Tenth Circuit holds that failure to exhaust is an affirmative defense not a jurisdictional defect in Title VII claims

The Tenth Circuit has reversed longstanding precedent to, now, hold that a plaintiff’s failure to exhaust the administrative charge requirements of a Title VII claim is a mere affirmative defense, not a jurisdictional defect. What’s the difference? The courts have jurisdiction to hear the circumstances surrounding the failure to exhaust when it is asserted as an affirmative defense. In this case, the plaintiffs apparently had failed to exhaust; however, they pointed to a prior stipulation by the defendant in which the company had agreed that they had in fact exhausted. The trial court had originally ruled, in line with the Tenth Circuit’s longstanding precedent, that a failure to exhaust is jurisdictional and that it, therefore, lacked jurisdiction over the claims and could not, as a result, entertain argument over the stipulation. The Tenth Circuit remanded, holding that the failure to exhaust was merely an affirmative defense, and as such the trial court is authorized to consider the stipulation.

Source: Lincoln v. BNSF Railway Co., case no. 17-3120 (10th Cir. 8/17/18).

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Troubled by NLRB Member Emanuel’s recusal in Hy-Brand?

If, like many, you are troubled by the recent recusal of NLRB Member Emanuel from the Hy-Brand case, you might want to read an article in the latest newsletter by the ABA Labor and Employment Law Section.

What’s Hy-Brand? Hy-Brand Industrial Contractors, 365 NLRB No. 186 (2015), was a decision by the NLRB under President Trump. It overruled Browning-Ferris Industries, 362 NLRB No. 186 (2015), which had been a decision by the NLRB under President Obama. In Browning-Ferris the Obama Board expanded the joint employer standard. The case set off a political firestorm. Thus it was no surprise when the Trump Board, in Hy-Brand, reversed Browning-Ferris, returning the Board to its prior approach to joint employers.

How did Member Emanuel end up being recused, and what did that mean for Hy-Brand? After Hy-Brand was announced, the Board’s own Inspector General called a foul on the play. The Inspector General opined that Member Emanuel should have recused himself from the decision because, it contended, he had a conflict of interest. With his vote subtracted, the Board was left split 2-2, effectively nullifying Hy-Brand and keeping Browning Ferris in place.

What was Member Emanuel’s conflict? This is where the case takes a sharp turn around President Trump’s own policies. Member Emanuel himself had no actual conflict. But for the Trump Administration’s own policies, the Trump Board’s vote in Hy-Brand would have stood. The conflict was imputed to Member Emanuel because he, like many NLRB Members, came from a large law firm. On the union side, it’s common for NLRB Members to come from large unions. It’s not uncommon therefore for Board Members to be called upon to decide cases that involve legal issues their prior law firm/union/company may have argued. In fact, it’s not just not uncommon, it’s expected. Nonetheless, the Inspector General imputed a conflict to Board Member Emanuel because his prior law firm had handled a matter involving the joint employer issue. It should be noted it did not involve the same parties, or the same evidence, simply the same legal issue. Normally that would not be enough to create a conflict, and even now it arguably should not be enough, but in this particular instance, at this particular time, it was, because, the Inspector General pointed out, the Trump Administration has required its appointees to agree to a voluntary ethics pledge (Executive Order 13770) that prohibits them from participating in “any particular matter involving specific parties that is directly and substantially related to (their) former employer or former clients” during the first two years of government service.

Source: “The NLRB Recusal Standard: How Will Hy-Brand, The Inspector General, and a Federal Regulation Affect Employees and Employers?,” G. Enis and S. Hamilton, American Bar Association Labor and Employment Law Section newsletter, vol. 46, no. 4 (Summer 2018).

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Want to hear my thoughts about the latest twist in the Masterpiece Cakeshop case?

Fun morning on 850 KOA’s Colorado Morning News. Hear the audio below.

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Want to read about the NLRB’s recent ruling on micro-units?

Check out my comments and in general this interesting article in Colorado Law Week regarding the NLRB’s recent decision involving Boeing and so-called “micro units.”

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Want to read about the NLRB’s upcoming ruling on emails?

The NLRB is currently considering whether and how to reverse Purple Communications, the decision that presumptively permitted employees access to company email systems for use in unionizing efforts. Read my comments in this great article on Colorado Law Week.

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Bill Berger – L2S Legal, LLC – Best Lawyers in America

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Honored to have been selected again for inclusion in Best Lawyers in America: Employment Law – Management!

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Supreme Court’s new expansive reading of FLSA is applied for first time by a Circuit Court

The Supreme Court held earlier this year in Encino Motorcars, LLC v. Navarro that the Fair Labor Standards Act (FLSA) should no longer be construed narrowly in favor of employees but should, instead, be given a “fair” reading based on its own language. The Supreme Court’s ruling has just seen its first application in a Circuit Court case, entitled Mosquera v. MTI Retreading Co., decided by the Sixth Circuit.

In Mosquera, the employee held an engineering degree but argued he spent less than 50% of his time doing work that required an engineering degree and should, therefore, not have been classified as a professional employee exempt from overtime. The Sixth Circuit disagreed. The Sixth Circuit noted the evidence that had been submitted in support of the employer’s summary judgment motion and dismissed the plaintiff’s own affidavit to the contrary, saying it was “unsubstantiated” and “self-serving.” The Sixth Circuit noted that, prior to Encino Motorcars, it would have looked on the plaintiff’s claim more favorably, interpreting the professional exemption “narrowly,” but under the Supreme Court’s new ruling, it was required to give the law a broader “fair” reading instead. Under the new approach to FLSA, the Sixth Circuit held the employer’s motion for summary judgment was “compelling” and as such, it held, the employee was properly characterized as a professional who was exempt from overtime.

Mosquera is no doubt the first in a long line of cases to come that will take a less “narrow” approach to interpreting FLSA.

Source:  Mosquera v. MTI Retreading Co. (6th Cir. 8/14/18).

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Are you ready for Colorado’s new data privacy law?

Colorado just passed a new data privacy law that will take effect September 1, 2018. It’s recommended that companies immediately take steps to conduct internal audits and develop compliance policies, which may also entail policy reviews.

For an excellent summary of this new law, check out this article from Brownstein Hyatt Farber Schreck.

Source: Colorado HB 18-1128.

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Will other states follow California’s lead with enhanced National Origin protections?

Effective July 1, 2018, California has, by way of administrative regulations, enhanced the protections against national origin discrimination found in its mini-Title VII called the California Fair Employment and Housing Act.

These well-intentioned but poorly drafted regulations expand the definition of national origin, now, to include an individual’s or their “ancestor’s” “actual or perceived”:

  1. physical, cultural, or linguistic characteristics associated with a national origin group;
  2. marriage to or association with persons of a national origin group;
    tribal affiliation;
  3. membership in or association with an organization identified with or seeking to promote the interests of a national origin group;
  4. attendance or participation in schools, churches, temples, mosques, or other religious institutions generally used by persons of a national origin group; and
  5. name that is associated with a national origin group.

The regulations offer few helpful definitions to interpret these new rules.

  • What is a “physical, cultural or linguistic characteristic” besides an obvious accent?
  • What is a church “generally used by persons of a national origin group”? For example, one can guess that the Greek members of a Greek Orthodox church are protected, but how about the non-Roman members of a Roman Catholic church parish that includes people of every national origin?
  • What is a “name that is associated with a national origin group”? For example, is the name “Garcia” such a name, where it is generally considered the most common Hispanic last name, even though it is common in nearly every Latino country and non-Latino country, and is actually of Basque origin (with the Basque arguably not being Hispanic in the sense their traditional language is Basque not Spanish)?

One definition that is offered in these vague regulations is for the phrase, “national origin groups”:

“National origin groups” include, but are not limited to, ethnic groups, geographic places of origin, and countries that are not presently in existence.

Unfortunately that definition raises more questions than it answers. For example, what does it mean to say someone identifies with “countries that are not presently in existence”?

The regulations also take a strong position against English-only rules. Under these new California regulations, English-only rules are never permitted during employee breaks, lunch, or employer-sponsored events, and only rarely permitted during working time and in workplaces when narrowly tailored as required by a business necessity.

With regard to accents, again, those seem to be protected as a national origin “characteristic,” and as such discrimination on the basis of accents is only permitted when, again, mandated as narrowly tailored to a business necessity.

The regulations expressly state that they protect even unauthorized immigrants. The only exception is when mandated otherwise by federal law. This is true even where the individual presents, as part of the I-9 process, a California driver’s license that expressly identifies the individual as an undocumented worker. The regulations also state that even a “single unwelcome act of harassment” may be sufficient to violate these laws, without explaining how it is that an employer can ask such a worker about their work authorization without inadvertently crossing the line into having asked a question that the worker found to be a “single unwelcome act of harassment.”

It remains to be seen whether other states will follow California’s lead, or if at some point the federal government will do so under Title VII. However, employers in every state may wish to take a moment to review these new regulations. Arguably their poorly drafted language does not, at least in some instances, expand Title VII so much re-interpret its existing requirements. If other jurisdictions do decide to follow California’s lead, they will hopefully provide employers with more clear language, especially since employers generally probably agree with the basic thrust of what the California bureaucrats who drafted these regulations intended.

Source: 2 California Code of Reglations 11027, et seq.

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