Below is a review of the posts on Facebook and LinkedIn from the past week. You can check out the full posts by clicking on the links.
NOTE: there is continued instability and fluctuation with the (attempted) changes in federal labor and employment law resulting from executive orders (EOs) and court decisions, so check with us or another employment lawyer before taking any action based on something in our posts.

The post on Sunday 4/27/2025 told us DEI injunction on Executive Orders lifted and EEOC issues DEI Guidance documents. This is need to know for employers.
A federal Court of Appeals has lifted a nationwide injunction on the Diversity, Equity, and Inclusion (DEI) Executive Orders (EOs) issued by President Trump in January 2025. This means the DEI EOs can and will be enforced while litigation continues relative to their constitutionality. The Court’s decision restores the government’s ability to enforce three key provisions in the DEI EOs. Federal agencies may now:
- “[T]erminate … all … ‘equity-related’ grants or contracts” within 60 days. EO 14151;
- Require contractors and grantees to make certifications required under EO 14173 (which are detailed in the post); and
- Take action to encourage the private sector to end “illegal discrimination and preferences, including DEI.” EO 14173.
As the injunction was lifted, the EEOC) issued two Guidance Documents for employees and employers regarding DEI in the workplace; they are listed and linked in the post. Together the Guidance documents emphasize that DEI has no special legal definition or exemption under Title VII of the Civil Rights Act of 1964 (Title VII). Employers should review the Guidance to better understand how their employment policies and procedures will be analyzed by the EEOC when faced with a charge of discrimination. Below are six important highlights (sone of which are sea changes):
- The EEOC’s position is that there is no such thing as “reverse” discrimination; there is only discrimination;
- Title VII’s protections apply equally to all workers and are not limited to “minority group”. How this could play out is in the post;
- Under Title VII, an employer initiative, policy, program, or practice may be unlawful if it involves an employer or other covered entity taking an employment action motivated—in whole or in part—by race, sex, or another protected characteristic;
The other three highlights are listed and described in the post – especially look at #5.
In light of these changes, employers should review DEI policies and practices for neutrality; eliminate quotas or preferences based on protected characteristics in employment decisions; make opportunity inclusive, not exclusive; and take the other steps listed in the post.
TAKEAWAY: How the EEOC will be looking at discrimination under the DEI lens has changed; make sure you know what is required for compliance (and avoidance of charges).

The post on Monday 4/28/2025 provided Notice to Employers: the EEOC is targeting anti-American bias. On February 19, 2025, the EEOC Acting Chair Andrea Lucas vowed to prioritize anti-American national origin discrimination in compliance efforts, investigations, and litigation. The press release is linked in the post, as is Lucas’s statement.
Things the EEOC’s announcement said are not valid reasons for an employer’s preference for non-American workers as invalid include lower cost labor (whether due to payment under the table to illegal aliens, or exploiting rules around certain visa-holder wage requirements, etc.), a workforce that is perceived as more easily exploited, in terms of the group’s lack of knowledge, access, or use of wage and hour protections, anti-discrimination protections, and other legal protections, and the other items detailed in the post.
Employers face potential risk under Title VII of the Civil Rights Act of 1964 (Title VII) for discrimination on the basis of various protected classes, including national origin. The types of relief that might be granted to the employees who were discriminated against are listed in the post.
The EEOC has already demonstrated its new focus on national origin discrimination in its first publicized settlement under Lucas’ leadership. On February 14, 2025, the EEOC filed suit in federal court (in Guam) against LeoPalace Guam Corporation. On what basis the EEOC alleged that LeoPalace violated Title VII is in the post. Fairly quickly LeoPalace agreed to settle; it will pay $1,412,500 and offer injunctive relief (including the items listed in the post).
The EEOC’s emphasis on national origin discrimination may have a particular impact on employers with high percentages of immigrant workers. Employers should prepare for increased scrutiny of, and potential discrimination claims based on, any workplace policy that appears to show a bias for or against any national origin group (including the sample policies noted in the post).
TAKEAWAY: Employers should review their workplace policies and hiring practices to ensure that they comply with federal law as interpreted and emphasized by the EEOC – consult an employment lawyer for advice on how to ensure that you remain legally compliant.

The post on Tuesday 4/29/2025 noted residents say HOA won’t meet with them – and City can’t send funds to HOA either. Ugh. Around a dozen residents of the Taylor Lakes neighborhood showed up to the first city council meeting of April frustrated with their homeowner’s association. They say the HOA has not met with them in years, forcing them to meet independently.
The neighborhood is in Councilman Oronde Mitchell’s district, and he has faced the same issue as residents. What he said is in the post. This problem hits the residents’ pocketbooks too. Mitchell said he can’t provide for Taylor Lakes like other neighborhoods in his district. What he meant, and why, is detailed in the post. And to make it worse, the current situation means that residents also can’t express their feelings or possibly change the bylaws.
Mitchell said that he would send another e-mail to the HOA requesting a meeting. If that doesn’t work, what he will do next is noted in the post. The city attorney told residents they may have to resort to filing suit. Local media reached out to the HOA for comment after the city council meeting. What happened is in the post.
TAKEAWAY: If a (condo or) homeowners’ association is not communicating, there are steps that can be taken. Getting advice from a community association lawyer should be first on the list.

The post on Wednesday 4/30/2025 was about lowering the legal standard for establishing workplace harassment claims. Since the US Supreme Court’s April 2024 decision in Muldrow v. City of St. Louis, some federal courts have felt compelled or justified in applying the same rationale to lower the standard to prove workplace harassment claims. The possible result of that (as affecting employers) is in the post.
What the Supreme Court did in Muldrow is detailed in the post (as a reminder). The Court based its decision on the statutory language of Title VII (as expounded in the post). The effect was that the Court lowered the bar for employees to prove intentional discrimination because of a protected trait.
Since Muldrow, some federal courts have applied the new standard to workplace harassment claims. As an example, the US Court of Appeals for the Sixth Circuit held in McNeal v. City of Blue Ash that hostile work environment claims do not require plaintiffs to show “significant harm.” Rather, what plaintiffs have to prove is as noted in the post. That Court’s conclusion is also in the post (verbatim).
So what does this all mean for employers? There will most likely be a change in how employers manage the workplace and how they consider litigation strategy when faced with legal challenges. Steps employers should take are in the post.
TAKEAWAY: Based on the way courts are ruling or leaning, employers should know how to act and they also may want to review arbitration agreements as an alternative to litigation; talk to an employment lawyer.

In the post on Thursday 5/1/2025, we saw theatres to pay $250K in EEOC class age discrimination lawsuit involving health benefit plan. Allen Theatres, Inc., which operates a chain of movie theaters across several states (noted in the post), will pay $250,000 to settle an age discrimination lawsuit filed by the EEOC.
According to the EEOC’s suit, Allen Theatres’ president forced Abby Parrish, who had been a theater manager for 31 years, to retire in September 2020 because he was 73 years old. And when the theatres reopened post-COVID? See the post.
But there’s more. The EEOC also alleged that Allen Theatres had a company-wide discriminatory compensation policy that stopped paying for Parrish’s family health insurance coverage because he was over 65 years old and eligible for Medicare. More detail on how the policy affected both the Theatres and employees is in the post.
The EEOC alleged that this conduct violated the Age Discrimination in Employment Act (ADEA) (the prohibitions of which are restated in the post).
The settlement involves a 2-year consent decree calling for payment of $250,000 in damages to Parrish and the other aggrieved individuals. But it also requires the Theatres to take other action as noted in the post (and which is directly related to its policy), including revising those policies and more.
The EEOC’s statement, as well as one from the district director of the field office, are in the post. And Abby Parrish? That statement too is in the post.
TAKEAWAY: Discrimination against a protected class will be caught – and you will be past your ears in legal hot water. Talk to an employment lawyer before taking adverse action.

The post on Friday 5/2/2025 noted an unusual twist: funeral home mogul takes on HOA over billboard. There must be a backstory with the delay in filing suit …
Funeral home mogul Robert “Dick” Tips is taking an HOA to court over its removal of a billboard from property he owns. Tips is the chairman and CEO of Mission Park Funeral Chapels & Cemeteries. His suit alleges that “one or more persons believed to have been acting on behalf or in conspiracy” with the HOA went on his property and “unlawfully removed” the billboard in May 2023. The suit was filed against the HOA and five individuals — including current or former HOA members — and seeks damages of at least $250,000 but not more than $1 million.
Tips doesn’t know who “trespassed” to remove the billboard, but why he sued the HOA and at least one of the individual defendants is in the post (and might be the basis for them being dismissed from the suit). Tips said the billboard had great value to him for logistical reasons – see the post for details. His suit has counts for trespass, conversion and conspiracy.
One exhibit to Tips’ suit shows a Feb. 24, 2023, email from the executive vice president with Avid Property Management, the HOA’s managing agent until last month. She wrote to some association members about a “verbal bid” that had been received “for the removal of the billboard and steel pole” at the entry to the community. More details on the email are in the post. Espino said the HOA’s board considered the billboard an “eyesore” and wanted it removed from the community’s entrance. But what happened when the person contacted to haul it away got there? See the post. Avid then discovered that the land where the billboard was located was not owned by the HOA. What Espino said is in the post, including as relates to some of the other defendants. Espinosa also said that the HOA was not involved in removal of the billboard. Avid and Espino are not defendants in the lawsuit.
TAKEAWAY: Sometimes a (condo or) homeowners’ association, or one or more board members, will end up as defendants in a lawsuit. And occasionally it may have nothing to do with the association …

Finally, in the post yesterday 5/3/2025, we asked: Can he actually do that? Trump Executive Order targets disparate impact liability. This post contains a good analysis of legality of the EO.
Let’s start at the beginning. On April 23, 2025, President Trump signed an executive order (EO) titled Restoring Equality of Opportunity and Meritocracy (which is linked in the post). The purpose of the EO is to eliminate liability for race-neutral (or otherwise relevantly neutral) policies that have a disparate impact based on a protected characteristic. So the question is, can he do that. The short, direct legal answer appears to be “no”. Title VII of the 1964 Civil Rights Act is a federal statute that forbids employment discrimination based on race, color, religion, sex and national origin – it even includes a provision (linked in the post) that expressly prohibits disparate impact discrimination. An EO cannot repeal a statute.
However, the longer – and perhaps more correct – answer is “maybe”. With the aid of what has shaped up to be a conservative activist US Supreme Court.” Justice Scalia warned of this possible coming in a concurrence in Ricci v. DeStefano (2009); see the post for what he wrote. Justice Scalia noted that if the government were to command a private actor to engage in illicit discrimination, that would be unconstitutional. And he is (of course) correct – see the post. But Justice Scalia and others worried that in order to forestall disparate impact liability, employers would engage in affirmative action, which, he thought, would be attributable to the government via Title VII and thus unconstitutional.
It is posited that Scalia’s argument has some problematic steps. First is the fact that Title VII specifically states that it does not require affirmative action. A 1973 Supreme Court case, Steelworkers v. Weber, took a bit of a different spin – see the post. But then the 2023 case of Students for Fair Admissions v. Harvard cast doubt on the continuing vitality of that ruling. The holding of that case is in the post. And if one prognosticates, one might think that the Court soon will overrule Steelworkers v. Weber.
Even if that happens, it would not mean that disparate impact discrimination is unconstitutional. It would mean only that affirmative action in employment is no longer permissible. And then the other leaps detailed in the post would have to happen. Could the Supreme Court make those leaps? Sure. But unless and until it does, the EO has no effect on Title VII disparate impact liability in private litigation.
There is another basis upon which one could argue the EO does not contradict Title VII. It starts with the statutory language quoted in the post. Note that subparagraph (C) says “only if” but not “if” or “if and only if”. So? Think about it: If Bob says “I will go to the Mets game on Sunday only if I can obtain a reasonably priced ticket,” he is not saying that if he can obtain a reasonably priced ticket, then he will definitely go to the Mets game on Sunday. The game might be rained out. Or Bob could catch a cold and not want to leave his home. “B only if A,” under this theory, means that A is a necessary condition for B but not a sufficient one. What if one applies that same logic to subparagraph (A)? See the post for how that would play out.
The date mentioned in the statute was one day before the Supreme Court decided Wards Cove Packing Co. v. Atonio (the holding of which is described in the post). What the four dissenters argued about that ruling, and the effect, is explained in the post. So in the end, as we noted before, unless and until the Supreme Court finds disparate impact liability under Title VII unconstitutional, the EO cannot and does not eliminate it.
Oh but we’re not done, there are at least two aspects of the EO that could be effective without a Supreme Court ruling. One part can be implemented immediately: Trump’s instruction to federal agencies to “deprioritize enforcement of all statutes and regulations to the extent they include disparate-impact liability.” That won’t stop the flow of private litigation, but how it might play out with the current EEOC is detailed in the post.
The other part of the executive order that might be implemented even without “help” from the Supreme Court is the instruction to the Attorney General to “initiate appropriate action to repeal or amend the implementing regulations for Title VI” insofar as they treat disparate impact as a violation of the conditions of federal funding. So what would the government need to do? See the post for details. And because there is no private enforcement under Title VI (see the post for the Supreme Court’s case and more detail), there will be no effect from that angle. So eliminating the regulation really does nothing (except make future administrations jump through hoops as noted in the post). Could that be a good thing? See the post.
TAKEAWAY: Employers must know what statutes and regulations apply to them and their workplaces – and what to do or not do. Consultation with an employment lawyer is always a good idea.