On Tuesday, a federal judge in Lubbock, Texas, ruled that the $1.7 trillion government funding bill of 2022 was unconstitutionally approved. This ruling came as lawmakers in 2022 utilized a pandemic-era rule permitting members of the U.S. House of Representatives to vote on the bill by proxy rather than in person.
Republican Texas Attorney General Ken Paxton has urged the courts to intervene and block a provision within the funding bill that gave pregnant workers stronger legal protections.
U.S. District Judge Wesley Hendrix has reviewed the request and issued a “limited” ruling concerning one of the two provisions that Paxton aimed to block.
In a ruling, Judge Hendrix, appointed by former President Trump, deemed the passage of the Pregnant Workers Fairness Act as improper, thereby prohibiting the law from being enforced against the state as an employer.
The Pregnant Workers Fairness Act, passed in December 2022, mandates that employers must offer reasonable accommodations to pregnant employees.
In his decision, Hendrix pointed out that his injunction only applies to employees of the state government.
Last year, Paxton filed a lawsuit asserting that the federal spending package was unconstitutionally passed. He argued that because over half of the members of the