Newsletter RSS

Mealey's Employment

  • 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 forwarding 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.

  • December 18, 2025

    Worker Tells High Court To Keep Hoffmann‑La Roche Notice Rule In Petition Response

    WASHINGTON, D.C. — In an opposition brief filed Dec. 17 in response to a medical company’s U.S. Supreme Court petition for writ of certiorari, an employee who filed an Age Discrimination in Employment Act (ADEA) suit against the company contends that standards established in Hoffmann-La Roche v. Sperling are sufficient to determine when district courts can authorize and facilitate notice to nonparties on behalf of plaintiffs when joining lawsuits as a collective and should not be overruled.

  • December 18, 2025

    11th Circuit Remands Retaliation Suit For ‘Convincing Mosaic’ Standard Analysis

    ATLANTA — An 11th Circuit U.S. Court of Appeals panel ruled that a federal judge in Georgia “improperly conflated” the pretext analysis of McDonnell Douglas Corp. v. Green “and the ‘convincing mosaic’ standard” when granting summary judgment to a group of county sheriff’s office employees who were sued by a fired employee for retaliation following complaints of harassment, reversing and remanding the case with instructions to apply the convincing mosaic standard as the standard of review.

  • December 16, 2025

    5th Circuit Denies Rehearing, Still Remands Airline Worker ADEA Case In New Opinion

    NEW ORLEANS — Despite a three-judge Fifth Circuit U.S. Court of Appeals panel submitting a substitute opinion, rehearing will not be held for its ruling that a terminated United Airlines employee’s federal and state age discrimination claims are not precluded or preempted in a federal forum by the Railway Labor Act (RLA), as the final conclusion remained unchanged.

  • December 16, 2025

    ‘Top Hat’ Plan Participants Seek Review Of 6th Circuit Ruling Against Them

    WASHINGTON, D.C. — The trust administrator for “top hat” deferred compensation and retirement plans on Dec. 15 waived its right to 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 16, 2025

    High Court Denies Cert In COVID Vaccine Religious Accommodation Refusal Cases

    WASHINGTON, D.C. — The U.S. Supreme Court on Dec. 15 denied petitions for writ of certiorari regarding a request to settle a circuit split and questions surrounding disability perceptions and pleadings that were filed by a group of New York City public educators and a U.S. Treasury Department employee who were denied religious accommodations for failing to adhere to COVID-19 vaccine mandates.

  • December 15, 2025

    High Court Denies Illinois County’s Petition In Correctional Officer Back Pay Case

    WASHINGTON, D.C. — The U.S. Supreme Court on Dec. 15 denied a petition for a writ of certiorari filed by an Illinois county and its sheriff asking whether the Americans with Disabilities Act (ADA) allows an employer to be held liable for discrimination against an employee on the basis of disability when there is no physical or mental impairment present, declining to hear their argument that four circuits disagreed with an appellate panel’s interpretation of the statute that reversed a lower court’s denial of back pay to a former correctional officer.

  • December 15, 2025

    Rehearing Denied Despite Argument That Benefits Ruling Will Kill Newspaper

    PITTSBURGH — The Third Circuit U.S. Court of Appeals denied a Pittsburgh newspaper’s request for rehearing after construing it as a motion for reconsideration of a November order declining to stay a ruling enforcing a National Labor Relations Board decision finding that the newspaper bargained in bad faith, unlawfully declared an impasse and unlawfully surveilled union activities.

  • December 12, 2025

    Executive Order Requires Evaluation Of Influence Of Foreign-Owned Proxy Advisers

    WASHINGTON, D.C. — On Dec. 11, President Donald J. Trump issued an executive order seeking to protect investors and pensions from politicized advice from foreign-owned proxy advisers.

  • December 12, 2025

    Federal Judge Refuses To Toss ‘As Regarded’ ADA Claim Based On Vaccination Status

    PITTSBURGH — Finding unpersuasive several cases cited by an employer that held that being unvaccinated for COVID-19 cannot be the basis for a perceived disability under the Americans with Disabilities Act (ADA), a Pennsylvania federal judge sustained a former employee’s objections to a magistrate’s report and recommendation and denied the company’s partial motion to dismiss the employee’s ADA claim alleging that the company failed to accommodate what it perceived as the medical disability of being immunocompromised.

  • December 12, 2025

    Jury Awards $11.5M To Fired Worker In Race Discrimination, Retaliation Suit

    DENVER — A Colorado federal jury found that a terminated employee of a professional human resources organization is entitled to a total $11.5 million in compensatory and punitive damages after proving that her race and complaints she made about racial discrimination and retaliation led to her firing.

  • December 10, 2025

    Magistrate Judge Recommends Denying Injunctive Relief In AI Discipline Challenge

    NEW YORK — A federal district court lacks jurisdiction over a Second Circuit U.S. Court of Appeals’ referral of an attorney to a grievance panel based on its conclusion that she misused artificial intelligence, and the attorney has not demonstrated a likelihood of success otherwise, a magistrate judge said in recommending that the court deny injunctive relief.

  • December 10, 2025

    Judge Won’t Stay AI Discrimination Case Pending U.S. Supreme Court Petitions

    SAN FRANCISCO — A federal judge in California declined to stay an artificial intelligence age discrimination case while the U.S. Supreme Court considers a pair of petitions involving Age Discrimination in Employment Act (ADEA) collective actions, saying any harm from having to reassess the notice process is speculative and does not outweigh the harm the plaintiffs would experience from the delay.

  • December 09, 2025

    U.S. High Court Won’t Hear Cases Challenging Union Payment And Cessation Actions

    WASHINGTON, D.C. — The U.S. Supreme Court on Dec. 8 denied two petitions for a writ of certiorari filed by public sector employees who alleged that union dues were unlawfully deducted from their paychecks without permission and one petition filed by a nonprofit that helps workers resign from unions that alleged unlawful conduct by three unions that refused union cessation paperwork that came in packaging displaying the organization’s name and logo.

  • December 09, 2025

    5th Circuit Affirms Ruling For Grocery Worker In Suit Over Termination After Injury

    NEW ORLEANS — In an unpublished per curiam order, the Fifth Circuit U.S. Court of Appeals affirmed summary judgment against a former grocery worker who alleged that her employment and benefits were improperly terminated to keep her from receiving benefits under a work injury plan and a return-to-work program that were governed by the Employee Retirement Income Security Act.

  • December 09, 2025

    High Court Wants Brief From U.S. In Fired Public University Workers’ Title IX Suit

    WASHINGTON, D.C. — The U.S. Supreme Court on Dec. 8 asked the U.S. solicitor general to weigh in on a case brought by two former employees of the Board of Regents of the University System of Georgia asking the high court to determine if they can privately sue their public employer for sex discrimination under Title IX of the Education Amendments of 1972.

  • December 09, 2025

    3rd Circuit Panel: Challenge To Federal Employee COVID Vaccination Mandate Is Moot

    PHILADELPHIA — Agreeing with the conclusions of a New Jersey federal court, a panel of the Third Circuit U.S. Court of Appeals on Dec. 8 affirmed the lower court judgment that the claims of federal employees and contractors challenging presidential executive orders implementing a mandatory COVID-19 vaccination policy were moot and that exceptions to mootness that might preserve their viability did not apply.

  • December 09, 2025

    High Court Grants Cert To Fired Hotel Worker In Arbitration Application Case

    WASHINGTON, D.C. — The U.S. Supreme Court granted a petition for a writ of certiorari from a fired West Hollywood hotel worker who sued his employer for discrimination and retaliation asking the high court to address “an important question of federal arbitration law that has divided the circuits” regarding a federal court’s jurisdiction over a post-arbitration application to confirm or vacate an arbitration award after a case has been stayed pending arbitration.

  • December 09, 2025

    U.S. High Court Denies Former Manager’s Petition Questioning Retaliation Evidence

    WASHINGTON, D.C. — The U.S. Supreme Court on Dec. 8 denied a petition for a writ of certiorari filed by a former fast food manager who asked the justices to consider two questions concerning McDonnell Douglas Corp. v. Green, pretext and motives at the summary judgment stage in a case alleging disability bias and Family and Medical Leave Act (FMLA) violations.

  • December 09, 2025

    High Court Seeks U.S. View Of Workers’ Challenge Of Repealed N.Y. Vaccine Rule

    WASHINGTON, D.C. — The U.S. Supreme Court on Dec. 8 invited the solicitor general to file a brief expressing the views of the United States regarding questions presented by health care workers challenging a now-repealed New York COVID-19 vaccine law that they say violated federal law.

  • December 09, 2025

    Minor-League Baseball Players’ Pay Rehearing Petition Denied By U.S. Supreme Court

    WASHINGTON, D.C. — The U.S. Supreme Court on Dec. 8 denied a petition for rehearing filed by minor-league baseball players who argued that another pending petition concerning baseball’s antitrust exemption made “clear that the issue of the validity of the ‘business of baseball’ exemption is an ongoing problem that is not going away and will continue to vex the courts until this Court grants certiorari and overturns the entirety of the exemption it created” in Flood v. Kuhn.