The Supreme Court’s June 5, 2025 decision to revive a heterosexual woman’s discrimination suit on the basis of sexual orientation against her employer could open a floodgate of future litigation. In a unanimous ruling...more
A U.S. Supreme Court with a conservative majority is still capable of surprising us. In Muldrow v. St. Louis, the Court lightened the burden on employment discrimination plaintiffs by lowering the legal ‘bar’ for an employee...more
It has been less than a month since the Supreme Court’s June 29 decision in Students for Fair Admissions, Inc. v. President and Fellows of Harvard College (SFFA), and the decision is already creating controversy....more
7/28/2023
/ Affirmative Action ,
Civil Rights Act ,
College Admissions ,
Diversity ,
Diversity and Inclusion Standards (D&I) ,
Educational Institutions ,
Equal Protection ,
Fourteenth Amendment ,
SCOTUS ,
Students for Fair Admissions v Harvard College ,
Students for Fair Admissions v University of North Carolina
On June 29, 2023, amid a flurry of other newsworthy opinions, the Supreme Court issued a unanimous ruling in Groff v. DeJoy, modifying the legal standard which courts now must use to determine when an employer has to grant a...more
7/13/2023
/ Civil Rights Act ,
De Minimus Doctrine ,
Employer Liability Issues ,
Equal Employment Opportunity Commission (EEOC) ,
Groff v DeJoy ,
Reasonable Accommodation ,
Religious Accommodation ,
Religious Discrimination ,
SCOTUS ,
Substantial Burden ,
Title VII ,
Undue Hardship ,
USPS
The U.S. Supreme Court has issued two opinions on COVID regulations impacting employers and workers across the country. In the first, the Court stayed the Occupational Safety and Health Administration’s (“OSHA”) “vaccine or...more
3/3/2022
/ Centers for Medicare & Medicaid Services (CMS) ,
Coronavirus/COVID-19 ,
Employer Mandates ,
Infectious Diseases ,
Lack of Authority ,
OSHA ,
SCOTUS ,
Stays ,
Vaccinations ,
Virus Testing ,
Workplace Safety
Last week, the Supreme Court issued two opinions on COVID regulations impacting employers and workers across the country.
• In the first, the Court stayed OSHA’s “vaccine or test” mandate for employers with 100 or more...more
1/19/2022
/ Centers for Medicare & Medicaid Services (CMS) ,
Coronavirus/COVID-19 ,
Employer Mandates ,
Healthcare Workers ,
Infectious Diseases ,
Lack of Authority ,
National Federation of Independent Business v Department of Labor and OSHA ,
OSHA ,
SCOTUS ,
Stays ,
Vaccinations ,
Virus Testing
In a long awaited landmark ruling by Justice M. Gorsuch, the Supreme Court ruled that Title VII protects gay and transgender workers. The Opinion provides...more
6/17/2020
/ Altitude Express Inc v Zarda ,
Bostock v Clayton County Georgia ,
Civil Rights Act ,
EEOC v RG & GR Harris Funeral Homes ,
Employer Liability Issues ,
Gender Identity ,
Hiring & Firing ,
LGBTQ ,
SCOTUS ,
Sex Discrimination ,
Sexual Orientation ,
Sexual Orientation Discrimination ,
Title VII ,
Transgender
Last week, the US Supreme Court made it easier for a federal worker to establish a claim for age bias.
This decision does not impact private employers, because it relied on the specific language of the federal sector...more
4/15/2020
/ ADEA ,
Age Discrimination ,
Babb v Wilkie ,
Burden of Proof ,
But For Causation ,
Employer Liability Issues ,
Federal Employees ,
Hiring & Firing ,
McDonnell Douglas Formula ,
Remedies ,
Reversal ,
SCOTUS ,
Standard of Care ,
Summary Judgment
On Monday, the Supreme Court held that appellate courts must utilize the deferential “abuse-of-discretion” standard when evaluating a ruling on a subpoena issued by the Equal Employment Opportunity Commission (“EEOC”)...more
Wal-Mart may have felt the first aftershock of the Supreme Court’s March 2016 opinion in Tyson Foods, Inc. v. Bouaphakeo, which undercut overbroad interpretations of its landmark 2011 Wal-Mart v. Dukes decision and found that...more
In a highly anticipated decision, the Supreme Court last week affirmed a $5.8 million judgment against Tyson Foods and held that damages in a class action can be established by “statistical sampling” – a phrase that may now...more
4/1/2016
/ Class Action ,
Comcast v. Behrend ,
Doffing ,
Donning ,
Dukes v Wal-Mart ,
FRCP 23 ,
SCOTUS ,
Statistical Sampling ,
Tyson Foods v Bouaphakeo ,
Unpaid Overtime ,
Wage and Hour
Last week, UPS settled its long-running case with Peggy Young, the employee whose case went up to the Supreme Court after she was denied light duty. As many will recall from an earlier blog post, the high court found that...more
It’s been a busy few weeks for developments in the area of LGBT rights since the Supreme Court’s decision in King v. Burwell , 576 U.S. ___ (2015)....more
7/27/2015
/ American Civil Liberties Union (ACLU) ,
Class Action ,
Department of Justice (DOJ) ,
Employee Benefits ,
Equal Employment Opportunity Commission (EEOC) ,
Equality Act ,
Gender Discrimination ,
King v Burwell ,
LGBTQ ,
Popular ,
Religious Freedom Restoration Act (RFRA) ,
Same-Sex Marriage ,
SCOTUS ,
Sex Discrimination ,
Spouses ,
Title VII ,
Transgender ,
Wal-Mart
Unless you’ve been living under a rock, you probably are well aware that on June 26, 2015, the U.S. Supreme Court ruled that same sex couples have a constitutional right to marry and have their marriages recognized across the...more
7/8/2015
/ Benefit Plan Sponsors ,
Discrimination ,
DOMA ,
Employee Benefits ,
Employee Rights ,
Employment Policies ,
Family and Medical Leave Act (FMLA) ,
LGBTQ ,
Marital Status ,
Marriage Equality ,
Obergefell v. Hodges ,
Same-Sex Marriage ,
SCOTUS ,
Spouses ,
US v Windsor
As most lawyers and HR professionals know, on June 1, 2015, Justice Antonin Scalia authored a concise opinion, overturning the Tenth Circuit and holding that Abercrombie & Fitch had intentionally discriminated against...more
6/8/2015
/ Abercrombie & Fitch ,
Appearance Policy ,
Corporate Counsel ,
Disparate Impact ,
Disparate Treatment ,
Dress Codes ,
EEOC v Abercrombie ,
Hiring & Firing ,
Job Applicants ,
Popular ,
Reasonable Accommodation ,
Religious Discrimination ,
SCOTUS ,
Title VII ,
Undue Hardship