On April 27, 2021, President Biden signed Executive Order 14026, which increases the minimum wage for workers on or in connection with a federal government contract to $15.00 as of January 30, 2022....more
On March 31, 2021, in United States ex rel. Felten v. William Beaumont Hospital, the Sixth Circuit Court of Appeals held that an employer’s allegedly retaliatory conduct directed at an employee after the employee’s...more
4/2/2021
/ Anti-Kickback Statute ,
Anti-Retaliation Provisions ,
Corporate Counsel ,
Disparagement ,
False Claims Act (FCA) ,
Healthcare Fraud ,
Hiring & Firing ,
Medicaid ,
Medicare ,
Qui Tam ,
Retaliation ,
TRICARE ,
Whistleblowers ,
Wrongful Termination
On March 30, 2021, the Office of Federal Contract Compliance Programs (OFCCP) announced that it was lowering the Vietnam Era Veterans’ Readjustment Assistance Act (VEVRAA) hiring benchmark again this year. Effective March...more
On March 2, 2021, the Office of Federal Contract Compliance Programs (OFCCP) amended its Corporate Scheduling Announcement List (CSAL) for supply and service contractors for fiscal year 2020 to remove all of the contractor...more
On February 9, 2021, the Biden administration took another step towards reversing the priorities of the Trump-era Office of Federal Contract Compliance Programs (OFCCP), by notifying the U.S. District Court for the Southern...more
On January 27, 2021, the Commonwealth of Virginia became the first state in the country to adopt permanent COVID-19 workplace safety and health standards. As we noted in a previous article, Virginia adopted an emergency...more
The new Biden administration wasted no time implementing changes at the Office of Federal Contract Compliance Programs (OFCCP). On January 20, 2021, the day of President Biden’s inauguration, the administration moved...more
The Biden Administration did not waste time in rescinding former President Trump’s controversial Executive Order 13950, which limited the ability of federal government contractors and grantees to conduct certain types of...more
1/22/2021
/ Bias ,
Biden Administration ,
Diversity ,
Diversity and Inclusion Standards (D&I) ,
Employee Training ,
Executive Orders ,
Federal Contractors ,
OFCCP ,
Race Relations ,
Regulatory Reform ,
Sexual Stereotyping
On January 8, 2021, the Office of Federal Contract Compliance Programs (OFCCP) issued an opinion letter on “Legal Protections for Religious Liberty in the Workplace.” The opinion letter builds on OFCCP’s recent regulations...more
Come Jan. 20, former Vice President Joe Biden will be inaugurated as the U.S.' 46th president. In the run-up to the election, the Biden campaign focused on pay equity issues and closing the wage gap as part of its platform to...more
1/7/2021
/ Biden Administration ,
Employer Liability Issues ,
Equal Pay ,
Federal Contractors ,
Gender Equity ,
Gender-Based Pay Discrimination ,
Labor Reform ,
OFCCP ,
Pay Equity Laws ,
Pay Gap ,
Pay Transparency ,
Sex Discrimination ,
Wage and Hour
On December 15, 2020, the District of Columbia Council unanimously passed the Ban on Non-Compete Agreements Amendment Act of 2020, under which the District of Columbia joins California and a small handful of jurisdictions...more
On December 7, 2020, the Office of Federal Contract Compliance Programs issued a Final Rule codifying an expansion of the agency’s exemption from Executive Order 11246’s nondiscrimination requirements for federal contractors...more
On November 10, 2020, OFCCP published its Final Rule on “Nondiscrimination Obligations of Federal Contractors and Subcontractors: Procedures to Resolve Potential Employment Discrimination.” We previously covered OFCCP’s...more
On October 21, 2020, the Office of Federal Contract Compliance Programs (OFCCP) continued to address the highly-controversial diversity and inclusion (D&I) training restrictions in Executive Order 13950....more
10/22/2020
/ Bias ,
Civil Rights Act ,
Deregulation ,
Diversity ,
Diversity and Inclusion Standards (D&I) ,
Employee Training ,
Executive Orders ,
Federal Contractors ,
OFCCP ,
Race Relations ,
Regulatory Reform ,
Request For Information ,
Sexual Stereotyping ,
Title VII ,
Trump Administration
The September 22, 2020, issuance of Executive Order 13950 limiting federal government contractors’ ability to conduct diversity, inclusion, and unconscious or implicit bias training has roiled the contractor community....more
10/9/2020
/ Bias ,
Civil Rights Act ,
Deregulation ,
Diversity ,
Diversity and Inclusion Standards (D&I) ,
Employee Training ,
Executive Orders ,
Federal Contractors ,
OFCCP ,
Race Relations ,
Regulatory Reform ,
Sexual Stereotyping ,
Title VII ,
Trump Administration
On September 22, 2020, President Trump issued an Executive Order Combatting Race and Sex Stereotyping that will prohibit federal contractors and grantees from engaging in many forms of diversity, inclusion, and implicit bias...more
On September 14, 2020, the Office of Federal Contract Compliance Programs (OFFCP) requested approval from the Office of Management and Budget to require government contractors to certify on an annual basis that they are in...more
The Office of Federal Contract Compliance Programs (“OFCCP”) recently issued new FAQ guidance on how federal government contractors should treat non-binary employees (i.e., those who do not exclusively identify as either male...more
9/10/2020
/ Affirmative Action ,
Civil Rights Act ,
Corporate Counsel ,
Employer Liability Issues ,
Employment Policies ,
Equal Employment Opportunity Commission (EEOC) ,
Federal Contractors ,
Gender Identity ,
Hiring & Firing ,
Job Applicants ,
OFCCP ,
Sexual Orientation Discrimination ,
Title VII
On August 31, 2020, the Department of Labor’s Wage and Hour Division published its annual update to the minimum wage for federal government contractors. As of January 1, 2021, employees performing services on or in...more
The Department of Labor (“DOL”) settled a claim of gender pay discrimination against Boehringer Ingelheim Animal Health USA Inc., a pharmaceutical company, on August 18, 2020. The Office of Federal Contract Compliance...more
On August 3, 2020, President Trump issued an Executive Order titled “Aligning Federal Contracting and Hiring Practices with the Interests of American Workers,” signaling that the administration may seek to limit the ability...more
On July 15, 2020, the Virginia Department of Labor and Industry’s Health and Safety Codes Board (“Board”) voted 9-2 to adopt emergency temporary standards designed to prevent the spread of COVID-19 in the workplace. As...more
On June 24, 2020, a Department of Labor Administrative Law Judge (ALJ) denied J.P. Morgan Chase & Co.’s motion for summary judgment seeking to dismiss an OFCCP enforcement action....more
The first round of VEVRAA focused reviews is on the horizon. Last year, OFCCP released its scheduling list identifying the federal contractors who were selected for focused reviews of their compliance with the Vietnam Era...more
Is Virginia the new California? That may be an exaggeration, but in April 2020 the Commonwealth took major steps away from its historically pro-employer climate to provide employees and independent contractors with new...more