By Dawn SoloweyLynn Kappelman, and Darien Harris

Seyfarth Synopsis:  A unanimous Supreme Court has issued its decision in Groff v. Dejoy, clarifying Title VII’s undue hardship standard to mean “substantial increased costs in relation to the conduct of its particular business.”  The Court effectively disavowed the long-standing de minimis standard from the seminal TWA v. Hardison

Continue Reading A Unanimous Supreme Court Rules on Undue Hardship in Religious Accommodation: De Minimis Is Out, “Substantial Increased Costs” Is In

By Dawn Reddy Solowey

Seyfarth Synopsis: Yesterday the Supreme Court held oral argument in Groff v. DeJoy, a case in which the Court is considering whether to overturn decades of precedent established by the seminal religious accommodation case, Trans World Airlines Inc., v. Hardison.  Decided in 1977, Hardison is the seminal case establishing that an employer is

Continue Reading Takeaways From SCOTUS Oral Argument in Groff v. Dejoy: Justices Attempt to Find “Common Ground” on Religious Accommodation Test

Seyfarth Synopsis: Seyfarth announces the publication of Seyfarth Shaw’s 2023 Edition of its EEOC-Initiated Litigation Report.

It is with great excitement that we announce the publication of Seyfarth Shaw’s 2023 Edition of its EEOC-Initiated Litigation Report. 2022 was another year of great change at the U.S. Equal Employment Opportunity Commission – and 2023 promises to be a year of

Continue Reading Seyfarth’s 2023 EEOC-Initiated Litigation Report Focuses on Big Changes at the EEOC

By Michelle ShamouilianDaniel I. SmallCourtney S. Stieber, and Robert S. Whitman

Seyfarth Synopsis: A bill pending in the New York City Council would prohibit employers from discharging employees absent just cause or a bona fide economic reason.  The bill would also ban employers from relying on data collected through electronic monitoring when discharging or disciplining

Continue Reading At-Will No More? New York City Bill Would Restrict Discharge of Employees

By Danielle Kays and James Nasiri

Seyfarth Synopsis: On November 30, 2022, the Illinois Second District Appellate Court reversed the trial court’s grant of summary judgment in Defendant’s favor in a case entitled Mora v. J&M Plating, Inc. The lawsuit was initiated by a former employee of the Defendant metal finisher, alleging that Defendant violated the Illinois Biometric Information Privacy

Continue Reading Illinois Appellate Court Holds Businesses Must Implement Biometric Retention and Destruction Policies Before Collecting Biometric Data

By Linda C. Schoonmaker and Elizabeth L. Humphrey

Seyfarth Synopsis: Railroad companies spend millions of dollars and thousands of hours developing their risk management systems. When a plaintiff aims to discover risk management data, companies understandably balk at the prospect of revealing information they have gone to great lengths to collect, categorize, and assess  for the purpose of mitigating

Continue Reading Does A Railroad (Or Potentially Any) Company Have To Turn Over Material Contained In Its Risk Management System In Discovery? The Alabama Supreme Court Says No

By Nick A. Lussier and Andrew M. McKinley

Seyfarth Synopsis: On October 13, 2022, the Supreme Court of Virginia analyzed whether individuals may be joint employers under Virginia’s Wage Payment Act. Answering in the negative, the Court held that the statute defined “employer” more narrowly than the FLSA, and thus extended joint employment liability only to entities, not individuals

Continue Reading Supreme Court of Virginia Refuses to Extend Joint Employer Liability to Individuals

By Danielle Kays and James Nasiri

Seyfarth Synopsis: On October 17, 2022, the U.S. District Court for the Western District of Washington granted Microsoft’s motion for summary judgment on the plaintiffs’ unique class action claims in a case entitled Vance v. Microsoft Corp. The plaintiffs, and Illinois residents, uploaded several pictures of themselves to popular photo-sharing site Flickr, which then

Continue Reading Washington Federal Court Awards Important BIPA Win

By Danielle Kays and James Nasiri

Seyfarth Synopsis: Earlier this week, Seyfarth’s Employment Law Lookout team posted a blog discussing the status of the first ever jury trial of an Illinois Biometric Information Privacy Act (“BIPA”) class action (Rogers v. BNSF Railway Co.).  Today, the jury–in just over an hour of deliberation–entered verdict for the plaintiff.  This means that the

Continue Reading UPDATE: Jury Quickly Finds Railway Company Liable in First Ever BIPA Trial

By Dawn Reddy Solowey, A. Scott Hecker, Coby Turner and James J. Swartz, Jr.

Seyfarth Synopsis: Despite President Biden’s recent declaration that the COVID-19 pandemic is over, litigation concerning employer vaccine mandates continues as employers face hurdles to ensure workplace safety and compliance with government mandates.

Here we take a closer look at issues companies are

Continue Reading New Frontier in COVID-19 Vaccine Litigation