Labor Department Backs Workers, Slams Court’s Outlier ERISA Rule

The US Labor Department advised the Eleventh Circuit to ditch its unique rule imposing additional roadblocks on workers claiming benefit plan mismanagement, bucking the government’s recent trend of supporting defendants in ERISA cases.

The department opposes the US Court of Appeals for the Eleventh Circuit’s rule requiring workers to first exhaust their benefit plan’s administrative remedies before suing for fiduciary breach under the Employee Retirement Income Security Act. This requirement “cannot be squared with ERISA, logic, or notions of fairness to the American worker,” the department said Wednesday in a motion seeking permission to file a late amicus brief.

The ...