Six months into her second pregnancy, Lauren Porter, a production scheduler at a Virginia shipyard, started struggling with back pain, which was aggravated by her commute and the eight-hour shifts at her desk. Porter had done her job remotely during the pandemic, and asked her manager—with a note from her chiropractor—if she could work from home for the remainder of pregnancy. Her request was rejected; she was told to take a leave of absence instead.
Before the passage of the PWFA, a growing number of state laws offered protections, but under federal law it could be difficult for employees to get accomodations. The 1978 Pregnancy Discrimination Act has offered some protections, but only requires employers to offer accommodations if a pregnant worker is deemed “similar” to other employees who get accommodations, such as workers who are injured on the job.
The appeal across party lines at the state level was striking, says Deborah Widiss, an Indiana University law professor who has written about and supported PWFA legislation. In her view, the bills gained bipartisan votes not only because the existing standards were confusing, but because the idea that pregnant workers should be able to keep working, with small accommodations for their safety, resonated broadly.
The PWFA bill was introduced in the House for a fifth time in May 2019 and received its first Congressional hearing in October 2019. Michelle Durham, a former EMT in Alabama, testified about how her life was derailed when she was denied a reprieve from heavy lifting during her pregnancy, a modification that her employer made available to injured workers.