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31 Oct '23
Ramit Mizrahi’s November 2023 ADR Update in the California Labor & Employment Law Review has been published and can be found below.
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01 Jul '23
Ramit Mizrahi’s July 2023 ADR Update in the California Labor & Employment Law Review has been published and can be found below.
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04 Mar '23
Ramit Mizrahi has joined the California Labor & Employment Law Review as its latest columnist. She will be authoring its ADR Update column in every other issue (March, July, November), alternating with Hon. Michelle R. Rosenblatt (Ret.).
Her first column can be found below.
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Ramit Mizrahi has been been selected by Super Lawyers® as one of the Top 100 Super Lawyers and Top 50 Women Super Lawyers in Southern California. It is the second year she has been selected to the Top 50 Women list.
Ms. Mizrahi has also been recognized in U.S News & World Report’s 2023 Edition of The Best Lawyers in America©.
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The year 2022 not only continued our new normal of a deluge of employment decisions, but it also brought some blockbuster decisions in employment law.
The January 2023 issue of the California Lawyers Association’s Labor & Employment Law Review features an article authored by Ramit Mizrahi, Andrew Friedman, and Anthony Oncidi—”The Top Employment Cases of 2022“—that highlights the most important California state and federal employment cases from last year.
Click on the below image to read the article in full.
Ramit will also be speaking at the following continuing education program this month:
2022 New Employment Practitioner Conference, Employment Law 101
Program by: California Lawyers Association Labor and Employment Law Section
Date/Time: : Thursday, 1/19/22, 8:30-10 a.m.
Description: California provides employees with numerous protections that practitioners need to understand to provide effective representation and which employers need to know in order to be in compliance. In this module, our panelists will provide an overview of filing and defending against claims of discrimination, harassment, and retaliation provided by the Fair Employment & Housing Act, Title VII of the Civil Rights Act, and other key employment laws. The presentation will touch upon exhaustion of administrative remedies, the essential points of analysis for claims, recent changes to the law, and emerging trends and concerns.
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Within the past two years, Labor Code § 1102.5, California’s general whistleblower protection law, went from being a secondary cause of action to the most important one for most employees alleging retaliation. Two critical events spurred this change: (1) the 2020 amendment to section 1102.5 allowing successful plaintiffs to recover attorney’s fees; and (2) the California Supreme Court’s January 2022 decision in Lawson v. PPG Architectural Finishes, Inc., 12 Cal. 5th 703 (2022), which clarified the framework for evaluating section 1102.5 claims. But while the benefits of attorney’s fees are readily apparent, the extent of Lawson’s impact remains to be seen.
In its November 2022 issue, the California Labor & Employment Law Review published an article by Ramit Mizrahi that examined all published and unpublished California and federal appellate decisions and federal district court cases that addressed Labor Code § 1102.5 claims post-Lawson. The results suggest that defendants continue to prevail on summary judgment, and some courts may be treating the first step in the sections 1102.5/1102.6 analysis as creating a heavier burden than the first step in the McDonnell Douglas test. If so, the benefits of section 1102.6 to plaintiffs may largely be neutralized.
Click below to read the article in full.
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In its September/October 2022 issue, CAOC Forum published an article by Ramit Mizrahi and Mariko Yoshihara on family responsibilities discrimination.
The article explores the damaging impact of family responsibilities discrimination. It then reviews the patchwork of laws California workers with family responsibilities currently rely on for protection, and their shortfalls. Finally, the articles discusses the efforts to add family responsibilities as a protected characteristic covered by the Fair Employment and Housing Act (“FEHA”).
Click below to read the article in full.
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On May 11, 2022, Ramit Mizrahi appeared on KALW’s Your Legal Rights radio show to discuss workplace harassment–and retaliation–as people return to the workplace, along with with Michael Robbins, Jeffrey Hayden, and Dean E. Johnson. You can listen to the program here.
The following resources may also be helpful:
- A blog post delving into sexual harassment;
- An article by Ramit Mizrahi on sexual harassment litigation in the post-#MeToo era;
- A blog post on H.R.4445, the Ending Forced Arbitration of Sexual Assault and Sexual Harassment Act of 2021;
- A blog post on new California employment laws in 2021; and
- A blog post on new California employment laws in 2020.
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Navigating the process to get reasonable accommodations at work can be challenging.
The Fair Employment and Housing Act (FEHA) creates an affirmative duty for employers to “make reasonable accommodation for the known physical or mental disability of an applicant or employee” so long as the accommodation would not create an “undue hardship.” If an employer cannot grant the employee’s requested accommodation, it must engage in a “timely, good faith, interactive process” to determine whether any effective reasonable accommodations exist. Far too often, this interactive process breaks down and employees are denied effective accommodations. The avoidable end result is litigation, with each side accusing the other of failing to meet its obligations.
In its April 2022 issue, Advocate Magazine published Ramit Mizrahi’s article, Top 10 Ways The Interactive Process Breaks Down. Click below to read the article in full.
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16 Mar '22
On March 3, 2022, President Biden signed into law H.R.4445, the Ending Forced Arbitration of Sexual Assault and Sexual Harassment Act of 2021 (“Act”). The Act provides, in relevant part, that:
“Notwithstanding any other provision of this title, at the election of the person alleging conduct constituting a sexual harassment dispute or sexual assault dispute, or the named representative of a class or in a collective action alleging such conduct, no predispute arbitration agreement or predispute joint-action waiver shall be valid or enforceable with respect to a case which is filed under Federal, Tribal, or State law and relates to the sexual assault dispute or the sexual harassment dispute.”
What this means is that employers can no longer force employees who have been subjected to sexual harassment or sexual assault to submit their legal claims to arbitration. Employees can now choose to file their cases in court, regardless of the prior existence of an arbitration agreement. Nor can employers force employees to give up the right to file a class or collective action related to sexual harassment or sexual assault.
The Act explicitly provides that it applies to any dispute or claim that arises or accrues on or after the date of enactment, meaning any harassment or sexual assault occurring on or after March 3, 2022. It does not apply to existing cases already in arbitration or ones where the sexual harassment or assault only occurred before March 3, 2022.
The Act provides that any dispute regarding the applicability of the Act to an arbitration agreement must be decided by a court, not an arbitrator.
We anticipate that more employment lawsuits will include claims for sexual harassment, and that courts will invalidate arbitration agreements in those cases.
This law levels the playing field by giving people subjected to sexual harassment and sexual assault a fair shot at justice. Research has shown that consumers are more likely to be struck by lightning than to win a monetary award in arbitration. We hope it opens the door to further legislation prohibiting arbitration in all employment and consumer cases.
