EEOC Sued Over Abortion Accommodation Rule

The Equal Employment Opportunity Commission (EEOC) is facing a lawsuit filed by the attorney generals of 17 states after the passage of a new rule that requires employers to provide abortion accommodations under the Pregnant Workers Fairness Act. The rule, which was finalized in mid-April, requires that most employers offer “reasonable accommodations” to workers related to pregnancy and childbirth. This includes paid time off to get an abortion. The EEOC said that the new rule does not require employers to pay for the abortion. It only requires them to offer paid time off to employees who want to get an abortion.

Republican lawmakers believe that the EEOC is attempting to rewrite the law into an abortion mandate. They have characterized the effort as “illegal.”

“Yet in a new rule, unelected commissioners at the EEOC seek to hijack these new protections for pregnancies by requiring employers to accommodate elective abortions—something the Act clearly did not authorize,” said one attorney general in a statement concerning the new rule. “The EEOC’s rule constitutes an unconstitutional federal overreach that infringes on existing state laws and exceeds the scope of the agency’s authority.”

New rules under the Pregnant Workers Fairness Act

The final rule became law last June after Congress passed the measure as part of a federal government spending package in late 2022. The new provisions apply to employers with at least 15 workers unless the accommodations would cause “undue hardship” for the employer.

The law provides pregnant workers and those who have just given birth with a variety of protections. These include time off for recovery from childbirth, prenatal and postnatal appointments, treatment for postpartum depression as well as accommodations related to seating, light duty, breaks for food, water, restroom needs, breastfeeding, and miscarriage. Employers are not, however, required to offer paid time off.

Nearly 100,000 responded to the EEOC’s effort to include abortion in the language of the new rule. About 54,000 of the comments urged the commission to exclude abortion while 40,000 comments supported the inclusion. The EEOC noted that the new rule cannot be used to require a job-based health care plan to pay for any procedure, including abortion. It specified that the new rule is more about workplace anti-discrimination than it is about securing abortion rights in the workplace. Nonetheless, there has been considerable pushback concerning the inclusion of abortion in the language of the bill.

“With respect to abortion, the PWFA’s requirements are narrow and will likely concern only a request by a qualified employee for leave from work,” the EEOC said in a statement they released last week.

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Source:

cnn.com/2024/04/25/politics/eeoc-abortion-lawsuit-pregnant-workers/index.html