Benefits

  • June 04, 2025

    3 Ways DOL Benefits Chief Nominee May Affect ERISA Cases

    A key committee will decide Thursday whether to send President Donald Trump’s pick to lead the U.S. Department of Labor’s employee benefits arm ahead for a full Senate vote, setting the stage for what attorneys expect will be an employer-friendly shift in policies. Here are three ways Daniel Aronowitz could change benefits litigation if confirmed.

  • June 04, 2025

    Heart Device Maker iRhythm Gets Investor Claims Trimmed

    A California federal judge has trimmed a class action accusing digital healthcare company iRhythm Technologies of making false and misleading statements about its heart-event monitoring device, finding that the suit does not plausibly plead knowledge of wrongdoing for most individual defendants, among other things.

  • June 04, 2025

    Judge Halts Fla. Law Over Medicaid Ballot Initiative Concerns

    A Florida federal judge on Wednesday blocked state officials from enforcing part of a new law that opponents say threatens to criminalize those collecting signatures for a 2026 ballot initiative to expand Medicaid access.

  • June 04, 2025

    NJ Man Cops To Dodging $2M Tax Bill On Real Estate

    A New Jersey man linked to an intricate pension plan scheme involving refunds from the Dutch government pled guilty to evading more than $2.4 million in U.S. taxes by concealing ownership of more than $5.5 million in real estate, the U.S. Department of Justice said Wednesday. 

  • June 04, 2025

    DC Judge Weighs Harm In Teen Program Funding Fight

    A D.C. federal judge on Wednesday seemed unconvinced by Planned Parenthood's assertion that new federal grant requirements for a public health initiative aimed at preventing teen pregnancy are harmful enough to warrant a preliminary injunction.

  • June 04, 2025

    Compliance Chiefs Eye New Jobs Amid Pay Growth Slowdown

    More than half of chief compliance officers are considering seeking new job opportunities in the coming year, according to a Wednesday report from in-house legal and compliance advisory firm BarkerGilmore LLC, which also found CCO pay growth generally slowed down compared to last year.

  • June 03, 2025

    BlackRock, Vanguard Want Red States' Coal Suit Extinguished

    Asset managers BlackRock Inc. and The Vanguard Group Inc. have urged a Texas federal judge to toss a suit brought by a coalition of Republican-led states alleging the firms ran a scheme to drive up coal prices as part of an "investment cartel," arguing the case rests on "implausible premises."

  • June 03, 2025

    6th Circ. Denies PBMs' Privilege Claim In Opioid MDL

    A Sixth Circuit panel on Tuesday denied a petition from Cigna's Express Scripts and UnitedHealth's Optum seeking to reverse discovery orders allowing certain personnel files and internal communications into the multidistrict opioid litigation, finding that the two pharmacy benefit managers failed to show extraordinary abuses justifying relief.

  • June 03, 2025

    Plan Providers Must Face DOJ Overpayment Suit, Judge Says

    A Maine federal judge refused to let five military healthcare plan providers escape a False Claims Act suit alleging that they knowingly pocketed millions of dollars that were overpaid, holding that U.S. Department of Justice claims against them pass muster for now.

  • June 03, 2025

    InnovAge To Pay $27M To Resolve IPO Investors' Suit

    InnovAge Holding Corp. and a class of stockholders have agreed to a $27 million settlement to resolve claims that the senior-health care company made misleading statements in an initial public offering that later caused stock prices to tank after a government audit exposed the falsehoods.

  • June 03, 2025

    Feds Extend Pause On Fight Over Short-Term Insurance Regs

    The Trump administration can have more time to develop a replacement for regulations that made it harder to offer short-term health insurance plans, a Texas federal judge said, rejecting a trade group's argument that keeping their legal challenge on ice wasn't justified.

  • June 03, 2025

    WTO Useful For China Enforcement, US Trade Nominee Says

    The U.S. should work with partners at the World Trade Organization to apply further trade pressure on China, making sure the country is complying with rules and trading fairly, a Skadden partner nominated by President Donald Trump to represent the U.S. at the WTO told lawmakers Tuesday.

  • June 03, 2025

    Fired CFO Can't Sue To Collect Bonuses, Conn. Court Told

    The ex-vice president and chief financial officer of an adhesive and fastener company is not entitled to collect nearly $300,000 in bonuses because he was not employed on the date they became payable and nothing prevented him from being terminated, according to a motion to dismiss his federal lawsuit with prejudice.

  • June 03, 2025

    Software Co. Settles Workers' Suit Over Lagging 401(k) Funds

    Software company ServiceNow told a California court Tuesday that it has agreed to settle a proposed class action alleging the business cost workers millions in savings by failing to trim underperforming target-date funds from its 401(k) plan.

  • June 03, 2025

    The Law360 400: A Look At The Top 100 Firms

    A rebound in client work sent the nation’s largest law firms into growth mode last year, driving a wave of hiring, mergers and strategic moves that reshaped the top tier of the Law360 400. Here's a preview of the 100 firms with the largest U.S. attorney headcounts.

  • June 02, 2025

    Despite 11-1 Split Warning, 7th Circ. Limits Use Of Mandamus

    The Seventh Circuit shrugged off assertions that it has inexplicably adopted one-of-a-kind restrictions on change-of-venue challenges, refusing Monday to rethink its recent rejection of mandamus as a mechanism to fight forum selection decisions.

  • June 02, 2025

    Alphabet Pledges $500M To Boost Compliance In Investor Suit

    Google's parent company, Alphabet Inc., has agreed to earmark half a billion dollars over the next 10 years to overhaul the tech giant's global compliance structure, according to two institutional investors that sued the company's leaders over allegations of anticompetitive and monopolistic business practices.

  • June 02, 2025

    Airbnb Nixed Conservative Shareholder Proposals, Suit Says

    Two institutional Airbnb shareholders that promote conservative values have sued the vacation property rental company, saying it wrongfully excluded their shareholder proposals from its 2025 proxy materials while allowing the inclusion of a proposal submitted by a "liberal-leaning" state pension fund.

  • June 02, 2025

    9th Circ. Sends Express Scripts Opioid Case To State Court

    The Ninth Circuit sent California's public nuisance lawsuit against Express Scripts and OptumRx over opioid dispensing back to state court Monday and denied the pharmacy benefit managers' bid to stay the remand pending appeal, saying the U.S. Supreme Court's 2009 Nken decision controls, not its later Coinbase ruling.

  • June 02, 2025

    8th Circ. OKs Nix Of Suit On Iowa's Quitting Of COVID Benefits

    The Eighth Circuit backed the dismissal of a proposed class action claiming Iowa violated workers' rights by prematurely pulling out of federal pandemic unemployment assistance programs, ruling Monday that the benefits they sought weren't protected by the U.S. Constitution.

  • June 02, 2025

    Google Wants Ex-Sales Rep's $2M Commission Suit Tossed

    Google urged a Connecticut federal court to ax a former Google Cloud salesman's suit alleging that the company owes him $2 million in commissions and fired him while he underwent cancer treatments to dodge insurance benefits, saying his claims can't stand.

  • June 02, 2025

    Twitter Must Search Email, Slack Records In Severance Spat

    Fired Twitter executives can force the social media company to comb through emails and Slack channels for specific terms to support their lawsuit alleging they are owed $200 million in severance, a California federal judge ruled, rejecting the company's argument that the searches would be overly burdensome.

  • May 30, 2025

    Wash. High Court Relaxes Standard For Worker Illness Suits

    Washington's highest court has lowered the bar for employees to sue over work-related illnesses, finding that in cases of latent diseases such as mesothelioma, a worker has a valid claim if they show their employer was "virtually certain" that the malady would develop.

  • May 30, 2025

    Fed Circ. Weighs In On Veterans Court Review Standard

    The Federal Circuit on Friday issued a precedential opinion backing the U.S. Court of Appeals for Veterans Claims' use of a questions of law analysis, rather than a standard requiring its own review of the facts in a disability evaluation case.

  • May 30, 2025

    NJ Panel Upholds Unemployment Benefits Claims For Strikers

    A New Jersey state appeals court on Friday supported a state employment board's conclusion that Teamsters-represented workers at a concrete manufacturing company who went on strike are eligible for unemployment benefits, finding federal labor law does not preempt the state agency's decision. 

Expert Analysis

  • ERISA Forecast After Diverging Pension Risk Transfer Rulings

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    Two district courts' split decisions on whether plaintiffs had standing in class actions challenging pension risk transfer transactions, amid a swath of similar suits, provide an early indication of how courts might rule in this new wave of Employee Retirement Income Security Act litigation, say attorneys at Gibson Dunn.

  • Series

    Teaching College Students Makes Me A Better Lawyer

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    Serving as an adjunct college professor has taught me the importance of building rapport, communicating effectively, and persuading individuals to critically analyze the difference between what they think and what they know — principles that have helped to improve my practice of law, says Sheria Clarke at Nelson Mullins.

  • Series

    Adapting To Private Practice: From DOJ Enviro To Mid-Law

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    Practitioners leaving a longtime government role for private practice — as when I departed the U.S. Department of Justice’s environmental enforcement division — should prioritize finding a firm that shares their principles, values their experience and will invest in their transition, says John Cruden at Beveridge & Diamond.

  • Legal Ethics Considerations For Law Firm Pro Bono Deals

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    If a law firm enters into a pro bono deal with the Trump administration in exchange for avoiding or removing an executive order, it has an ethical obligation to create a written settlement agreement with specific terms, which would mitigate some potential conflict of interest problems, says Andrew Altschul at Buchanan Angeli.

  • Series

    Playing Football Made Me A Better Lawyer

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    While my football career ended over 15 years ago, the lessons the sport taught me about grit, accountability and resilience have stayed with me and will continue to help me succeed as an attorney, says Bert McBride at Trenam.

  • What Del. Supreme Court LKQ Decision Means For M&A Deals

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    The Delaware Supreme Court's recent decision in LKQ v. Rutledge greatly increases the enforceability of forfeiture-for-competition provisions, representing an important affirmation of earlier precedent and making it likely that such agreements will become more common in M&A transactions, say attorneys at Mayer Brown.

  • 10 Arbitrations And A 5th Circ. Ruling Flag Arb. Clause Risks

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    The ongoing arbitral saga of Sullivan v. Feldman, which has engendered proceedings before 10 different arbitrators in Texas and Louisiana along with last month's Fifth Circuit opinion, showcases both the risks and limitations of arbitration clauses in retainer agreements for resolving attorney-client disputes, says Christopher Blazejewski at Sherin and Lodgen.

  • How High Court's Cornell Decision Will Affect ERISA Suits

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    The U.S. Supreme Court's recent decision in Cunningham v. Cornell, characterizing prohibited transaction exemptions as affirmative defenses, sets the bar very low for initiating Employee Retirement Income Security Act litigation, and will likely affect many plan sponsors with similar service agreements, says Carol Buckmann at Cohen & Buckmann.

  • Series

    Power To The Paralegals: The Value Of Unified State Licensing

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    Texas' proposal to become the latest state to license paraprofessional providers of limited legal services could help firms expand their reach and improve access to justice, but consumers, attorneys and allied legal professionals would benefit even more if similar programs across the country become more uniform, says Michael Houlberg at the University of Denver.

  • 10 Soft Skills Every GC Should Master

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    As businesses face shifting regulatory and technological uncertainty, general counsel will need to strengthen certain soft skills to succeed, from admitting when they make a mistake to maintaining a healthy dose of dispassion, says Douglas Brown at Manatt.

  • How Proxy Advisory Firms Are Approaching AI And DEI

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    Institutional Shareholder Services' and Glass Lewis' annual updates to their proxy voting guidelines reflect some of the biggest issues of the day, including artificial intelligence and DEI, and companies should parse these changes carefully, say attorneys at Cahill Gordon.

  • An Unrestrained, Bright-Eyed View Of Legal AI's Future

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    Todd Itami at Covington offers a bright-eyed, laughing-all-the-way, skydive look at what the legal industry could look like after an artificial intelligence revolution, which he believes may happen much sooner and more dramatically than we expect.

  • Tracking The Evolution In Litigation Finance

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    Despite continued innovation, litigation finance remains an immature market with borrowers recieving significantly different terms as lenders learn to value cases, which firms need a strong handle on to ensure lending terms do not overwhelm collateral value, says Robert Wilkins at Lightfoot Franklin.

  • How Plan Sponsors Can Mitigate Risk In PBM Contracts

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    A recent lawsuit in New York federal court alleges that JPMorgan caused exorbitant prescription costs by mishandling the pharmacy benefit manager arrangement, adding to a growing body of Employee Retirement Income Security Act fiduciary breach litigation and affirming that fiduciaries must proactively manage their healthcare plan vendors, say attorneys at Hall Benefits Law.

  • Series

    Volunteer Firefighting Makes Me A Better Lawyer

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    While practicing corporate law and firefighting may appear incongruous, the latter benefits my legal career by reminding me of the importance of humility, perspective and education, says Nicholas Passaro at Ford.

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