Hunton Employment & Labor Perspectives

On September 18, 2022, California Governor Gavin Newsom signed into law Assembly Bill (“AB”) 2188, which prohibits employer discrimination based on employees’ use of cannabis off the job and away from the workplace.  While recreational use of cannabis, or marijuana, has been legal in California since 2016, the new law goes farther in specifically providing protections for employees who consume the substance.  AB 2188 makes California the most recent state to provide workplace protections for use of marijuana away from the workplace.  The bill will become effective beginning January 1, 2024.

HuntonAK’s Labor and Employment practice has been recognized as nationwide leaders by Benchmark Litigation’s 2022 Labor and Employment guide.   HuntonAK’s Labor and Employment Team was recognized as a nationwide practice and in several individual jurisdictions.

Nineteen individual team lawyers were also acknowledged.

Since we last reported on the delay of the District of Columbia’s Ban on Non-Compete Agreements Act of 2020 (the “Act”), the D.C. Council passed the Non-Compete Clarification Amendment Act of 2022 (the “Amendment”), effective October 1, 2022, which significantly rolled back some of the more prohibitive features of the original 2020 version of the Act. 

On September 7, 2022, the NLRB released a Notice of Proposed Rulemaking (“NPRM”) and request for public comment regarding its latest iteration of the joint employer rule.  The NPRM proposes to rescind and replace the current final rule, entitled “Joint Employer Status Under the National Labor Relations Act,” which took effect on April 27, 2020.

On September 27, 2022, Governor Gavin Newsom signed Senate Bill 1162, which amends California Labor Code section 432.3, expanding employers’ pay disclosure and record keeping requirements in California.  

HuntonAK Labor and Employment partner Ryan Bates was named a member of the 2022 class of “Leader in the Law” by Virginia Lawyers Weekly.  Ryan is one of just 30 Virginia lawyers being honored for outstanding contributions to the practice of law.

The Fourth Circuit recently issued a significant decision, Williams v. Kincaid, which held that the Americans with Disabilities Act (ADA) protects individuals with gender dysphoria, becoming the first federal circuit in the country to do so.

Court watchers following the ripple effects of groundbreaking wage and hour opinion Swales v. KLLM Transport Services, LLC, 985 F.3d 430 (5th Cir. 2021) (“Swales”) may have gained their first insight into the Supreme Court’s thought process following Chief Justice John Robert’s refusal to pause a conditional collective action certification in Maximus Inc. v. Thomas, et al., No. 22A164, currently pending in the Eastern District of Virginia and following this decision and a failed appeal from the Fourth Circuit.

Editor’s Note: The California legislature failed to enact the proposed CCPA exemption amendments to Assembly Bill 1102.

On August 16, 2022, California Assembly Member Cooley introduced amendments to Assembly Bill 1102 that would extend the California Consumer Privacy Act’s (“CCPA’s”) temporary exemptions for HR and B2B data for an additional two years – until January 1, 2025. Under the CCPA, these exemptions are set to expire on January 1, 2023, when the amendments to the CCPA made by the California Privacy Rights Act (“CPRA”) become operative.

HuntonAK labor and employment partner Amber Rogers was honored by Corporate Counsel in the category of Thought Leadership in the publication’s list of 2022 Women, Influence & Power in Law Awards.