By Daniel Wiessner
(Reuters) -A federal decide in Texas on Friday quickly blocked a Biden administration rule from taking impact that will prolong obligatory extra time pay to 4 million salaried U.S. employees.
U.S. District Choose Sean Jordan in Sherman, Texas, mentioned the U.S. Division of Labor rule that’s set to enter impact on Monday improperly bases eligibility for extra time pay on employees’ wages reasonably than their job duties.
Jordan, an appointee of Republican former President Donald Trump, blocked the Labor Division from making use of the rule to state employees in Texas pending the end result of a authorized problem by the Republican-led state.
The Labor Division and the workplace of Republican Texas Lawyer Normal Ken Paxton didn’t instantly reply to requests for remark.
The division can search evaluation of the ruling within the New Orleans-based fifth U.S. Circuit Court docket of Appeals, which is extensively thought to be essentially the most conservative federal appeals courtroom.
The rule adopted in April would require employers to pay extra time premiums to salaried employees who earn lower than $1,128 per week, or about $58,600 per 12 months, after they work greater than 40 hours in per week. The present threshold of about $35,500 was set in 2019.
Federal regulation exempts employees with “govt, administrative, {and professional}” (EAP) duties from receiving extra time pay, and the Labor Division has for many years used wage as one consider deciding when that applies.
In adopting the rule, the division mentioned that lower-paid salaried employees typically do the identical jobs as their hourly counterparts, however work extra hours for no extra pay.
The rule additionally establishes computerized will increase within the wage threshold each three years to mirror wage development.
Texas in its lawsuit mentioned the rule violates federal regulation by conditioning extra time exemptions totally on employees’ pay reasonably than their duties, and is in search of to strike it down nationwide.
Texas says that subjecting states to the extra time growth violates their proper underneath the U.S. Structure to construction the pay of state staff and, in flip, resolve learn how to allocate giant parts of their budgets.
Jordan on Friday agreed that the Labor Division had overstepped its authority by successfully rewriting federal regulation.
“Because the extraordinary which means of the EAP Exemption focuses solely on duties, any rule implementing the EAP Exemption – together with the 2024 Rule — should likewise middle on duties,” the decide wrote.
Jordan can be presiding over a problem to the rule by enterprise teams, and a small advertising and marketing agency is suing over the regulation in a unique federal courtroom in Texas.
(Reporting by Daniel Wiessner in Albany, New York; Modifying by Sandra Maler and Daniel Wallis)