The U.S. Supreme Court building is seen in Washington, U.S., June 26, 2022. REUTERS/Elizabeth Frantz
(Reuters) - The U.S. Supreme Court on Monday turned away a challenge by groups representing freelance workers to California's controversial law making it more difficult for businesses to treat workers as independent contractors rather than employees.
The court denied a petition by the American Society for Journalists and Authors and the National Press Photographers Association, which claim the 2019 law known as AB5 violates freelance journalists' free-speech rights by exempting other workers but not them.
The 9th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals in October said AB5 regulates economic activity and not speech, and that it made sense for the law to carve out certain industries in which worker misclassification has been less of a problem.
The California Attorney General's office did not immediately respond to a request for comment.
Jim Manley of the Pacific Legal Foundation, who represents the freelancer groups, said in an email that the court's decision "is a loss for the thousands of freelancers who have built thriving careers through the freedom and flexibility that independent contracting provides."
AB5 says workers are a company's employees if they are under its direct control, engaged in its usual course of business, or do not operate their own independent businesses.
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