Biden Day Three – Additional EOs to Deliver Economic Relief for American Families and Businesses Amid the COVID-19 Crises
Client Alert | 2 min read | 01.22.21
President Biden signed two executive orders (EO) today to address the economic toll of the pandemic. Among other provisions, the EOs include expanding the Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program to address food insecurity, accelerating financial assistance to eligible Americans, ensuring worker protections, and beginning the process to require that everyone working for the federal government get a minimum wage of $15 an hour. The following is a brief summary and link to each EO signed today as well as a link to the talking points accompanying the directives:
- Executive Order on Economic Relief Related to the COVID-19 Pandemic –
- Directs all executive departments and agencies to identify actions they can take within existing authorities to address the current economic crisis resulting from the pandemic. Agencies should specifically consider actions that facilitate better use of data and other means to improve access to, reduce unnecessary barriers to, and improve coordination among programs funded in whole or in part by the Federal Government.
- Directs agencies to prioritize actions that provide the greatest relief to individuals, families, and small businesses; and to State, local, Tribal, and territorial governments.
- Executive Order – Protecting and Empowering Federal Workers and Contractors –
- Restores collective bargaining power and worker protections by revoking Trump Executive Orders 13836, 13837, and 13839. It goes further to direct agencies to bargain over permissible, non-mandatory subjects of bargaining when contracts are up for negotiation so that workers have a greater voice in their working conditions.
- Eliminates Schedule F, which undermines the foundations of the civil service. Its existence threatens the critical protections of career employees and provides a pathway to burrow political appointees into the civil service.
- Promotes a $15 minimum wage. The Executive Order directs the Office of Personnel Management to develop recommendations to pay more federal employees at least $15 per hour.
Talking Points: January 22 Executive Orders – Economic Relief | The White House
Fact Sheet: President Biden’s New Executive Actions Deliver Economic Relief for American Families and Businesses Amid the COVID-19 Crises | The White House
Contacts
Insights
Client Alert | 3 min read | 11.21.25
On November 7, 2025, in Thornton v. National Academy of Sciences, No. 25-cv-2155, 2025 WL 3123732 (D.D.C. Nov. 7, 2025), the District Court for the District of Columbia dismissed a False Claims Act (FCA) retaliation complaint on the basis that the plaintiff’s allegations that he was fired after blowing the whistle on purported illegally discriminatory use of federal funding was not sufficient to support his FCA claim. This case appears to be one of the first filed, and subsequently dismissed, following Deputy Attorney General Todd Blanche’s announcement of the creation of the Civil Rights Fraud Initiative on May 19, 2025, which “strongly encourages” private individuals to file lawsuits under the FCA relating to purportedly discriminatory and illegal use of federal funding for diversity, equity, and inclusion (DEI) initiatives in violation of Executive Order 14173, Ending Illegal Discrimination and Restoring Merit-Based Opportunity (Jan. 21, 2025). In this case, the court dismissed the FCA retaliation claim and rejected the argument that an organization could violate the FCA merely by “engaging in discriminatory conduct while conducting a federally funded study.” The analysis in Thornton could be a sign of how forthcoming arguments of retaliation based on reporting allegedly fraudulent DEI activity will be analyzed in the future.
Client Alert | 3 min read | 11.20.25
Client Alert | 3 min read | 11.20.25
Client Alert | 6 min read | 11.19.25
