Congress Passes Emergency Paid Sick Leave and Emergency FMLA Bill

Late Wednesday afternoon, the U.S. Senate voted to pass the Families First Coronavirus Response Act (the “Act”), which was initially passed by the U.S. House of Representatives on Saturday and then amended on Monday.  The Act establishes an emergency paid sick leave program as well as an emergency FMLA leave program governing employers with fewer than five hundred (500) employees in an effort to combat the growing COVID-19 pandemic.  The Act will become effective fifteen (15) days after it is signed into law by President Trump, which is expected to occur in the coming days. As the Senate did not make any changes to the House Bill regarding the emergency paid sick leave and emergency FMLA programs, the discussion of the terms of these programs in a blog post from Tuesday remains valid. 

As this situation progresses, we will continue to keep employers updated on all key developments related to COVID-19 and its impact on the workplace.  Please be sure to subscribe to our blog so that you can receive timely updates and analysis by e-mail. For example, in another post from Tuesday, we addressed the impact of COVID-19 on employees’ ability to collect unemployment if they are furloughed or laid off. Earlier on Wednesday, we addressed the actions that employers can take with respect to sick employees. For questions about these topics or any other labor and employment law matter, please do not hesitate to contact the attorneys at Hoffman & Hlavac.