Equal Employment Opportunity Commission

Floor Speech

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Mr. McCONNELL. Mr. President, on one final matter, sometime soon, we also expect to vote on a Democratic resolution to overturn a rule put in place by the previous administration. Under Republican leadership, the Equal Employment Opportunity Commission--an aggressive Washington regulator of the American job market--issued modified marching orders that increased transparency and decreased the odds of expensive lawsuits.

Several years back, one investigation found the EEOC had become very aggressive and was perpetrating a kind of legal harassment on job creators, often leaving American taxpayers on the hook for court cases which the Commission had actually lost. Taxpayers were paying to sue job creators and lose in court, so the Republicans updated their guidance. It was the first substantial update of the way the EEOC handles disputes and conciliation since 1977. It said that the employer in question deserves a written summary of the facts behind a complaint, a written explanation of the legal justification, a few other details, and 14 days to respond. Sounds pretty reasonable. This helps ensure the Commission is making a good-faith effort to see if the dispute can be settled outside of court before beginning a costly, adversarial process.

Apparently, even these modest steps were too much for my friends on the Democratic side. They want to roll back this progress. A number of groups have asked them not to do this, from small business owners, to builders and contractors, to restaurant owners, to retailers, and beyond. These are the same employers who are already struggling to climb back out of this pandemic and rehire workers. They don't need any more Washington headwinds in their faces, and taxpayers don't need more of their dollars being funneled back toward trial lawyers. So I would urge Senators to vote against this resolution so the current, improved rule can actually be left in place.

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