Sponsor
Ruben Gallego
Senator · D-AZ
The bill raises pay and enforceability for employees who work federal holidays, improving worker compensation and remedies, while imposing higher labor and compliance costs on employers and creating some legal uncertainty for territorial wage-order review.
Employees covered by the FLSA (including many low- and middle-income workers) will receive at least 1.5× pay for working on federal public holidays, increasing take-home pay for holiday shifts.
Employees gain an explicit private right to recover unpaid holiday premium pay under existing FLSA remedies (including liquidated damages and injunctions), improving enforcement and remedies for unpaid holiday wages.
State and local laws that require higher holiday pay than the federal minimum remain effective, preserving stronger worker protections in jurisdictions that already mandate them.
Employers—particularly small businesses that staff holidays—will face higher labor costs for holiday work, which could lead to higher prices for consumers, reduced employee hours, or fewer hires.
Expanding the categories of recoverable unpaid compensation and adjusting statute-of-limitations language increases litigation risk and compliance costs for employers, potentially raising legal expenses and administrative burdens (costs that can be passed to consumers or taxpayers).
The repeal of 29 U.S.C. §210 changes review procedures for Puerto Rico and the U.S. Virgin Islands' wage orders, creating transitional legal uncertainty for employers and workers in those territories.
Based on analysis of 2 sections of legislative text.
Requires time-and-a-half pay for employees covered by the FLSA who work on federally listed public holidays and treats unpaid holiday pay like other unpaid wages for enforcement.
Senator · D-AZ
Requires covered employers to pay time-and-a-half for work performed on federally recognized public holidays and treats unpaid holiday pay the same as other unpaid wages for enforcement and remedies under the Fair Labor Standards Act. It adds a new FLSA provision defining “legal public holiday” by reference to the federal list, preserves stronger state or local holiday-pay rules, and updates cross-references and enforcement provisions to authorize damages and remedies for holiday-pay violations.
Official title: Amend the Fair Labor Standards Act of 1938 to require employers to compensate employees working on a legal public holiday for such work at a rate that is not less than one and one-half times the regular rate at which the employee is employed, and for other purposes.
Introduced February 12, 2026 by Ruben Gallego · Last progress February 12, 2026