The Risks in Background Checks
The Clean Slate Act’s Impact on Employers
AGG Talks: Background Screening - Ban the Box and Fair Chance Hiring Laws: The Year in Review
Expungements: A Helping Hand for a Second Chance and New Opportunities
AGG Talks: Background Screening - Redaction of Identifiers by the Courts Update, Breaking News from California
AGG Talks: Background Screening - Redaction of Identifiers by the Courts in Michigan and California Pose Challenges for Background Checks
#WorkforceWednesday: COVID-19 Restrictions Tighten, NYC Fair Chance Act, Biden's Budget - Employment Law This Week®
How to Conduct Criminal Background Checks the Right Way
[WEBINAR] Labor & Employment Law: What Changed in 2017
"Ban The Box" And Other Laws Limiting An Employer's Use Of Criminal History
LXBN This Week Ep. 2: EEOC on Criminal Records & Transgender Discrimination, BP Oil Spill Arrest, AZ Immigration Law at SCOTUS
A large convenience store chain recently learned about the Equal Employment Opportunity Commission’s intention to challenge how employers use arrest and conviction records to make hiring decisions....more
An overwhelming majority of states have adopted what is widely known as “ban-the-box” laws or policies that generally prohibit employers from inquiring about an applicant’s criminal background until later in the hiring...more
The federal government became the most recent employer to adopt a “Ban the Box” policy when The Fair Chance to Compete for Jobs Act became effective December 20, 2021. The law prohibits federal contractors and most federal...more
Last month, the new chair of the EEOC, Charlotte A. Burrows, was the keynote speaker at a conference regarding new research on criminal recidivism....more
Executive Summary: On March 23, 2021, Governor J.B. Pritzker signed into law Illinois Senate Bill 1480 which amends the Illinois Human Rights Act, the Illinois Equal Pay Act of 2003, and the Illinois Business Corporation...more
Illinois Governor J.B. Pritzker signed Senate Bill 1480 into law on March 23, effective immediately. The new law limits employers’ use of conviction records in making employment decisions, requires broad workplace demographic...more
Seyfarth Synopsis: On February 4, 2020, EEOC Chair Janet Dhillon’s released a list of priorities for the Commission in 2020. While the priorities primarily focus on continuing to seek justice for workers raising claims of...more
Seyfarth Synopsis: Stepping into a new year always gives one a chance to reflect on the lessons and trends of the prior year. In that spirit, we are pleased to present our annual selections for the five most intriguing...more
Seyfarth Synopsis: After six years of litigation, on November 18, 2019, the Equal Employment Opportunity Commission (EEOC) announced a multimillion-dollar settlement with a national employer, which resolved litigation that...more
A growing chorus of cities, counties, and states have passed “ban-the-box” laws that restrict when and how employers can consider an applicant’s or employee’s criminal history. Currently, thirteen states (California,...more
As the year draws to a close, employers are assessing the next wave of labor and employment laws and regulations they will face in 2020 and beyond. Most new laws taking effect at the end of 2019 and throughout 2020 are at the...more
Employers should continue to exercise caution and care in drafting their criminal record screening policies. A recent settlement by Dollar General underscores this point, even though it comes on the heels of the Fifth...more
Seyfarth Synopsis: In the latest battle of the multi-year showdown between the State of Texas and the EEOC – whereby Texas asserted that the EEOC’s 2012 “Enforcement Guidance on the Consideration of Arrest and Conviction...more
A federal appeals court ruled yesterday that the 2012 guidance document from the Equal Employment Opportunity Commission (EEOC) that cautioned employers not to apply blanket bans against hiring those with criminal records...more
On August 6, 2019, in Texas v. EEOC, the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Fifth Circuit dealt the EEOC a significant setback, largely affirming the district court’s decision that the EEOC violated the federal Administrative...more
Over 33 states and 150 cities, counties and municipalities have enacted Ban-the Box laws that prohibit employers from asking about an applicant’s criminal record or criminal history prior to the applicant being selected for...more
On November 10, 2018, the U.S. Virgin Islands joined the “ban-the-box” movement by enacting legislation regulating employers’ use of the criminal records of applicants and employees. Currently, 32 states and over 150...more
Employers that use criminal record-screening policies must continue to be vigilant about compliance with all applicable laws and should know that the EEOC’s scrutiny of such policies, while perhaps scaled back, has not ended....more
Almost two years into the new presidential administration, and with highly consequential and hotly debated mid-term elections around the corner, Littler’s Workforce Policy Institute’s Labor Day Report examines the state of...more
Employers use job applications to seek information about conviction records. Criminal background checks are often performed before hiring an employee. Why? The reasons seem obvious, but unfortunately, how the information can...more
It is estimated that the "American criminal justice system holds almost 2.3 million people in 1,719 state prisons, 102 federal prisons, 1,852 juvenile correctional facilities, 3,163 local jails, and 80 Indian Country jails as...more
The state of California has long led the nation in regulating the employment relationship. From continuously expanding the classes of employees protected under its anti-discrimination laws, to passing one of the nation’s most...more
Seyfarth Synopsis: In a showdown between the State of Texas and the EEOC – whereby Texas alleged that the EEOC’s “Enforcement Guidance on the Consideration of Arrest and Conviction Records in Employment Decisions Under Title...more
Employers that have been frustrated with the EEOC’s position on how they can use arrest and conviction records, take note: earlier this month, a federal court in Texas enjoined the EEOC and the Attorney General of the United...more
State and local jurisdictions have continued to consider and enact legislation restricting employers from inquiring about a job applicant’s criminal background during the initial stages of the application process. Two of the...more