An employer facing a workplace fatality or serious injury may have only hours to decide whether the Occupational Safety and Health Administration (OSHA) must be notified. That pressure is familiar, but the statutory source of those deadlines may now warrant a closer look. In July 2026, the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Fifth Circuit held in Exxon Mobil Corp. v. Occupational Safety and Health Review Commission that OSHA exceeded its statutory authority when it required employers to record employee-reported work-related mental illnesses. This decision may have opened the door to new challenges to OSHA’s regulations.
Quick Hits
In a July 2026 opinion, the Fifth Circuit vacated OSHA’s mental-illness recording rule, and the citation and penalty issued under it, after concluding that the OSH Act did not authorize the rule.
The court’s analysis appears to have opened the door to challenging the statutory basis underpinning OSHA’s reporting rules.
OSHA’s reporting rule remains in effect… Read the complete article here...
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