3 U.S.C. § 415 — Rights and protections under the Worker Adjustment and Retraining Notification Act

(a) Worker Adjustment and Retraining Notification Rights. (1) In general. Except for the exception in paragraph (2), no employing office covered by this chapter may close or order a mass layoff — as those terms are defined in section 3 of the Worker Adjustment and Retraining Notification Act (the WARN Act) — until 60 days after the office gives written notice of the planned closing or layoff. That notice must go to employee representatives if covered employees have them, or otherwise directly to the covered employees. (2) Exception. (A) In general: this exception applies when a sitting President (the "previous President") loses re-election to a new President. In that situation: (i) no notice or 60-day waiting period is required for separating an employee described in subparagraph (B), as long as the separation happens because of a closure or mass layoff ordered after the new President's term begins; and (ii) if such an employee is separated, or starts leave under the Family and Medical Leave Act, before the new term begins, nothing in this chapter forces the government to reinstate or restore that person to their job once the new term starts. (B) Description of individuals: this exception covers any covered employee who was appointed during the previous President's own term, or during any earlier term in which that same person served as President or Vice President. (b) Remedy. If subsection (a) is violated, the remedy is the same kind of damages that would be available under paragraphs (1), (2), and (4) of section 5(a) of the WARN Act. (c) Regulations To Implement Section. (1) In general: the President, or someone the President designates, must issue regulations to carry out this section. (2) Agency regulations: those regulations must match the substantive WARN Act regulations the Secretary of Labor has already issued for the same kind of notice-and-remedy rules — unless the President or designee finds good cause, explained together with the regulation, that a different version would work better here. (d) Effective Date. Subsections (a) and (b) take effect on whichever comes first: the date regulations issued under subsection (c) become effective, or October 1, 1998.