Two federal laws enacted in December—the Pregnant Workers Fairness Act and the PUMP Act—place new requirements on employers to accommodate pregnant and nursing mothers in the workplace, including, for the first time, many exempt employees.
“The reason why this legislation is so monumental,” said Melinda Koster, a partner at Sanford Heisler Sharp and a co-chair of the firm’s discrimination and harassment practice group, “is that, up until it was passed at the end of last year, there had been no federal legislation requiring employers to provide pregnant workers with accommodations related to pregnancy. Title VII and the Pregnancy Discrimination Act did not require employers to take affirmative steps to accommodate pregnant women.”
Koster said these new laws are unlikely to form the basis for causes of action on their own—but they may be added to broader lawsuits alleging problematic workplace cultures.
And problematic workplace cultures are, unfortunately, not uncommon in the tech industry.
In July of last year, for example, a Los Angeles Superior Court judge granted preliminary approval of a landmark, $100 million settlement to resolve claims brought by California’s Civil Rights’ Department against Riot Games for “systemic sex discrimination and harassment.”
In that case, Riot employees filed a class action and entered a proposed $10 million settlement. But the CRD and California Division of Labor Standards...
A Southwest Florida farmer has reached a plea deal related to his role in a larger federal fraud conspiracy. Mark Frisbie pleaded guilty to one count of making a false statement in a federal crop-...