8. Looking Ahead To Fiscal Year 2025 Moving into FY 2025, the EEOC’s budget includes a $33.221 million increase from 2024, and prioritizes five key areas, including advancing racial justice and combatting systemic discrimination on all protected bases, particularly with respect to vulnerable workers; advancing pay equity; addressing the use of artificial intelligence in employment decisions; providing information to assist employers that chose to undertake lawful approaches to fostering diversity, equity, inclusion, and accessibility (DEIA) in their workplaces; and preventing unlawful retaliation and harassment. The EEOC also maintained its FY 2024 goals for its own Diversity, Equity, Inclusion, and Accessibility (DEIA) program where it seeks to achieve four goals, including workplace diversity, employee equity, inclusive practices, and accessibility. Additionally, the EEOC continues to emphasize and build upon its FY 2021 software initiatives addressing artificial intelligence (AI), machine learning, and other emerging technologies in continued efforts to provide guidance. The EEOC notably recognized that AI systems may offer new opportunities for employers but cautioned AI’s potential to facilitate discrimination. Finally, the joint anti-retaliation initiative among the EEOC, the DOL, and the National Labor Relations Board (NLRB) will continue to address retaliation in Following the White House party switch in January 2025, President Trump made several Executive Orders that impacted the EEOC and its acting Commissioners. President Trump President Trump seems to be looking to pivot the focus of the EEOC to a more business-friendly posture. On February 18, 2025, in EEOC v. LeoPalace , Case No.: 25-CV-4 (D. Guam), the EEOC settled a lawsuit and entered into a three-year consent decree with LeoPalace Resort, a large hotel in Guam. Under the terms of the agreement, LeoPalace agreed to pay over $1.4 million and hire an external equal employment monitor to settle allegations that it provided employees of non-Japanese national origin with less favorable wages, benefits, and other terms of employment than their Japanese counterparts. This lawsuit is significant because it is the first seven figure settlement that the Commission has procured since President Trump took office in January 2025 and it is accompanied by a statement from the new Acting Chair Andrea Lucas announcing the Commission’s new enforcement agenda and its intent to protect all workers from national origin discrimination and “Anti- American workplaces. Yet, a caveat is in store.
8
© Duane Morris LLP 2025
EEOC Litigation Review - 2025
Made with FlippingBook - professional solution for displaying marketing and sales documents online