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Mealey's Employment

  • January 09, 2026

    Ousted NLRB, MSPB Members Seek D.C. Circuit Rehearing After Removals Upheld

    WASHINGTON, D.C. — Petitions for rehearing en banc were filed by a member of the Merit Systems Protection Board (MSPB) and a member of the National Labor Relations Board after their firings by President Donald J. Trump were upheld by a divided panel of the District of Columbia Circuit U.S. Court of Appeals.

  • January 08, 2026

    Gender Dysphoria Expert Can Testify In Employee’s Discrimination Case, Judge Says

    CONCORD, N.H. — A gender dysphoria expert retained by a transgender woman suing her employer for refusing to provide her with health insurance coverage for gender-affirming care can testify in the woman’s discrimination case, a New Hampshire federal judge ruled Jan. 7.

  • January 08, 2026

    Judge ‘Overrules’ Summary Judgment Motion In FCA ‘Fraud’ Suit Over ‘Overpayments’

    KANSAS CITY, Kan. — A Kansas federal judge on Jan. 7 “overruled” a hospital’s motion for summary judgment in a suit asserting that it violated the federal False Claims Act (FCA) by retaliating against and terminating its former CEO, who alleged possible fraud related to the hospital overpaying several of its physicians, finding that there are issues of material fact regarding whether the hospital’s “articulated reasons” for terminating the former CEO were “pretextual.”

  • January 08, 2026

    Responses Filed To High Court Petitions Disputing FLSA Collective Lawsuit Notices

    WASHINGTON, D.C. — In a Jan. 7 response to a petition for a writ of certiorari cross-filed in the U.S. Supreme Court, four former Cracker Barrel employees contend that the restaurant’s question regarding the standard for federal district courts to authorize and facilitate notices to nonparties on behalf of plaintiffs when joining a lawsuit as a collective pursuant to the Fair Labor Standards Act (FLSA) lacks merit and “seeks review of an issue that was neither pressed nor passed upon” at the appellate level, while Cracker Barrel states in a response filed days earlier to the employees’ petition that the workers’ similar question “does not present an issue justifying this court’s review.”

  • January 08, 2026

    9th Circuit Upholds Injunction, Permitting NLRB Action In Amazon Bargaining Dispute

    SAN FRANCISCO — Administrative proceedings before the National Labor Relations Board (NLRB) addressing unfair labor practice charges against Amazon for allegedly refusing to recognize and bargain with the union representing a group of delivery drivers can proceed after a Ninth Circuit U.S. Court of Appeals panel determined that a lower court judge was correct in denying a motion for preliminary injunction.

  • January 07, 2026

    U.S. High Court Denies Pittsburgh Post-Gazette’s Stay Petition In Bargaining Case

    WASHINGTON, D.C. — The U.S. Supreme Court on Jan. 7 denied the Pittsburgh Post-Gazette’s emergency application for a stay of two Third Circuit U.S. Court of Appeals rulings in favor of a National Labor Relations Board’s decision finding that the newspaper bargained in bad faith, unlawfully declared an impasse and unlawfully surveilled union activities during a long-running labor dispute.

  • January 07, 2026

    Employees Fired For Refusing COVID Shot Appeal Dismissal Of Medical Rights Case

    NEW HAVEN, Conn. — Former employees of a university hospital appealed to the Second Circuit U.S. Court of Appeals seeking review of the judgment of a Connecticut federal judge, who granted the hospital’s motion to dismiss the employees’ second amended complaint alleging violations of their constitutional rights to “bodily autonomy, medical privacy and equal protection” caused by the health system’s mandatory COVID-19 vaccination policy and seeking damages under Section 1983 of Title 42 of the U.S. Code.

  • January 06, 2026

    9th Circuit OKs Dismissal Of Former Twitter Workers’ Severance Benefits Appeal

    SAN FRANCISCO — Resolving several motions, the Ninth Circuit U.S. Court of Appeals granted voluntary dismissal of an appeal where former Twitter Inc. employees had initially tried to revive their putative class action for more than $500 million in severance benefits, saying in part that “[i]t appears that the interests of any members of the putative class . . . can be protected adequately in” a similar suit filed Nov. 4.

  • January 06, 2026

    Union, NLRB Oppose Newspaper’s High Court Petition For Stay In Bargaining Case

    WASHINGTON, D.C. — The National Labor Relations Board and the union representing certain Pittsburgh Post-Gazette employees involved in a years-long labor dispute filed separate responses in the U.S. Supreme Court on Jan. 5 in opposition to the newspaper’s emergency application for a stay of two Third Circuit U.S. Court of Appeals rulings against it.

  • January 06, 2026

    7th Circuit Upholds Job Termination Under Contract’s Disability Clause

    CHICAGO — The Seventh Circuit U.S. Court of Appeals affirmed judgment for an employer in a job termination dispute with an orthopedic surgeon that hinged on “the meaning of the phrase ‘the procedures for being determined disabled’” in his employment contract, saying in a nonprecedential disposition that under Wisconsin law, the surgeon’s interpretation “is untenable.”

  • January 06, 2026

    Split 9th Circuit Denies Rehearing After Federal Worker RIF Discovery Ruling

    SAN FRANCISCO — The two remaining members of a Ninth Circuit U.S. Court of Appeals panel on Jan. 5 denied a petition for panel rehearing or rehearing en banc filed by federal government parties who challenged the panel majority’s September ruling that denied the government’s petition for a writ of mandamus seeking to require the trial court to vacate a discovery order requiring in camera production of reduction-in-force (RIF) and reorganization plans for federal agencies; a full court vote was requested on the petition for rehearing en banc but failed to receive a majority of the votes.

  • January 06, 2026

    Fired Employee Who Refused COVID Vaccine Asks Judge To Reconsider New Trial Grant

    CHICAGO — A former transit authority employee who was awarded $425,000 by a jury — statutorily reduced to $300,000 — for violations of Title VII of the Civil Rights Act stemming from his termination for refusing to be vaccinated against COVID-19 moved for reconsideration of an Illinois federal judge’s grant of a new trial, which the judge ordered after determining that he had erred in failing to include a mixed-motive jury instruction on the issue of the transit authority’s motivation for terminating the employee.

  • January 05, 2026

    Nevada High Court Affirms Ruling Finding Claim To Now-Insolvent Insurer Excluded

    LAS VEGAS — The Nevada Supreme Court affirmed a lower court’s ruling finding that a truck driver’s claim for work-related injuries to the trucking company’s now-insolvent insurer was excluded by a workers’ compensation exclusion clause, finding that the driver failed to show that he was an independent contractor and that the workers’ compensation claim related to his injuries was denied.

  • January 05, 2026

    CFPB Firings Preliminary Injunction Clarified After En Banc Rehearing Granted

    WASHINGTON, D.C. — A federal judge in the District of Columbia clarified a March 2025 preliminary injunction that halted the termination of more than 1,400 workers at the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau (CFPB), writing that the federal government parties’ notice to the court that “the Federal Reserve ‘currently lacks combined earnings from which the CFPB can draw’” is a “transparent attempt to starve the [CFPB] of funding and yet another attempt to achieve the very end the Court’s injunction was put in place to prevent.”

  • January 05, 2026

    6th Circuit Panel Majority Denies Rehearing In State Farm ADA Retaliation Case

    CINCINNATI — A Sixth Circuit U.S. Court of Appeals panel majority denied State Farm’s petition for rehearing of a ruling that a fired employee who helped a disabled coworker seek an Americans with Disabilities Act (ADA) accommodation can pursue retaliation claims.

  • January 05, 2026

    Federal Workers’ Privacy Suit Over OPM ‘Test’ Emails Dismissed For No Jurisdiction

    WASHINGTON, D.C. — A federal judge in the District of Columbia dismissed for lack of jurisdiction a putative class complaint by federal workers suing under pseudonyms who alleged that the Office of Personnel Management (OPM) failed to conduct and publish a privacy impact assessment (PIA) before allegedly sending out “test” emails the workers claimed were being used to collect information on them.

  • January 05, 2026

    6th Circuit: Truck Drivers’ Contract Choice-Of-Law Provisions Can’t Be Enforced

    CINCINNATI — Choice-of-law provisions in independent contractor and lease agreements between truck drivers and a transportation company can’t be enforced where “there is no material connection between Tennessee and the parties’ transactions,” a Sixth Circuit U.S. Court of Appeals panel ruled, reversing a Tennessee federal court’s dismissal of the drivers’ wage-and-hour putative class complaint brought under New Jersey law.

  • January 02, 2026

    High Court Asked To Review Vacatur Of Arbitration Award Concerning Severance

    WASHINGTON, D.C. — An employer has waived its right to respond to a U.S. Supreme Court certiorari petition concerning a decision the petitioner says “encourages a cascade of litigation over the enforceability of arbitral awards”; the challenged 2-1 ruling affirmed vacatur of an award that resulted from pro se arbitration over severance pay and concerned an Employee Retirement Income Security Act discrimination claim that the majority concluded the claimant never raised.

  • January 02, 2026

    En Banc Rehearing Granted After Split D.C. Circuit Rules On CFPB Firings Claims

    WASHINGTON, D.C. — The District of Columbia Circuit U.S. Court of Appeals granted a petition for rehearing en banc after a divided panel in August vacated a trial court’s preliminary injunction in a case over the termination of more than 1,400 workers at the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau (CFPB); the majority ruled at that time that the claims related to loss of employment “must proceed through the specialized-review scheme established in the Civil Service Reform Act.”

  • December 31, 2025

    2nd Circuit Denies Rehearing After Ruling On Attorney Fees In Termination Case

    NEW YORK — The Second Circuit U.S. Court of Appeals denied a petition for panel rehearing and rehearing en banc filed by an employee after the appellate panel issued a ruling on a reduction of attorney fees for the employee’s counsel and remanded for recalculation in a wrongful termination case.

  • December 30, 2025

    High Court Signals Interest In Petition Filed By ‘Top Hat’ Plan Participants

    WASHINGTON, D.C. — The U.S. Supreme Court on Dec. 29 requested that the trust administrator for “top hat” deferred compensation and retirement plans respond to a certiorari petition in which plan participants argue that they were wrongly left without relief from federal and state law because the Sixth Circuit U.S. Court of Appeals “adopted an exceedingly narrow and historically unmoored understanding of equitable relief” while simultaneously embracing “an all-too-broad understanding of preemption.”

  • December 26, 2025

    Rehearing Denied After DOGE Discovery Mandamus Petition Partially Granted

    WASHINGTON, D.C. — The District of Columbia Circuit U.S. Court of Appeals denied a petition for rehearing en banc filed by U.S. DOGE Service (DOGE or USDS) and other federal government parties after the appellate panel partially granted and partially denied the government parties’ petition for writ of mandamus challenging two trial court discovery orders in a Freedom of Information Act (FOIA) case regarding DOGE’s authority.

  • December 24, 2025

    Enforcement Of NLRB Ruling On Newspaper’s Bargaining Administratively Stayed

    WASHINGTON, D.C. — A U.S. Supreme Court justice administratively stayed pending further consideration two rulings by the Third Circuit U.S. Court of Appeals enforcing the National Labor Relations Board’s decision against a Pittsburgh newspaper.

  • December 23, 2025

    Judge Finds Privacy Act, APA Claims Against DOGE, OPM Not Mooted

    NEW YORK — A New York federal judge found that the U.S. Office of Personnel Management (OPM) and the Department of Government Efficiency (DOGE) did not establish that claims against them under the Privacy Act and the Administrative Procedure Act (APA) were mooted by the establishment of new compliance procedures, leading her to deny a motion to dismiss.

  • December 23, 2025

    New Trial Granted In Chicago Transit Authority Vaccine Refusal Firing Case

    CHICAGO — Concluding that it had erred in failing to include a mixed-motive jury instruction, an Illinois federal court on Dec. 22 denied a municipal transit authority’s motion for judgment as a matter of law (JMOL) but granted its alternate motion for a new trial after a jury awarded a former transit authority employee $425,000 for violations of Title VII of the Civil Rights Act stemming from his termination for refusing to be vaccinated against COVID-19 after being denied a religious exemption.