HR Law 101 Ep. 9: How Does USERRA Apply To Your Company?
The stated purpose of the “Senator Elizabeth Dole 21st Century Veterans Healthcare and Benefits Improvement Act” (Dole Act) is to improve Department of Veterans Affairs programs for home and community-based services for...more
On January 2, 2025, then-President Biden signed into law the Senator Elizabeth Dole 21st Century Veterans Healthcare and Benefits Improvement Act (Dole Act), a bipartisan bill that expands healthcare and other benefits for...more
In August 2024, pilots employed by Alaska Airlines and members of the Air Force Reserves scored a major victory in a federal appeals court. In Synoracki v. Alaska Airlines, Inc., the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Ninth...more
Uniformed Services Employment and Reemployment Rights Act of 1994 issues are almost certain to increase under the incoming Trump-Vance administration, which has promised greater border enforcement and signaled that the...more
This wonderful nation – and the working economies it affords – will remain the land of the free only so long as it is the home of the brave. That philosophy is advanced in the workplace through the statutory and regulatory...more
In Porter v. Trans State Holdings, Inc., No. 1:23-CV-00263 (D. Colo. Nov. 7, 2024), a federal district court dismissed a Naval Reserve pilot’s Uniformed Services Employment and Reemployment Rights Act (USERRA) lawsuit...more
As the name suggests, the United Services Employment and Reemployment Act (“USERRA”) requires employers of active-duty service members to hold open the employee/service members job while deployed—whether overseas, for...more
In the second in a series of blogs examining often overlooked or misunderstood provisions of common employment laws, today we are covering four things employers may not know about the federal Uniformed Services Employment and...more
On August 22, 2024, the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Ninth Circuit issued its decision in Synoracki v. Alaska Airlines, Inc., reviving a class action under the Uniformed Services Employment and Reemployment Rights Act...more
USERRA prohibits an employer from discriminating against an employee because of their past or current military service. Specifically, USERRA prohibits an employer from denying service members initial employment, reemployment,...more
The landscape of federal military leave law may be shifting. In the past three years, four federal appellate courts have held that an employer may be required to offer paid leave for an employee’s military service where the...more
When people think of a “protected class,” they often think of age, race, gender, or disability. While those are some of the classes protected by anti-discrimination laws, often-overlooked classes include honorably discharged...more
On June 24, 2024, the U.S. Supreme Court granted certiorari in the case of Feliciano v. Department Of Transportation. The Supreme Court will review the Federal Circuit’s decision affirming the Merit Systems Protection Board’s...more
This year, the Uniformed Services Employment and Reemployment Rights Act (USERRA) turns 30 years old. Although this law, prohibiting employers from discriminating and retaliating against employees or applicants because of...more
Manufacturers rely on consistent employee attendance to operate production lines and meet critical delivery deadlines to customers. The best-laid production plans can be disrupted by employee absences leaving a gap in the...more
With Veterans Day recently passed, it seems like a good time to remind employers of a federal law with teeth that protects employed servicemembers. It behooves employers not to overlook USERRA, the “Uniformed Services...more
The United States celebrated Veterans Day on November 11, 2023, a holiday meant to honor military veterans of the United States Armed Forces. Employers may want to take this as an opportunity to consider the ways they can...more
A little more than a year after U.S. Army veteran Le Roy Torres kept his case alive at the U.S. Supreme Court, a Texas jury voted unanimously to award him $2.49 million on the claim that his former employer, the Texas...more
On June 8, 2023, the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Eleventh Circuit held in Myrick v. City of Hoover, Alabama that military leave is comparable to paid administrative leave under the Uniformed Services Employment and...more
Most employers are well aware that the Uniform Services Employment and Reemployment Rights Act, (“USERRA”) requires businesses to grant protected leave to employees called to active duty or engaged in reserve training. ...more
On February 19, 2023, the City of San Francisco’s new ordinance, the Military Leave Pay Protection Act (“MLPPA”), went into effect, which requires private San Francisco employers who have at least 100 employees worldwide, to...more
The Uniformed Services Employment and Reemployment Rights Act (USERRA) applies to all private employers in the U.S., regardless of size, and requires them to provide unpaid leave for up to five years for certain absences...more
Do you have to pay an employee on military leave? Generally, you only have to pay for military leave if you pay employees on “comparable” leaves. So what is a comparable leave? In Clarkson v. Alaska Airlines, Inc., the Ninth...more
Thanks to a recent ruling by the federal Ninth Circuit Court of Appeals (which covers California, Oregon, Washington, Idaho, Montana, Nevada and Arizona), Alaska Airlines now faces a jury trial in a class action claim that it...more
On Feb. 1, 2023, the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Ninth Circuit held that employers who provide paid short-term leave for some reasons — such as for sickness, bereavement or jury duty — must also pay employees who take...more