18th Annual Workplace Class Action Report - 2022 Edition

Annual Workplace Class Action Litigation Report: 2022 Edition 559 not classify as cancelled. The Court found that the class definitions did not meet the requirements of Rule 23. The Court determined that because Plaintiff’s theory of liability required Defendant to issue refunds to buyers who received a voucher instead of a refund or who held tickets to events rescheduled 9 or more days after the original dates, the proposed class could include buyers who would prefer to keep their vouchers or tickets. Id . at *13. The Court also reasoned that the record reflected that some buyers had used their vouchers for events that already occurred and some buyers redeemed their vouchers for upcoming events. Id . at *15. The Court thus reasoned that the class failed to meet the commonality and typicality requirements of Rule 23(a). The Court also opined that the proposed classes were unmanageable because they were based on arbitrary criteria. In sum, the Court concluded that there were significant individual questions that predominated over any common issues of fact or law. For these reasons, the Court denied Plaintiff’s motion for class certification. Smith, et al. v. Biden, 2021 U.S. Dist. LEXIS 215437 (D.N.J. Nov. 8, 2021). Plaintiffs brought a class action and sought to preliminarily enjoin Defendants from enforcing Executive Order 14042 and Executive Order 14043 mandating COVID-19 vaccinations for federal employees and employees of federal contractors. The Court denied the motion. Plaintiffs argued that the Executive Orders violated the due process clause of the Fifth Amendment because they intruded on Plaintiffs’ fundamental rights of liberty and privacy to make their own healthcare decisions and decline unwanted medical procedures. Id . at *8. Plaintiffs further contended that the Executive Orders could not survive a strict scrutiny analysis because even if it was assumed that the government had a compelling interest in combating the spread of COVID-19 and protecting the health of its citizens, Plaintiffs’ liberty and privacy rights were stronger and more compelling than that of the government. The Court reasoned that case law authorities had repeatedly refused to enjoin an employer’s COVID-19 vaccine mandate, provided they contained legally required exemptions, inasmuch as such policies passed muster under the rational basis test. Here, the Court found that Plaintiffs were not likely to succeed on the merits of their claims, as every case that had considered the constitutionality of a COVID-19 vaccine mandate by an employer or university had deemed prior U.S. Supreme Court precedent controlling, and rejected claims of a fundamental right to refused a vaccine, and applied a rational basis standard of review to the policies at issue. Under the rational basis review, the action of the government "need only be rationally related to a legitimate government interest." Id . at *21. The Court held there could be no serious question that the government has a legitimate interest in preventing the spread of COVID-19. Thus, the only question is whether the mandates were rationally related to the government’s interest in stemming the spread of COVID-19. The Court concluded that such a rational relationship existed, and vaccines were a safe and effective way to prevent the spread of COVID-19. Id . at *23. For these reasons, the Court denied the motion for a preliminary injunction. Sparks, et al. v. Mills, 2021 U.S. Dist. LEXIS 58227 (D. Me. March 26, 2021). Plaintiff, an incarcerated inmate participating in a Work Release Program (“WRP”), filed a class action alleging that Janet Mills, the Governor of Maine, Randall Liberty, the Commissioner of the Maine Department of Corrections, and Laura Fortman, the Commissioner of the Maine Department of Labor ("Defendants") improperly seized already realized and improperly denied future unemployment benefits in violation of the Fourteenth Amendment. Defendants asserted that they were immune under the qualified immunity doctrine and filed a motion to dismiss, which the Court granted. Plaintiff was employed at Applebee’s until March 16, 2020, when the State of Maine suspended the WRP and told participants they could no longer leave the facility to limit their potential exposure to COVID- 19. Fifty-three WRP participants were deemed eligible for state and federal unemployment benefits and received $198,767. Plaintiff received seven payments of $106 from the State of Maine and $600 from the federal government. Governor Mills thereafter directed DOC Commissioner Liberty to take all unemployment benefits already given to WRP participants and place them into a trust account and withhold any further distribution of unemployment funds to WRP participants because she did not believe either the Maine Legislature or the U.S. Congress intended to provide WRP participants with unemployment benefits. Defendants argued that Plaintiff did not have a constitutionally protected interest in his unemployment benefits, but even if he did, he was afforded all the process he was due. The Court agreed with Defendants. The Court noted that because Plaintiff was not at risk of losing the ability to sustain life while appealing the state government’s decision in a post- deprivation hearing, he received due process as provided by the U.S. Constitution. The Court determined that the administrative procedures involved provided Plaintiff with notice and the opportunity to be heard in an adjudicatory proceeding in which he could present evidence, argue issues, call and examine witnesses, and