DOL Pulls The Plug On Plan To Move FLSA Interpretations Out Of The CFR

On October 7, 2026, the Wage and Hour Division (WHD) of the U.S. Department of Labor (DOL) published a notice withdrawing its July 2025 proposal to strip nine parts of longstanding Fair Labor Standards Act (FLSA) interpretive guidance out of the Code of Federal Regulations (CFR). The proposal is dead, and the guidance stays right where it has been for decades.

How We Got Here

Since the 1940s, WHD has published “Statements of General Policy or Interpretation Not Directly Related to Regulations” in Subchapter B of its chapter of the CFR (29 C.F.R. Parts 775–795). These are largely “interpretive bulletins”—pronouncements of the agency’s views that, in contrast to “legislative” or “substantive” rules (commonly called “regulations”), don’t have to go through the notice-and-comment rulemaking process. (The Part 541 “white-collar exemption” regulations in Subchapter A are a good example of the latter.) Unlike regulations, which can have the force and effect of law, interpretive bulletins