The Pregnant Workers Fairness Act (“PWFA”) was signed into law by President Biden on December 29, 2022, and became effective on June 27, 2023. The PWFA requires employers with 15 or more employees to provide “reasonable accommodations” for a worker’s known limitations related to pregnancy, childbirth, or related medical conditions, unless the accommodation will cause the employer an undue hardship. When the PWFA was signed into law, Congress directed the U.S. Equal Employment Opportunity Commission (“EEOC”) to issue regulations to implement the PWFA by the end of this year. On August 7, 2023, the EEOC released its 275-page Notice of Proposed Rulemaking (“NPRM” or the “proposed rule”) to implement the PWFA and seeks public comments on the proposed regulations.

The proposed rule seeks to provide necessary and practical guidance to employers and delivers a detailed discussion of various aspects of the PWFA and its purpose. This article, however, is intended to only address certain provisions of the proposed rule.

Broad Definition of Terms

• The proposed rule uses the following non-exhaustive list to define “pregnancy, childbirth, or related medical conditions”: “current pregnancy, past pregnancy, potential pregnancy, lactation (including breastfeeding and pumping), use of birth control, menstruation, infertility and fertility treatments, endometriosis, miscarriage, stillbirth or having or choosing not to have an abortion, among other things.” This expanded definition may...

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