August 29, 2017

OMB orders the EEOC to stay pay data collection.

After six years of analysis, which included significant interagency consultations and multiple lengthy public notice and comment periods, the EEOC concluded that employee pay data was critical to enforcing the nation’s anti-discrimination and related civil rights laws. One year later, in a memorandum that was barely over one page long, OMB echoed three brief letters sent by the Chamber of Commerce and other industry lobbyists in 2017 and claimed there was no “practical utility” to the equal pay data collection.

November 15, 2017

We filed our lawsuit against OMB.

February 13, 2018

The government tried to dismiss the case.

It did not defend its decision on the merits and instead claimed that it was actively reconsidering the equal pay protection through a “multi-step reconsideration process.

February 27, 2018

We opposed the government’s motion to dismiss.

In subsequent filings we also pointed out statements from then-OMB Director Mick Mulvaney showing that, despite representing to the court in February 2018 that OMB was actively reconsidering the equal pay protection, Director Mulvaney testified he “has not looked at” the equal pay data collection rule since September 2017.

Summer 2018

Documents reveal industry lobbyists who objected to equal pay transparency had access to OMB leadership.

In records obtained by NWLC through FOIA lawsuits, industry lobbyists requested the rescission of the equal pay tool directly to OIRA leadership or senior staff repeatedly between February and August 2017. In that same period of time OIRA failed to respond to requests from NWLC, with support from approximately 90 other civil rights and women’s organizations, to meet with equal pay stakeholders to hear their views on the importance of the tool.

August 2018

Documents reveal Ivanka Trump played a role in this rollback.

Newseek: Ivanka Trump was more than complicit in Obama equal pay rollback—she had a hand in it, watchdog alleges

October 2018

We moved for summary judgement.

The administration had failed to provide any reasoned explanation or defense of is decision. We also demonstrated that OMB failed to conduct its own analysis and acted solely on requests from corporate lobbyists without any evaluation of their merits.

November 2018

Court ordered release of full Administrative Record.

The record revealed that OMB conducted no analysis of its own in halting the pay data collection, and instead merely parroted complaints from the Chamber of Commerce and other big business-backed lobbyists. In contrast, the administration failed to consider, let alone rebut, any comments it received in support of the pay data collection. Additionally, the administration failed to consider the impact that the elimination of the pay data collection would have on the EEOC’s antidiscrimination mission and the urgent need to close the wage gap.

February 7, 2019

Court rejected attempt to keep a key memo out of the lawsuit.

The government withheld from the Administrative Record a key EEOC memorandum that disavowed the stated reason for the stay. This memo, which was initially obtained by the ACLU, states that the lobbyists’ concern about the data file specifications—the only concrete justification the administration provided—did not warrant reconsideration. The EEOC’s analysis reached the exact same conclusions that we voiced in our lawsuit and that the administration’s arguments had denied. OMB’s actions were directly contrary to the only analysis undertaken by the government anywhere in the record.

March 4, 2019

Court declared stay unlawful, reinstated equal pay protection.

In a significant defeat for the Trump Administration, the court ruled that Trump’s OMB broke the law when it halted this critical tool. Specifically, the court concluded that by reversing its prior policy without any reasoned explanation, the administration violated the APA’s prohibition of “arbitrary and capricious” policymaking. As a result, the court fully reinstated the equal pay policy.