‘Employers should take heed’: EEOC lawsuits will be on the upswing in 2024
Since the EEOC has landed a budget $26 million increase, employment attorneys’ advice to their clients is simple: Be on your best behavior and let the fair treatment of workers, free of discrimination, prevail.
Move over DOJ, SEC and NLRB. It’s time for the EEOC to get its time in the sun.
While the Department of Justice and Federal Trade Commission have grabbed headlines by aggressive enforcement, and the National Labor Relations Board has drastically reduced the barriers to unionizing company, the Equal Opportunity Commission has been comparatively sleepy.
That’s despite the fact that the EEOC’s mission is close to President Biden’s heart: the fair treatment of workers, free of discrimination.
Well, if there is anything sure in government, this is it: The EEOC is going to be much more active in fiscal 2024, which started Oct. 1. Employment attorneys all but guarantee to it.
They have an abundance of reasons to trust their soothsaying skills. For starters, the EEOC has landed a 6% budget increase, which translates into a $26 million increase.
And then there is an even bigger factor: Even though Biden nominates members of the commission, GOP gamesmanship prevented Democrats from gaining majority control of the panel until this July, when the Senate confirmed Kalpana Kotagal.
As Law.com’s Hugo Guzman reported this month, a flurry of late-year lawsuit filings, including 67 in September alone, boosted EEOC’s 2023 lawsuit filings to 143, up 52% from a year earlier. It’s a miraculous number when you consider that in the first four months of the fiscal year, the EEOC filed a grand total of three cases, the law firm Seyfarth Shaw noted.
Related: EEOC-initiated lawsuits shot up 52% in latest fiscal year
The fiscal 2023 tally was the most cases the EEOC had filed in five years, though well below the more than 300 filed during some years of President Barack Obama’s presidency.
“EEOC litigation is back in full throttle, with no signs of slowing down. Employers should take heed,” the law firm Duane Morris said in a recent client note.
“Amplifying that activism, the commission issued a press release at the end of the fiscal year touting its increased enforcement litigation activity, a somewhat unprecedented media statement that the EEOC has never issued in previous years.”
Employment attorneys told Guzman they’re expecting the same thing.
“The edict is, ‘We want to do everything within our power to prevent discrimination of any sort, or any unfair treatment of employees,’” said Mara Levin, a Blank Rome partner.
Employment attorneys’ advice to clients is simple: Be on your best behavior.
“We anticipate these figures will grow by next year’s report, so it is more crucial than ever for employers to comply with discrimination laws,” Duane Morris said in its client note.