Republican EEOC Commissioner Sonderling to Exit as Term Ends (1)

The US Equal Employment Opportunity Commission’s Keith Sonderling will depart the agency in August following the end of his term, leaving a Republican vacancy on the five-member panel charged with enforcing workplace civil rights laws.

Sonderling’s term expired July 1, but Title VII of the 1964 Civil Rights Act provides that EEOC commissioners can stay in their posts another 60 days. They may remain beyond that, if the president nominates a replacement during the holdover period.

Sonderling confirmed that he will step down in August in an announcement Monday on LinkedIn.

In the post, he said he has had “the unique privilege of working on issues that impact hundreds of millions of workers and employers worldwide” during his time at the commission and with the US Department of Labor, where he worked before going to the EEOC.

Sonderling said in an interview he was planning to rejoin the private sector, but declined to give more details about his future plans. He always intended to leave after a single term, he said.

“I’m still an EEOC commissioner, so that’s still my focus,” Sonderling said.

Sonderling was originally nominated to the EEOC by former President Donald Trump and joined in 2020. He served as vice chair until 2021.

Republicans became a minority on the commission in August 2023, when Democrat Kalpana Kotagal joined, creating a 3-2 split that ended a long period of partisan gridlock that kept the commission from taking a more active approach to policy and enforcement.

Sonderling voted with fellow Republican commissioner Andrea Lucas and in opposition to the EEOC’s three Democratic members on several key recent issues.

Sonderling and Lucas voted against the EEOC’s final rule on the Pregnant Workers Fairness Act, which requires employers to accommodate workers’ limitations related to pregnancy. The rule drew criticism from conservatives for its inclusion of abortion as a condition “related” to pregnancy and childbirth.

Sonderling also recently voted against the agency’s guidance on workplace harassment, which advised employers that misgendering workers or preventing them from using bathrooms that align with their gender identities may be seen as harassment by the EEOC.

Sonderling also joined Lucas in May to pause a joint memo between the EEOC and the National Labor Relations Board that would clarify where workers’ offensive speech against those crossing picket lines raises harassment concerns.

Following Sonderling’s exit, Lucas will be the only Republican on the commission unless a successor is nominated by the White House and confirmed by the Senate quickly.

Sonderling has made his mark, including through the commission’s growing work on artificial intelligence-based bias in employment law. He has advocated for the EEOC to put out more guidance on use of the technology, which has created risks for both employers and tech vendors when job applicants say the software discriminates against them.

Before the EEOC, Sonderling was deputy administrator of the DOL’s wage and hour division.