Seyfarth Synopsis: In a case
involving motor carriers, the California Court of Appeal has held
that the FAAAA (Federal Aviation Administration Authorization
Act of 1994) does not preempt the ABC employment test California
adopted in AB 5.
The Facts
In January 2018, the State of California sued several motor
carriers that contracted with owner-operator trucker drivers,
alleging that the motor carriers had misclassified the
owner-operators as independent contractors. The lawsuit claimed
that the owner-operators should be treated as employees under the
traditional Borello test, a multi-factor test that the
California Supreme Court used in 1989 to determine whether a worker
is an independent contractor.
