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Mealey's Employment

  • 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on “the meaning of the phrase ‘the procedures for being determined disabled’” in his employment contract, saying in a nonprecedential disposition that under Wisconsin law, the surgeon’s interpretation “is untenable.”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.

  • December 23, 2025

    Respondents To High Court: Skip ERISA Releases Ruling; There Is No Split

    WASHINGTON, D.C. — In a brief filed at the request of the U.S. Supreme Court, former Atmel Corp. employees urge denial of a certiorari petition focused on a ruling concerning Employee Retirement Income Security Act releases in their long-running class action concerning severance benefits “[b]ecause there is no circuit conflict and nothing remarkable about the Ninth Circuit’s formulation of the non-exhaustive list of factors relevant to a district court’s assessment of the enforceability of an ERISA claims release.”

  • December 22, 2025

    High Court Denies EOIR Petition For Stay Of ‘Indefensible’ Speech Policy Mandate

    WASHINGTON, D.C. — In a Dec. 19 order, the U.S. Supreme Court denied without prejudice an application filed by the director of the Executive Office for Immigration Review (EOIR) to stay a Fourth Circuit U.S. Court of Appeals panel’s mandate that vacated and remanded an order that dismissed a complaint filed by the National Association of Immigration Judges (NAIJ) challenging a federal employee speech policy.

  • December 19, 2025

    Appeal Dismissed After States Granted Summary Judgment In Federal Staffing Suit

    BOSTON — The First Circuit U.S. Court of Appeals granted a motion by President Donald J. Trump and other federal government agency heads to dismiss an appeal challenging a trial court’s preliminary injunction restraining the federal government from implementing an executive order (EO) “attempt[ing] to dismantle congressionally sanctioned agencies” as applied to the Institute of Museum and Library Services (IMLS), the Minority Business Development Agency (MBDA) and the Federal Mediation and Conciliation Service (FMCS); the voluntary dismissal was filed several days after the trial court granted summary judgment to the states that brought the case.

  • December 19, 2025

    7th Circuit Upholds Dismissal Of Workers’ Case Over Vaccination Data Collection

    CHICAGO — Current and former Chicago police officers who challenged their employer’s collection of their COVID-19 testing results and vaccination status failed to bring a claim with legal merit, the Seventh Circuit U.S. Court of Appeals ruled, affirming a trial court’s dismissal of the case.

  • December 19, 2025

    Police Chief Forced To Resign For Racist Texts Petitions High Court On Speech Laws

    WASHINGTON, D.C. — A California city police chief who says the department forced her to resign after she forwarded reportedly racist text messages filed a petition for a writ of certiorari asking the U.S. Supreme Court to settle a circuit split and determine the First Amendment protections allowed for a public employee who says something controversial as a private citizen, a question fueled by the dismissal of claims of retaliation and conspiracy alleged in a lawsuit filed after her termination.

  • December 19, 2025

    California Jury Awards Fired Liberty Mutual Worker $103M In Age Harassment Case

    LOS ANGELES — A California jury returned verdicts totaling $103 million for a 30-year employee of Liberty Mutual Insurance Co. who alleged that she was harassed due to her age and fired the same day she returned from disability leave.

  • December 19, 2025

    EOIR High Court Petition Seeks Stay Of ‘Indefensible’ Speech Policy Mandate

    WASHINGTON, D.C.— In support of a U.S. Supreme Court application to stay a Fourth Circuit U.S. Court of Appeals panel’s mandate vacating and remanding an order that dismissed a complaint filed by the National Association of Immigration Judges (NAIJ) challenging a federal employee speech policy, the director of the Executive Office for Immigration Review (EOIR) contends that the action “is amply warranted to preserve this Court’s ability to swiftly and summarily reverse the court of appeals’ indefensible decision below” among an array of other points that include addressing a response in opposition.