Bishops Sue Biden’s EEOC for Mandating Employers ‘Accommodate Employee Abortions’

Several Catholic organizations, including the United States Conference of Catholic Bishops (USCCB), filed a lawsuit against the U.S. Equal Employment Opportunity Commission (EEOC) last week after the commission included abortion in its implementation of the Pregnant Workers Fairness Act (PWFA). 

The act, which was passed in 2022, seeks to provide “more robust protections for pregnant women in the workforce,” making it “illegal for employers to deny reasonable accommodations” for pregnancy, childbirth, or a related medical condition, according to the Becket Fund for Religious Liberty, the legal group representing the USCCB. Some examples of “reasonable accommodations” include additional breaks, adapting a uniform to allow maternity clothes, adjusting a work schedule, and leave for health care appointments, among many others. The text of the PWFA does not mention abortion at all.

Throughout the deliberation process, legislators repeatedly clarified that the act does not require employers to accommodate the procurement of abortion. “I want to say for the record … that under the act, under the Pregnant Workers Fairness Act, the [EEOC] could not—could not—issue any regulation that requires abortion leave,” Sen. Bob Casey, the bill’s sponsor, stated on the Senate floor prior to the bill’s passage. 

But the EEOC had other ideas. After Congress passed the PWFA, the legislation was turned over to the EEOC for implementation. Though the act doesn’t reference abortion, the EEOC and the courts have previously interpreted the Title VII phrase “pregnancy, childbirth, or related medical conditions” — the very same phrase employed in the PWFA — to include abortion. Further, as Becket Law explains, the agency “claims that the ‘plain meaning’ of the PWFA supports abortion’s inclusion, because abortion involves ‘the condition of being pregnant.’”  

Drawing on this definition, the agency mandated that “employers nationwide must accommodate employee abortions,” meaning that employers must “knowingly agree to let their employees take leave, including paid leave, to have an abortion.” 

Additionally, the EEOC prevents employers from “communicat[ing] about pro-life beliefs in ways that ‘interfere’ with abortion accommodation.” Under the agency’s final rule, religious employers must “rescind their current policies and practices against abortion accommodations or advocacy” and “replace them with policies” that “affirm a willingness to accommodate abortion”; “prohibit any potentially ‘harassing’ discussion of abortion in the workplace”; and do not “interfere with” an employee’s decision to obtain an abortion. In other words, as National Catholic Register points out, pro-life speech in the workplace could be construed as “retaliation,” opening employers up to potential legal action.

The agency will only consider religious liberty objections on a “case-by-case” basis, creating notable legal and financial barriers to employers seeking exemptions.

The USCCB had previously supported the passage of the PWFA on the basis that “the law’s purpose of protecting the well-being of expecting mothers and their unborn children [is] a goal consistent with the Catholic Church’s belief in the inherent dignity of all human life.” But now the bishops feel betrayed. Represented by Becket, the USCCB, the Catholic University of America, the Diocese of Lake Charles, Louisiana, and the Diocese of Lafayette, Louisiana, filed a lawsuit in the U.S. District Court for the western district of Louisiana on May 22. (RELATED: The Supreme Court’s Religious Retreat) 

“The bill’s purpose was laudable and obvious: to expand protections for pregnant women in the workplace,” wrote Archbishop Timothy P. Broglio, president of the USCCB, in the Wall Street Journal. “Yet the EEOC … has twisted it to undermine human dignity.” 

Bishop Kevin C. Rhoades, chairman of the USCCB’s Committee for Religious Liberty, stated: 

It is indefensible for the Equal Employment Opportunity Commission to twist the law in a way that violates the consciences of pro-life employers by making them facilitate abortions. No employer should be forced to participate in an employee’s decision to end the life of their child.

The discrepancy between the PWFA’s intent — to protect a working mother’s health and the health of her baby — and the EEOC’s interpretation is obvious. But it shouldn’t be surprising that the administrative state is intent on smuggling abortion into every corner of the law. After all, throughout the Trump administration, Republican priorities were continually undercut by politically motivated bureaucrats. Congress can pass as much legislation it wants, but until the institution reclaims the actual work of governing from the administrative state, this won’t be the last lawsuit Catholics have to file in defense of religious liberty. 

Mary Frances Myler is a contributing editor at The American Spectator. She graduated from the University of Notre Dame in 2022. 

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