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August 07, 2026
CHICAGO — Agreeing with the lower court that “an attempt to change the rights of a surviving spouse by a person acting under a Wisconsin grant of a power of attorney” failed because “Wisconsin law required a specific, express grant of power that the power of attorney did not contain,” the Seventh Circuit U.S. Court of Appeals affirmed a summary judgment ruling in an Employee Retirement Income Security Act case that meant the roughly $1.2 million proceeds of two pension plans would go to the decedent’s 12 children instead of to his 36 grandchildren.
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August 07, 2026
BUFFALO, N.Y. — Claiming that he was the subject of religious discrimination because his employer did not grant his request to include “a fossil-fuel-free investment option” in its 401(k), an employee of Thermo Fisher Scientific Inc. sued the company in New York federal court.
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August 06, 2026
LOS ANGELES — A California federal judge who had resolved competing summary judgment motions in a long-running Employee Retirement Income Security Act class action by ruling that trial was required for some issues has now ordered trial on a different mix of issues after granting a reconsideration motion focused on disclosure obligations concerning brokerage windows.
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August 06, 2026
CHICAGO — Granting judgment against a long-term disability (LTD) claimant on the grounds that he failed to exhaust his administrative remedies, a Chicago federal judge ruled that “a federal common law presumption that mail properly sent is received” isn’t established because “there is insufficient evidence that the purported appeal letters were properly directed and mailed” — and “even if the mailbox presumption might otherwise apply, it is defeated both by Plaintiff’s error in addressing the January 2022 letter and Defendant’s robust evidence of nonreceipt.”
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August 05, 2026
NEW YORK — After the Pension Benefit Guaranty Corp. (PBGC) and a multiemployer plan reported reaching an agreement “that this matter may be efficiently resolved” in a special financial assistance (SFA) dispute the U.S. Supreme Court recently declined to review, a New York federal judge entered a stipulated order.
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August 05, 2026
NEW YORK — The Second Circuit U.S. Court of Appeals has scheduled oral argument for Sept. 3 in an appeal where a corporate finance attorney who claimed that she became unable to do her job after her vehicle was rear-ended at a traffic light seeks reversal of a ruling upholding denial of her claim for long-term disability (LTD) benefits.
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August 04, 2026
NEWARK, N.J. — The plaintiffs in an Employee Retirement Income Security Act class action that is now centered on allegations of self-dealing and prohibited transactions have asked a New Jersey federal court to grant preliminary approval of a settlement with ADP TotalSource Group Inc. and related parties that would include a $48 million common fund and nonmonetary relief.
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August 04, 2026
COLUMBIA, S.C. — Saying in part that the key provision a retirement plan sponsor invoked “does not authorize an award of attorney’s fees against counsel,” a South Carolina federal judge on Aug. 3 declined to order the plaintiff’s counsel to pay $1,133,428.61 to cover the legal fees and nontaxable costs the sponsor said it incurred in successfully defending itself against an Employee Retirement Income Security Act case focused on recordkeeping fees.
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August 03, 2026
ST. LOUIS — Resolving challenges to several rulings that arose from a suit in which an employer prevailed over the parties that alleged that it owed multiemployer fund contributions, the Eighth Circuit U.S. Court of Appeals affirmed summary judgment and expert exclusion decisions but said it lacks jurisdiction regarding an attorney fee ruling that did not set the amount owed to the employer and, therefore, is not yet ripe for appeal; one panel member filed a concurrence concerning the expert exclusion.
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July 31, 2026
PASADENA, Calif. — Citing a failure “to rigorously analyze whether Rule 23’s typicality and adequate representation requirements were satisfied,” the Ninth Circuit U.S. Court of Appeals on July 30 issued an unpublished disposition vacating class certification and remanding “for proceedings consistent with this disposition” in an Employee Retirement Income Security Act suit over retirement plan fees and funds.
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July 31, 2026
SAN FRANCISCO — Applying Platt v. Sodexo, S.A. in a July 30 ruling that one panel member dissented from for two reasons, the Ninth Circuit U.S. Court of Appeals affirmed that a nonseverable arbitration provision is unenforceable because it contains a class, collective and representative action waiver that prevents effective vindication of retirement plan participants’ substantive right under the Employee Retirement Income Security Act.
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July 30, 2026
SAN FRANCISCO — Partly reviving the suit of a pro se scientist, the Ninth Circuit U.S. Court of Appeals issued an unpublished memorandum disposition reversing summary judgment against him as to claims concerning a pension plan; however, the appellate court also upheld denial of the scientist’s motions for discovery sanctions and affirmed that he had waived his claims concerning a 401(k) plan and retaliation in exchange for a $12,500 severance payment.
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July 30, 2026
DALLAS — Retirement plan participants opposed dismissal of their amended class action complaint in a Texas federal court brought under the Employee Retirement Income Security Act (ERISA) against retirement plan fiduciaries, arguing that their revised claims properly allege imprudent retention of the Prudential Guaranteed Income Fund (Prudential GIF), excessive recordkeeping and administrative fees and derivative monitoring failures by adding detailed allegations that cure deficiencies identified in the court’s prior dismissal ruling.
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July 30, 2026
PHILADELPHIA — Citing Yegiazaryan v. Smagin and finding “a clear indication that” the Employee Retirement Income Security Act “applies extraterritorially to the plaintiffs’ claims for benefits,” a Pennsylvania federal judge declined to remand a case in which Kosovo residents who say they worked for a U.S.-based company seek long-term disability (LTD) benefits from a U.S.-based insurer; the judge then granted dismissal with leave to amend on the grounds that ERISA preempts all of the employees’ state law claims.
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July 30, 2026
A wave of putative class lawsuits that started in late 2024 continues to grow, with at least seven new Employee Retirement Income Security Act complaints challenging health plan tobacco surcharges filed from May through late July, plus one amended consolidated complaint.
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July 29, 2026
To date, defendants have fully prevailed in roughly one of every four rulings resolving dismissal motions in a wave of lawsuits challenging health plan tobacco surcharges, but that ratio includes a recent two-day stretch in which federal judges in New Jersey and Minnesota dismissed putative class cases against Campbell Soup Co. and Target Corp. and a federal judge in Texas partly dismissed a putative class case against United Surgical Partners International Inc.
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July 28, 2026
PITTSBURGH — Deepening the conflicting case law in a series of putative class actions challenging pension risk transfers (PRTs) under the Employee Retirement Income Security Act, a Pennsylvania federal judge on July 27 dismissed one such case for lack of standing, saying in part that the retirees “haven’t plausibly alleged that there is a significant likelihood Athene would default to a degree that their pensions would be affected.”
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July 28, 2026
ST. LOUIS — After each party had filed a brief in the Eighth Circuit U.S. Court of Appeals concerning an attempt to revive a putative class Employee Retirement Income Security Act mortality table case, the appellants moved for voluntary dismissal of the appeal with prejudice and the appellate court granted the motion after the appellees reported that they did not object to the motion.
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July 27, 2026
LOS ANGELES — Concluding that a trade association “articulates a viable theory of injury” but lacks standing because “it fails to allege sufficient facts to show its members have suffered that injury,” a California federal judge on July 24 dismissed with leave to amend a suit in which the association argued that the Employee Retirement Income Security Act preempts a California state law that purports to impose fiduciary duties on the pharmacy benefit managers (PBMs) of self-funded health plans.
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July 27, 2026
DENVER — Resolving two motions filed by a physician who is challenging denial of her claim for long-term disability (LTD) benefits, a Colorado federal magistrate judge allowed her to amend the complaint to seek exemplary damages but ordered her to respond to interrogatories concerning “the impressions or opinions of her former coworkers.”
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July 27, 2026
NORFOLK, Va. — Partly granting a motion filed by a Virginia state senator who formerly played in the National Football League and is challenging the league’s denial of his application for total and permanent (T&P) disability benefits, a Virginia federal magistrate judge directed that three documents be redacted and filed publicly but the rest of the administrative record remain sealed.
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July 24, 2026
BOSTON — Asking the First Circuit U.S. Court of Appeals to reverse a ruling that a former attorney is entitled to ongoing long-term disability (LTD) benefits, an insurer argues that its termination decision was not arbitrary and capricious and should have been upheld because the attorney “failed to provide any objective proof of limitations which would prevent her from performing the material duties of her Regular Occupation.”
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July 24, 2026
BAY CITY, Mich. — Concluding on de novo review that termination of long-term disability (LTD) benefits for a claimant who had psychiatric illnesses and physical impairments was improper because the plan administrator “applied the wrong plan certificate,” a Michigan federal judge said that the claimant “comes up short on proofs relating to his physical condition” but “the evidence of his psychiatric conditions leaves little doubt as to his disabled status.”
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July 23, 2026
NEW YORK — Making the same key arguments it did in January in a similar interlocutory appeal, the U.S. Department of Labor (DOL) filed an amicus curiae brief urging the Second Circuit U.S. Court of Appeals to reverse a ruling that retirees had standing to file a putative class lawsuit that is part of a much-watched string of pension risk transfer (PRT) challenges; among other things, the retirees generally allege that the use of offshore captive reinsurers makes the insurers now responsible for paying their annuities more likely to fall short of their obligations.
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July 22, 2026
GREENVILLE, S.C. — Concluding that an insurer’s application of a preexisting condition exclusion was not reasonable, a South Carolina federal magistrate judge ruled that a claimant who stopped working shortly after being tentatively diagnosed with multiple sclerosis (MS) was wrongly denied long-term disability (LTD) benefits.