Updates on important legal developments as they occur.
The Wisconsin Fair Employment Act (WFEA) generally prohibits employers from discriminating against individuals on the basis of their arrest and conviction records, subject to certain exceptions. One of those exceptions permits employers to refuse to hire or terminate an employee or applicant if the material circumstances of a pending charge or conviction bear a “substantial relationship” to the circumstances of the job at issue. This is known as “the substantial relationship test.”
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The Americans with Disabilities Act (ADA) generally prohibits covered employers from discriminating against individuals on the basis of a qualifying disability, subject to certain exceptions. One of those exceptions permits employers to refuse to hire or allows them to terminate a disabled employee if the condition at issue would pose a “direct threat” to the employee or other employees in the workplace. It is the employer’s burden to prove an employee’s disability poses a “direct threat.”
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The H-1B visa program was launched in 1990 providing a pathway for highly educated foreign nationals to temporarily work in the United States. The program allows an employer to hire a foreign employee to work in any of the following three categories: (1) specialty occupations; (2) services of exceptional merit and ability related to Department of Defense cooperative research and development project; or (3) fashion models of distinguished merit or ability.
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