Compliance Stuff

Baker Botts and ACC Houston hosted a half-day seminar on January 29, 2026 that featured timely discussions on AI, employment law, and what’s ahead for the workplace. Partners Rich Harper, Paul Morico and Scott Nelson and Latasha McDade, Senior Counsel at Exxon Mobil Corporation, Tenley Krueger, Vice President, Global Intellectual Property at Technip Energies and Courtney Flores, Managing Compliance Counsel at Motiva Enterprises participated in a session titled “Where AI, Employees, and the Law Intersect.” Key Takeaways   AI use in employment has shifted from experimentation to accountability.   Employers of all sizes are using AI to inform hiring, pay, promotion, discipline, and workforce reductions. The central legal question is no longer focused on a manager’s intent. The focus is now on how AI tools are trained, governed, documented, and reviewed. Weak documentation, limited human involvement, or overreliance on vendor tools increases risk even where no discrimin...

We’ve all heard the horror stories. A job seeker spends hours tailoring his resume, finally hits “submit,” and within seconds receives a rejection email in his inbox. Clearly, no human could have actually reviewed the resume. The applicant wasn’t rejected by a person; he was rejected by a pattern-matching algorithm. The “ No Robot Bosses Act ” could curtail these scenarios. The bill has bipartisan support in Congress, having been co-sponsored by Democrats Suzanne Bonamici of Oregon and Christopher Deluzio of Pennsylvania, and the Republican Delegate from Guam, James Moylan. The core premise of the proposed No Robot Bosses Act?  Employers would be prohibited from relying exclusively on automated decision systems to make employment-related decisions , including whether to hire or fire. Under the proposed law, an “automated decision system” is defined broadly as follows: a system, software, or process that . . . uses computation, in whole or in part, to determine outcomes, make or aid...

Agentic AI is poised to transform the way businesses operate and how consumers behave. Equipped with the ability to autonomously plan, adapt to, and complete complex, multi-step tasks, this developing technology simultaneously unlocks exciting opportunities and introduces emerging risks for businesses. Artificial Intelligence (AI) is evolving at a rapid and unprecedented pace, and the emergence of “agentic AI” is at the leading edge. Unlike traditional AI systems that are designed to perform specific, narrowly defined tasks ( e.g. , generating text or images or analyzing inputs) and rely on human input and oversight, agentic AI systems have the capacity to complete far more complex, multi-step tasks with a high degree of autonomy and make decisions based on context. Beyond acting as tools that users leverage for specific tasks, agentic AI systems equip individuals and businesses with agents that can plan, adapt, and make decisions on their behalf. The promise of agentic AI opens up a ...

Certain businesses implement dynamic pricing based on individual preferences or previously collected consumer data. This practice may soon be prohibited in New York if those websites fail to state, “THIS PRICE WAS SET BY AN ALGORITHM USING YOUR PERSONAL DATA.” While currently the subject of litigation, New York’s  Algorithmic Pricing Disclosure Act  seeks to require any entity doing business in New York to provide a clear warning whenever a price is set by an algorithm that uses a consumer’s personal data. The law suggests that it is inadequate for this warning to be included solely in a privacy policy. Instead, it appears that the disclosure must be displayed in the same medium alongside the price. Further, the Act’s definition of personal data is broad, encompassing not only sensitive information but also non-sensitive details that a consumer might provide voluntarily, like zip code and rewards program history . Hence, even if a pricing algorithm uses only non-sensitive per...

At a Glance AI presents both challenges and opportunities for labor-management relations. This article outlines some key labor positions on AI and offers practical guidance for employers navigating this evolving landscape. Artificial intelligence (AI) presents both a large opportunity for employers — and potentially a source of reputational risk — depending on how its adoption is handled. As AI transforms the workplace, unions are responding with a mix of concern, advocacy, and strategic adaptation. For employers—especially those in unionized environments—understanding these responses is essential to effective labor relations and for ensuring compliance with emerging legal and regulatory frameworks.    This article outlines some key labor positions on AI and offers practical guidance for employers navigating this evolving landscape. 1 “AI” here will refer to an emerging definition of “AI system,” set down in EU law and recently adapted in a proposed AI law for New York. The d...

  The times, they are a'changin'. Wasn't it nice of me to give you a week and a half off to recover from the election? I hope everyone is safe and strong again, and ready to talk about what employers can expect from President Trump's second term. Here's a bipartisan summary of what we expect to see.   Labor law.  I predict that  Jennifer Abruzzo , General Counsel of the National Labor Relations Board, will be fired if she doesn’t quit first. (President Biden fired the Trump-appointed Board GC within days of taking office.) GC Abruzzo has taken very aggressive positions adverse to employers during her tenure, so her expected departure would not make me cry. President Trump can name a new Chairman of the NLRB. The only Republican on the Board now is  Marvin Kaplan , who was first appointed during President Trump's first term. I'm gonna go out on a limb and predict that the new Chairman of the Board (get it?) will be Member Kaplan. "DOO-BEE-DOO-BEE-DOO . ....