P. Patel and Attorney General Pamela J. Bondi “perceived them to be political opponents.”

  • April 01, 2026

    Employment Lawyers, Firms On Hook For Attorney Fees After Fake Citations, Quotes

    PHOENIX — Two attorneys and their law firms will be jointly liable for reasonable attorney fees incurred by Suns Legacy Partners LLC after the company sought sanctions for the plaintiffs’ inclusion of at least 16 fake citations and quotes in a woman’s employment case, a federal judge in Arizona said March 31 in partially denying a motion to dismiss.

  • April 01, 2026

    Summary Judgment Denied For Unions, Government On APA Claims In DOGE Access Suit

    WASHINGTON, D.C. — A federal judge in the District of Columbia on March 31 denied summary judgment to both sides — unions and nonprofits and federal government agencies — as to Administrative Procedure Act (APA) claims in a case over U.S. Digital Service and U.S. DOGE Service Temporary Organization (together, DOGE) personnel’s right to access U.S. Department of Labor (DOL) records, finding that “real disputes over facts foundational to plaintiffs’ APA claims . . . persist.”

  • April 01, 2026

    7th Circuit Receives Illinois High Court Ruling On Pre-Shift COVID-19 Screening

    CHICAGO — Having received a response from the Illinois Supreme Court in the negative as to whether the Illinois Minimum Wage Law (IMWL) incorporates the federal Portal-to-Portal Act (PPA) amendments to the Fair Labor Standards Act (FLSA) so as to exclude certain pre-shift activities, such as screening for COVID-19, from compensable time, the Seventh Circuit U.S. Court of Appeals directed the parties to file statements about what action the court should take to complete the resolution of the appeal.

  • April 01, 2026

    Removed MSPB Member Seeks U.S. High Court Review Of ‘Adjudicatory Body’ Removals

    WASHINGTON, D.C. — A case currently before the U.S. Supreme Court concerning a president’s power to remove at-will Federal Trade Commission members will not decide “whether Congress may enact a for-cause removal statute for a purely ‘adjudicatory body’ that does not make policy,” a member of the Merit Systems Protection Board (MSPB) who is seeking review of her February 2025 removal by President Donald J. Trump argues in her U.S. Supreme Court petition for a writ of certiorari.

  • March 31, 2026

    DOL Seeks Comments On Proposed Revision To Foreign Worker Visa Program Wage Levels

    WASHINGTON, D.C. — The U.S. Department of Labor (DOL) is soliciting comments from the public on a proposed rule that would amend the methodology used to set prevailing wage levels for H-1B and Permanent Labor Certification (PERM) visa program workers and allow for pay increases in an effort to stop employers from hiring “alien workers at wage levels below those that similarly employed U.S. workers were paid,” which the DOL says has led to “adverse effects to the wages and working conditions of U.S. workers.”

  • March 31, 2026

    High Court Denies Debt Firm’s Petition In CFAA Suit Against Ex-Workers

    WASHINGTON, D.C. — The U.S. Supreme Court on March 30 denied a petition for a writ of certiorari filed by a national debt collection firm that sought review of whether the Third Circuit U.S. Court of Appeals was correct in ruling that two former employees committed “workplace-policy infractions” and did not violate the Computer Fraud and Abuse Act (CFAA) when they shared a spreadsheet containing passwords for login information and that the passwords were not trade secrets under state or federal law.

  • March 31, 2026

    Hollywood Hotelier, Fired Worker Argue Arbitration Jurisdiction Case In High Court

    WASHINGTON, D.C. — The U.S. Supreme Court heard oral arguments on March 30 in a dispute between the owners and operators of a West Hollywood luxury hotel and an employee terminated during the COVID-19 pandemic over whether a federal court that had original jurisdiction over a case and stayed it for arbitration maintains jurisdiction to confirm or vacate the arbitration award under the Federal Arbitration Act (FAA) without an independent jurisdictional basis.

  • March 30, 2026

    High Court To Review Affirmative Defense Filing Dispute In Termination Case

    WASHINGTON, D.C. — The U.S. Supreme Court on March 30 granted a petition for a writ of certiorari filed by a terminated employee of a Georgia district attorney’s office seeking review of whether the dismissal of her federal claims that she was terminated because of her pregnancy was proper when the affirmative defense her employer used as the basis of its summary judgment motion was not filed as part of its answer to her amended complaint in violation of the Federal Rules of Civil Procedure.

  • March 27, 2026

    Trump Issues New EO Banning ‘DEI Activities’ By Federal Contractors

    WASHINGTON, D.C. — President Donald J. Trump issued an executive order (EO) March 26, requiring federal contractors to end any “diversity, equity, and inclusion” (DEI) activities, including hiring, allocation of resources and training and mentoring programs.

  • March 27, 2026

    Reservist Differential Pay Class Certified Nearly 1 Year After Feliciano Decided

    WASHINGTON, D.C. — A federal judge certified a class of military reserve and National Guard members seeking differential pay and interest for time spent in active duty and away from their federal civilian jobs, opining in part that a potentially overbroad class “definition is preferable to an overly narrow one” and that modifications may still be made as the case proceeds.

  • March 26, 2026

    High Court Hears Arguments On Driver Classification In FAA Arbitration Case

    WASHINGTON, D.C. — The U.S. Supreme Court heard oral arguments on March 25 about whether workers who locally deliver goods without crossing state borders are characterized as “transportation workers” who are “engaged in foreign or interstate commerce” and therefore exempt from the Federal Arbitration Act (FAA) in a dispute regarding the classification of an employee of a national bakery products corporation.

  • March 24, 2026

    Contractor Waives Response In Disabled Veteran’s High Court Discrimination Case

    WASHINGTON, D.C. — A government contractor on March 23 waived its right to respond to a petition for writ of certiorari filed in the U.S. Supreme Court by a disabled veteran employee asking whether independent review or shared decision-making protects an employer from “‘cat’s paw’ liability” pursuant to Staub v. Proctor Hospital, when the action was caused by a “biased subordinate’s act.”

  • March 23, 2026

    High Court Denies Police Officers’ Petition To Review COVID Shot Data Suit Toss

    WASHINGTON, D.C. — The U.S. Supreme Court on March 23 denied a petition for writ of certiorari filed by current and former police officers asking to address a circuit split regarding discovery and determine if a decision in an early 20th century smallpox case “should be limited or overturned in favor of a tiers-of-scrutiny approach in assessing First Amendment religious discrimination claims” while challenging the dismissal of claims that collection of their COVID-19 testing results and vaccination statuses violated federal and state law.

  • March 23, 2026

    Judge Dismisses Potbelly’s Suit Against Employment Practices Liability Insurer

    SEATTLE — A federal judge in Washington granted an employment practices liability insurer’s motion to dismiss with prejudice a breach of contract lawsuit brought by the owner and operator of several Potbelly Sandwich Shops in Washington state seeking a declaratory judgment that the insurer has a duty to defend and indemnify it against an underlying putative class alleging that it violated the Washington Equal Pay and Opportunities Act by not providing wage and salary information to job applicants in Washington, concluding that the underlying action does not assert that Potbelly engaged in discrimination to trigger coverage under the policy.

  • March 20, 2026

    Parties Agree To Dismiss ADA ‘Regarded As’ Claim Based On COVID Vaccination Status

    PITTSBURGH — The parties filed a stipulation of dismissal on March 19 in a lawsuit brought by a former employee under the Americans with Disabilities Act (ADA) claiming that her employer failed to accommodate what it perceived as the medical disability of being immunocompromised after she refused to become vaccinated for COVID-19.

  • March 20, 2026

    Government Calls Union’s Intervention Denial Petition ‘Manifestly Unwarranted’

    WASHINGTON, D.C. — The federal government contends in response to a petition for a writ of certiorari filed by the Office and Professional Employees International Union (OPEIU) that review of a Fifth Circuit U.S. Court of Appeals panel majority’s decision to deny intervention in a trio of cases involving the constitutionality of the National Labor Relations Board is “manifestly unwarranted” because the panel’s decision was correct, the appeal was untimely, no circuit split exists and there are no unmet interests, among other arguments.

  • March 19, 2026

    10th Circuit Affirms Dismissal Of Fired Chipotle Manager’s Age Discrimination Suit

    DENVER —  A 10th Circuit U.S. Court of Appeals panel affirmed a New Mexico federal judge’s summary judgment holding that a 54-year-old, terminated Chipotle field manager did not present sufficient evidence to show that he was fired due to age discrimination and instead concluded that he was fired because of a cockroach infestation and reports of other cleanliness issues at several restaurants he was responsible for overseeing.

  • March 19, 2026

    D.C. Federal Judge Vacates Actions Taken To Reduce Staffing At Voice Of America

    WASHINGTON, D.C. — A federal judge in the District of Columbia ordered all Voice of America (VOA) employees placed on administrative leave in March 2025 to return to work no later than March 23, 2026, in a decision that partially granted and partially denied summary judgment motions filed by journalists, unions and the U.S. Agency for Global Media (USAGM), which oversees VOA.

  • March 19, 2026

    Vice Chancellor Reinstalls Subnautica Studio CEO After ChatGPT Termination Plan

    WILMINGTON, Del. — A Delaware vice chancellor reinstated the CEO of the game studio behind “Subnautica,” unwinding a termination the parent company undertook after consulting with ChatGPT in an effort to avoid an up to $250 million payout to employees it believed would have been triggered by the release of a sequel to the popular title.

  • March 18, 2026

    Wash. State Target Workers Ink $1.5M Class Settlement In Federal Wage Law Case

    TACOMA, Wash. — Tens of thousands of current and former hourly Target employees in Washington will receive portions of a $1.5 million payment under a settlement of a class action after the corporation allegedly failed to pay adequate wages and provide legally required breaks over a nearly four-year period.

  • March 18, 2026

    N.J. Farm Opposes DOL’s Push For High Court Review Of Migrant Worker Fines Case

    WASHINGTON, D.C. — In response to a petition for writ of certiorari filed by the Department of Labor (DOL) in which the department asks the U.S. Supreme Court to review whether the U.S. Constitution allows it to handle cases where employers owe money for violating H-2A migrant worker employment rules, a New Jersey family farm says the department’s question is flawed and misstates the Immigration and Nationality Act (INA) and it seeks a denial of the petition or a “more neutral phrasing” of the question.

  • March 18, 2026

    Fired Employee Who Refused COVID Shot Settles With Employer After New Trial Grant

    CHICAGO — A transit authority and its former employee have reached a settlement in the employee’s lawsuit seeking damages for violations of Title VII of the Civil Rights Act stemming from his termination for refusing to be vaccinated against COVID-19 after an Illinois federal judge granted a new trial because he had failed to include a mixed-motive jury instruction on the issue of a transit authority’s motivation for terminating the employee.