Labor Department Blocked From Adjudicating Whistleblower Case

The US Labor Department can’t continue proceedings related to a former Kinder Morgan Inc. employee’s whistleblower complaint while the gas company challenges the constitutionality of the agency’s in-house adjudication process.

Kinder Morgan has shown it’s likely to succeed on the merits of its claim that the agency’s administrative law judges are unconstitutionally shielded from removal by the president, Judge Sim Lake of the US District Court for the Southern District of Texas said in a Monday order.

Federal agencies faced constitutional challenges to their internal judicial processes following the US Supreme Court’s June 2024 ruling in SEC v. Jarkesy ...