This Littler Lightbulb highlights some of the more significant employment and labor law developments in the federal courts of appeal in the last month.
Ninth Circuit Reverses District Court and Finds Production Company Not Liable Under the Multiemployer Pension Plan Amendments Act
Nev. Resort Ass'n Int'l All. of Theatrical Stage Emps. v. JB Viva Vegas, LP, __ F.4th __ (9th Cir. Jan. 6, 2026),1 involved a question of exemption for a theatrical production company from the Multiemployer Pension Plan Amendments Act (MPPAA), which imposes liability on employers that withdraw from multiemployer pension plans. The MPPAA provides an exemption from withdrawal liability if, among other things, “the plan primarily covers employees in the entertainment industry.” The plaintiff in the case, an employee pension fund, claimed that over 50 percent of an individual’s work must be in the entertainment industry for the individual to be an “employee[] in the entertainment industry.” The production company argued that the statute did not require minimum employee entertainment work to satisfy the exemption. The district court granted summary judgment for the pension fund, and the production company appealed to the Ninth Circuit.
Examining the text of the statute, the Ninth Circuit held that the entertainment industry exemption “unambiguously covers individuals performing any amount of entertainment work,” stating, “[t]he text does not say that an individual’s work must be ‘substantially’ or ‘...
Abu Dhabi -- Dr Anwar Bin Mohammed Gargash, Diplomatic Advisor to the President of the UAE, shared a statement on the "X" platform, noting that Iranian claims of targeting American military bases ...