04-03-2025

Equal Pay Day in 2025 was March 25. This date represents the additional days female workers must work to earn the same amount their male counterparts earned in the 2024 calendar year. While women continue to complete increasing levels of education and earn senior leadership positions at work, the pay and promotion gaps have not narrowed.

04-02-2025

Two major law firms filed lawsuits to block executive orders directed at them. WilmerHale and Jenner & Block want to block the orders that strip them of their security clearances, bar their attorneys from entering federal buildings, and discourage federal officials from interacting with them. Jenner & Block created a website, “Jenner Stands Firm,” to publicize its filing, share newspaper editorials critical of the executive orders, and post law school professors’ comments questioning the order’s legality. The firms have asked for temporary restraining orders to stop the government from implementing the executive orders. The firms represent some of the country’s largest companies and work on regulatory issues before government agencies. Perkins Coie filed a similar lawsuit earlier.

04-01-2025

The Uniformed Services Employment and Reemployment Rights Act (USERRA) precludes employers from discriminating and retaliating against veterans and service members based on their military status or service. It also gives service members reemployment rights and other rights/benefits when military obligations impact their civilian jobs. It was enacted in 1994. The Dole Act is bipartisan legislation that expands USERRA’s protections. Let's review some of the changes.

03-27-2025

The 10-campus University of California system will no longer use diversity statements in hiring. These statements asked job applicants to share how they would contribute to campus diversity. For a decade, the UC system led the way for other university campuses by using the statements to increase student and faculty diversity. The UC Board of Regents chair said the system will “continue to embrace and celebrate Californians from a variety of life experiences, backgrounds and points of view.” However, the Regents suggest that diversity statements may cause applicants to focus on things “outside their expertise or prior experience.”

03-26-2025

Following the executive orders regarding diversity, equity, and inclusion programs, the EEOC released a technical assistance document called “What You Should Know About DEI-Related Discrimination at Work.” An employer’s D.E.I. policy, program, or practice may be unlawful if it includes “taking an employment action motivated—in whole or in part—by race, sex, or another protected characteristic.” “DEI-related disparate treatment” may include disparate treatment in hiring, firing, promotion, demotion, compensation, and fringe benefits.

03-25-2025

The EEOC’s acting chair sent letters to 20 of the country’s largest law firms, questioning them about their diversity programs and practices. In the letter, the agency indicated its concern that the firms discriminated against white candidates. Former EEOC officials wrote to the acting chair to express their “grave concerns” about the letters served on the law firms. They stated that the letters requested “extensive information and imply a duty to respond without any basis in the laws that the EEOC enforces.”

03-20-2025

Karen Ortiz is an administrative law judge within the EEOC. She received a directive from her supervisor to pause all LGBTQ cases and send them back to Washington, D.C. for review in light of the executive order that the government would only recognize two genders. Ortiz responded with an email to 185 colleagues, asking them to “resist” complying. The next day, Ortiz went bigger, emailing Acting Chair Andrea Lucas with a cc to 1000 colleagues with the subject line “A Spoon is Better Than a Fork." The email made it to the internet where it was recirculated on Bluesky and received more than 10,000 “upvotes” on Reddit. The EEOC has issued her a written reprimand for “discourteous conduct.”

03-19-2025

The Department of Education announced plans to investigate 45 colleges over “race-exclusionary practices.” Title VI requires schools that receive federal funds to provide students with a discrimination-free environment based on race, color, or national origin. The targeted schools purportedly violated the law by working with The Ph.D. Project. That project described itself as helping to “change the future workforce by providing students a model of achievement and businesses” to “enrich the talent pipeline.” The administration asserted it limited participation based on race.

03-18-2025

Many judges who have made rulings that do not align with the current presidential administration have faced physical and job threats from Elon Musk and other supporters. Musk and other administration allies have publicly tried to discredit judges who have ruled against their efforts to fire federal employees and dismantle programs. They have called for judicial impeachment and attacked the judges’ integrity. Reuters interviewed eleven federal judges. They shared heightened concerns over their physical security and the rise in violent threats.