The Pregnant Workers Fairness Act

The Pregnant Workers Fairness Act (PWFA) is a federal law that requires employers to provide reasonable accommodations for workers who have limitations related to pregnancy, childbirth, or related medical conditions, unless it would create an undue hardship for the employer.  

Congress passed the PWFA to safeguard against employers forcing pregnant workers onto  unpaid leave or pushed out of work entirely. The PWFA helps to ensure that no worker has to choose between their job and their health or the health of their pregnancy. 

The PWFA went into effect on June 27, 2023. The U.S. Equal Employment Opportunity Commission (EEOC) issued legally binding regulations as well as interpretive guidance that provides numerous examples to help workers and employers understand their rights and obligations under the law (referred to collectively here as the Final Rule). 

To learn more about the Pregnant Workers Fairness Act, read this fact sheet. 

Since the PWFA was passed, some states and private employers have brought lawsuits attacking the EEOC’s Final Rule implementing the PWFA. One state–Texas–has challenged the constitutionality of the entire law and other employers have since raised similar arguments. These objectors seek a range of court action, from narrowing the scope of the final rule to overturning the entire law.  

As described below, the ongoing litigation may affect how PWFA can be enforced against certain employers in certain situations. However, PWFA remains broadly in effect nationwide and continues to protect workers’ rights to accommodations.   

Lawsuits challenging the scope of PWFA’s protections 

Nineteen states have challenged the final EEOC Final Rule that makes explicit that PWFA protects worker accommodations relating to abortion. In addition, several employers and organizations, including religious entities, have brought a series of lawsuits challenging the EEOC’s regulations, claiming religious objections to attack the Final Rule’s protections for accommodations related to abortion and fertility treatments.  

In some of these cases, the judges have issued decisions that prevent the EEOC from enforcing the Final Rule against certain employers with respect to accommodations for abortion, and in one case, fertility care.  For example, a federal judge ordered that the EEOC could not enforce sections of the Final Rule pertaining to abortion- or fertility-related accommodations against members of the Catholic Benefits Association, a benefits organization that represents an estimated 9,000 for-profit and non-profit employers. In May 2025, a federal judge in Louisiana issued a decision vacating the portions of the Final Rule on abortion-related accommodations and directed the EEOC to rewrite the rule to remove that language. Importantly, vacating these portions of the Final Rule does not change the law. By statute, the PWFA requires employers to provide accommodations for limitations related to or arising out of pregnancy, childbirth, or related medical conditions, and abortion is related to pregnancy.  Despite one court’s interpretation, workers may still try to enforce their rights to abortion-related accommodations under the statute.    

These cases challenge the Congressional intent of the Pregnant Workers Fairness Act: to ensure access to accommodations for workers seeking care relating to pregnancy. States and employers are turning to anti-abortion judges to exclude reproductive health care that they could not successfully get carved out during the legislative process. Notably, these attacks against PWFA go against the public’s strong majority support for access to abortion and fertility care. By sowing confusion and uncertainty about the scope of the PWFA’s protections, these decisions will make it harder for workers to access the accommodations they need.  

Lawsuits challenging the constitutionality of the PWFA 

Shortly after the PWFA was passed, the State of Texas filed a lawsuit seeking to strike down the entire law, which would block these critical protections for workers nationwide.  

The PWFA was passed as part of the 2023 Consolidated Appropriations Act. Texas baselessly argued that the entire Appropriations Act, including the PWFA, was not constitutionally enacted because some Members of Congress voted for it by proxy, under voting procedures adopted during the Covid-19 pandemic. Notably, however, the state only sought to block certain pieces of the law, including the PWFA, not the rest of the 1000+ page Appropriations Act. 

In February 2024, in an unprecedented decision, a federal judge held that the statute cannot be enforced against the State of Texas, which impacts the ability of Texas state employees to enforce their rights under PWFA. That decision has been appealed. However, while the case is pending, the EEOC cannot enforce the PWFA against the State of Texas. 

Because Texas has challenged the constitutionality of a Congressional process, this case could have far-reaching implications beyond PWFA. A broad range of stakeholders—from veterans’ groups to national security experts and Members of Congress on both sides of the aisle—have therefore filed briefs with the court of appeals opposing Texas’ challenge.  

Unfortunately, at least one other employer and an employer association have latched onto the February 2024 decision and have asserted similar arguments challenging the constitutionality of the PWFA in their own lawsuits. 

NWLC continues to fight for strong enforcement of the PWFA, and for the rights of all workers to receive reasonable accommodations for the full range of needs they may experience related to pregnancy and childbirth.  

• We are educating workers about their rights under the PWFA. 
• Through the Legal Network for Gender Equity, which is administered by the National Women’s Law Center Fund, we support workers whose rights under the PWFA have been violated by connecting them with attorneys in our network, who will do a first consultation for free.  
• We are filing amicus briefs in the courts to defend the EEOC’s PWFA regulations and explain why the regulations are so important for workers.