The court vacated a citation and $700 penalty that OSHA issued against Exxon Mobil for not disclosing that an employee had reported developing post-traumatic stress disorder after a fire at the Texas facility where he worked.
The panel said that in light of a landmark 2024 U.S. Supreme Court ruling that eliminated the deference courts long owed to federal agency rulemaking, it was required to independently assess OSHA's policy rather than deferring to the agency's expertise.
Court says law covers physical injuries, not mental conditions
OSHA has required employers to record and annually report work-related mental illnesses since at least 2001. But a proper reading of federal law, the court said, shows that it was only meant to address traditional workplace injuries and not mental health issues.
"However commendable OSHA’s desire to improve mental health in the workplace, like all agencies, OSHA’s authority to regulate toward that end is constrained by the limits of power Congress delegated to the agency," Circuit Judge Cory Wilson wrote for the court.
Federal law directs the Secretary of Labor to "prescribe regulations requiring employers to maintain accurate records of, and to make periodic reports on, work-related deaths, injuries and illnesses." The Labor Department has delegated those powers to OSHA.
OSHA cited Exxon Mobil in 2022 after a union reported to the agency that the company failed to document the Texas employee's mental health issues. The worker had twice accompanied firefighters into a burning building to help them close valves that were fueling a fire, according to filings in the case.
The company challenged the citation, which was upheld in 2024 by an administrative law judge. A review board declined to take up the case and Exxon Mobil appealed to the 5th Circuit, arguing that tracking mental illnesses was outside of OSHA's purview.
The court on Tuesday agreed. When the Occupational Safety and Health Act was adopted in 1970, the term "illness" was widely understood to refer to an unhealthy condition of the body and not the mind, the panel said.
"The enumerated objects of OSHA’s wide-ranging inspection power are categories of things that risk physical harm," Wilson wrote.
The panel included Circuit Judges Jennifer Walker Elrod and Jerry Smith. All three judges were appointed by Republican presidents.
The case is Exxon Mobil v. Occupational Safety and Health Review Commission, 5th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals, No. 25-60108.
5th Circuit rules OSHA can't require mental health tracking
A U.S. appeals court has ruled in a case involving Exxon Mobil that the U.S. Occupational Safety and Health Administration cannot require businesses to document work-related mental illnesses reported by employees.
A unanimous three-judge panel of the New Orleans-based 5th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals said on Tuesday that a requirement in federal law that employers periodically report work-related deaths, injuries and illnesses only applies to physical and not mental conditions.
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