Congress Seeks to Delay Overtime Rule

Facing a certain veto by President Obama, this week the House voted 246 to 177, with five Democrats joining all House Republicans, to pass H.R. 6094, which would delay implementation of the final overtime rule to June 1, 2017, as opponents of the measure cast their hopes on pending litigation.  After the House vote, two additional overtime bills were introduced in the Senate.  One bill introduced by Sen. Lamar Alexander would phase in the new salary threshold over five years, while the other (S. 3429) would delay the rule's implementation date for two years.  Although the Senate is expected to take up one of the measures after the November election, it is unlikely to get past a likely filibuster, which will leave the two court challenges to the final rule as the only hope for delay.  Last week, a coalition of 21 states' attorney generals and a group of business associations filed two separate lawsuits arguing the Labor Department overstepped its legal authority by imposing an exceedingly large increase in the salary level threshold for the FLSA white collar overtime exemption and automatically indexing the increase every three years.  The plaintiffs in both cases are expected to ask the court for expedited review given the December 1st implementation date, but it is unclear if the court will grant the motion.