The EEOC sent letters to 500 of the largest employers in the United States questioning their Title VII compliance and flagging potentially “illegal” DEI initiatives — a signal that the agency views many diversity hiring and promotion programs as discriminating against majority-group employees. Non-compete enforcement has fractured between an abandoned federal rulemaking and a patchwork of increasingly aggressive state laws. FTC Chairman Andrew https://startentrepreneureonline.com/job/japanese-speaking-hr-canon/ Ferguson announced the agency would pursue enforcement case-by-case rather than through broad rulemaking — effectively leaving the non-compete landscape to state law, where it had always primarily resided. A new General Counsel memorandum directs Board regions to pursue settlement “based solely on the maintenance of potentially unlawful rules” as inefficient — a direct departure from Biden-era enforcement posture. The Board restored a working quorum in early 2026, and on February 26, 2026, formally reinstated its 2020 joint employer standard, reverting from the broader 2023 Biden-era rule. Without a quorum, the NLRB cannot issue decisions in unfair labor practice appeals, cannot resolve union election disputes, and cannot make new policy.

The ruling deepens a circuit split on the scope of executive power over independent agencies, and its ultimate resolution is expected to be determined by the Supreme Court based on its conflict with other appellate readings of longstanding Supreme Court precedent on independent agencies. Employers with multijurisdictional footprints should address these changes to refine and update compliance roadmaps for 2026. Federal agency authority faced significant constitutional challenges, while states and cities accelerated their own legislation on pay transparency, paid leave, and hiring practices. This new episode highlights a few of the biggest L&E developments from the Summer of 2025, including from the DOL

Programs carefully designed to be legally defensible under prior EEOC guidance may now draw scrutiny from the same agency that issued that guidance. The rule was blocked by a federal district court in August 2024, appealed, and then the FTC quietly dropped its appeal in September 2025. Meanwhile, Acting General Counsel William Cowen rescinded over 25 guidance memoranda previously issued by Abruzzo on topics including electronic surveillance of employees, non-compete agreements, and enhanced remedies in unfair labor practice settlements.

All Aboard: Navigating STB Constraints When Financing Class III Railroads

• Non-compete clauses, confidentiality agreements, and non-disparagement provisions that Abruzzo had argued were presumptively unlawful under the NLRA are now in a more permissive enforcement environment.
• The Fifth Circuit’s decision in SpaceX v. NLRB allows employers in that circuit (specifically, Texas, Louisiana, and Mississippi) to seek to enjoin ongoing NLRB proceedings based on the alleged unconstitutionality of Board member and administrative law judge (ALJ) removal protections.
• This episode provides important takeaways for employers to address internal and external messaging after – and before – a crisis occurs.
• The EEOC has simultaneously deprioritized claims based on “disparate impact” (policies that affect protected groups disproportionately even without discriminatory intent) in favor of direct challenges to employer diversity policies.

New York City expanded its Safe and Sick Leave law, and new statewide paid sick leave laws took effect in Alaska, Missouri, and Nebraska. For companies that have implemented internal AI systems with communication features, now is the time to verify any compliance hurdles for 2026. The laws require additional safety protocols to detect potential harm and notify users that they are interacting with AI on a recurring basis. Of particular note are California and New York’s AI chatbot laws, which require additional safety measures for companies that utilize AI with varying degrees of human-like responsiveness. This decision drastically raises the bar for plaintiffs in Kentucky, Michigan, Ohio, and Tennessee.

Civil penalties apply for noncompliance, and the city will publish the names of employers that fail to report. A designated agency will use the aggregated data to conduct citywide pay-equity studies and publish recommendations for employers to address pay disparities. Departing from EEOC guidance and other circuits that use a negligence standard, the court held that an employer is liable for harassment of an employee by a client or customer only if the employer intended for the harassment to occur or was substantially certain that it would occur. If confirmed, Mayer and Murphy would restore a three-member quorum, enabling the Board to resume issuing decisions.

Plaintiffs who previously couldn’t survive summary judgment under the heightened standard can now proceed under the standard framework. Imposing a categorical extra burden based solely on a plaintiff’s group membership — requiring more proof simply because of who the plaintiff is — contradicts the statute’s plain text and the Court’s own precedents. The statute draws no distinction between majority and minority plaintiffs.

Pay Transparency Laws Expand

The most significant pending question is the Supreme Court’s forthcoming ruling on whether Humphrey’s Executor — the 1935 precedent permitting Congress to insulate independent agency members from at-will removal — should be overruled. That asymmetry is operationally significant for any business using significant numbers of contractors, subcontractors, or staffing agency workers. Unlike the Trump administration’s 2020 NLRB joint employer standard — which requires direct and immediate control — the DOL’s proposed FLSA rule takes a broader view, examining indirect or potential control, economic dependence, and the totality of the business relationship. The DOL’s April 2026 proposed rule on joint employer status — covering the FLSA, FMLA, and the Migrant and Seasonal Agricultural Worker Protection Act — is the most broadly applicable regulatory development of the year for large employers. Employment lawyers across the ideological spectrum have noted that the ruling resolves a procedural question — who must show what at the threshold pleading stage — without changing the substantive standards that determine whether discrimination actually occurred or what defenses employers can raise.

The Sixth Circuit created yet another circuit split related to employer liability for third-party harassment in its Bivens v. Zep, Inc. decision. In contrast, other circuits require a showing of case-specific harm, meaning this ability to “pause” Board enforcement is largely limited to Texas, Louisiana, and Mississippi. Second, even with a restored quorum, Article II disputes are poised for Supreme Court review, so further shifts remain likely.

In this second part of my new mini-series “What’s Now With…”, I am joined by my Cozen O’Connor colleague Tamara On today’s episode, NLRB General Counsel Abruzzo talks directly about the new Memorandum she issued this week and why she Today’s episode provides the latest https://contrefacon-riposte.info/a-beginners-guide-to-39/ update on the implementation of President Trump’s DEI Executive Orders, and the state of flux in which federal agencies currently sit.

• Unlike the Trump administration’s 2020 NLRB joint employer standard — which requires direct and immediate control — the DOL’s proposed FLSA rule takes a broader view, examining indirect or potential control, economic dependence, and the totality of the business relationship.
• The class-action lawsuit Mobley v. Workday, Inc., which alleges that an HR software vendor’s AI tools are discriminatory, highlights the risk for employers using third-party AI for hiring and other employment decisions.
• Employment lawyers across the ideological spectrum have noted that the ruling resolves a procedural question — who must show what at the threshold pleading stage — without changing the substantive standards that determine whether discrimination actually occurred or what defenses employers can raise.
• The ruling opens the courthouse door slightly wider for majority-group claims; it doesn’t automatically invalidate programs that survived scrutiny before.
• Today’s episode provides the latest update on the implementation of President Trump’s DEI Executive Orders, and the state of flux in which federal agencies currently sit.
• First, without a confirmed quorum, the Board cannot issue decisions in unfair labor practice appeals, which can stall matters for extended periods.

Smithfield Says It Shouldn’t Face Jury In EEOC’s Age Bias Suit

This new episode highlights a few of the biggest L&E developments from the Summer of 2025, including from the DOL and EEOC, and on such hot topics as DEI-related discrimination, the FTC’s non-compete proposal, and AI laws. In today’s episode, I talk about the L&E developments and trends that employers should be watching as we begin 2026. In this first part of my new mini-series „What’s Now With . . .“, I am joined by my Cozen colleagues Dan Johns and Kelly Kindig to talk about What’s Now (new) With . In this second part of my new mini-series „What’s Now With…“, I am joined by my Cozen colleague Tamara Hinton to talk about What’s Now (new) With . Today, I am joined by Jonathan Berry, the new Solicitor of Labor for the United States Department of Labor, to discuss Solicitor Berry’s new Enforcement Memo that identifies a significant shift in policy and priorities for this DOL administration. In this third part of my new mini-series „What’s Now With…“, I am joined by my Cozen colleague Mariah Passarelli to talk about What’s Now (new) with .

In today’s episode, I talk about the L&E developments and trends that employers should be watching as we begin 2026. In this episode, I discuss important labor and employment developments, including the EEOC’s new technical guidance on remote work as I am joined by Claudio Martinez Santistevan, a lawyer from the Mexico-based law firm of De La Vega & Martinez Rojas to discuss Mexico’s perspectives on the first few months of President Trump’s second term and how this administration’s initiatives are viewed. Today’s episode provides the latest update on the ping-pong court decisions involving President Trump’s DEI Executive Orders, and the noteworthy response to the EEOC’s new guidance on DEI-related discrimination and harassment.