In today’s news and commentary, the Supreme Court denies Cemex’s emergency request to pause enforcement of an NLRB bargaining order, employers may still face Title VII liability for English-only workplace policies despite the EEOC’s planned rescission of longstanding guidance, and a Texas federal judge rejects an injunction in an NLRB removal protections challenge.

On Monday, Justice Elena Kagan denied Cemex Construction Materials Pacific LLC’s emergency application to stay enforcement of a Ninth Circuit mandate requiring the company to bargain with the International Brotherhood of Teamsters. Earlier this year, the Ninth Circuit upheld the NLRB’s bargaining order under the Supreme Court’s 1969 NLRB v. Gissel Packing Co. decision, concluding that the Board could require bargaining without a rerun election based on Cemex’s unfair labor practices. The court declined to address the validity of the Board’s 2023 Cemex Construction Materials Pacific decision, which established a new framework governing union representation proceedings. Cemex argued that being forced to bargain before the Supreme Court has an opportunity to review the Board’s new framework would cause irreparable harm. Following Justice Kagan’s rejection, Cemex filed a motion to renew the company’s stay application before Justice Samuel Alito. 

Meanwhile, employment attorneys are cautioning employers against interpreting the EEOC’s planned rescission of its 1980 national origin discrimination guidance as a green light to adopt broad English-only workplace policies. Although the rescission reflects the Trump administration’s shift away from disparate impact enforcement, Title VII itself remains unchanged. As a result, employers implementing broad English-only or citizenship requirements may still face liability under federal or state law. As Caroline J. Berdzik, co-chair of Goldberg Segalla’s employment and labor practice group, told Bloomberg Law, “[t]he rescission is significant symbolically, and it shifts the federal enforcement posture, but it does not change what Title VII actually says or Supreme Court precedent.”

Finally, a federal district judge in Texas ruled that the NLRA’s for-cause removal protections for NLRB members are unconstitutional but declined to block an ongoing unfair labor practice proceeding against Aimbridge Employee Service Corp. Judge Amos Mazzant concluded that, under the Supreme Court’s decision in Trump v. Slaughter and Fifth Circuit precedent, NLRB members are removable at will by the President. Rather than enjoining the proceeding, Judge Mazzant severed the unconstitutional removal provisions from the NLRA, rendering Aimbridge’s request for injunctive relief moot. The decision marks a departure from the Fifth Circuit’s 2025 SpaceX v. NLRB ruling and suggests employers may no longer be able to obtain injunctions based solely on challenges to the Board’s removal protections.