Arbitration, FAA, Transportation Workers: SCOTUS Holds Transportation Worker Exemption Applies To What Workers Do, Not Who They Work For

A 9-0 Opinion Authored By Justice John Roberts.

Wonder Bread Store, B-80, Rock Springs, Wyoming. Photographer: John Margolies. 2004. Library of Congress. No known restrictions.

        The Supreme Court, in a unanimous decision, holds: "A transportation worker need not work in the transportation industry to fall within the exemption from the FAA provided by §1 of the Act." Bissonnette v. LePage Bakeries, 23-51_6647 (Sup. Ct. 4/12/24) (Roberts, J.). 

        Section 1 of the FAA exempts transportation workers from mandatory arbitration. The issue in Bissonnette was whether transportation workers are workers who work for employers in the transportation industry, as the District Court majority and the Second Circuit had ruled, or whether transportation workers are defined by what they do. Justice Roberts explains that transportation workers are defined by what they do.

        We have written about the FAA exemption for transportation workers before. See our sidebar category Transportation Workers.

        BONUS: Baby Boomers may remember advertisements for Wonder Bread, the white bread that made you grow 12 ways. Wonder Bread is one of the "flagship products" of defendant/respondent Flower Foods, Inc., "which it promotes with a 95-foot-tall hot air balloon and a parade float called The Wondership."