As anticipated, on March 3, 2022, President Joe Biden signed into law the Ending Forced Arbitration of Sexual Assault and Sexual Harassment Act (“the Act”). As we discussed in a recent blog post, the Act limits the enforceability of U.S. employers’ mandatory arbitration agreements which require that all employment-related claims be arbitrated, rather than litigated.  Under the new law, employees may now opt to pursue their sexual assault or sexual harassment claims in court even if they signed an arbitration agreement with their employer that waived their right to do so. 

On February 10, 2022, Congress passed the Ending Forced Arbitration of Sexual Assault and Sexual Harassment Act, which amends the Federal Arbitration Act by prohibiting employers from forcing employees to arbitrate sexual harassment and sexual assault complaints. President Biden is expected to sign the Act into law. Once signed, the Act will be effective immediately. The Act represents a significant change from the overall trend in workplace law allowing employers to require employees to arbitrate workplace disputes.

In this new era of remote working, employers may think that the risk of sexual harassment is no longer a major concern, and therefore, prevention training should not be a high priority. Unfortunately, this reasoning relies on misconceptions about harassment and can lead to serious problems for an employer, including challenging employee relations issues, disruption of business operations, embarrassing news coverage that can damage an organization’s brand and bottom line, and costly litigation and liability under federal and state anti-harassment laws.