3 U.S.C. § 416 — Rights and protections relating to veterans’ employment and reemployment

(a) Employment and reemployment rights
(1) It's against the law for an employing office^* to do three things to an "eligible employee^*": discriminate against them in the ways described in subsections (a) and (b) of section 4311 of title 38; deny them the reemployment rights described in sections 4312 and 4313 of title 38; or deny them the benefits described in sections 4316, 4317, and 4318 of title 38.
(2) An "eligible employee" is a covered employee^* who is performing service in the uniformed services (as defined in section 4303(13) of title 38), as long as their service hasn't ended for one of the disqualifying reasons listed in section 4304 of title 38.

(b) Remedy
If subsection (a) is violated, the employee can get the same kind of damages that section 4323(d) of title 38 allows.

(c) Regulations to implement this section
(1) The President, or someone the President designates, must issue regulations to carry out this section.
(2) These regulations must generally match the Secretary of Labor's existing regulations for the same rights under subsections (a) and (b) — with two exceptions. First, the President's designee may modify them if there is good cause, shown and stated together with the regulation, explaining why a modification would be more effective. Second, the President's designee may instead choose to apply a provision from section 4314 or 4324 of title 38 to executive branch employees, in place of an analogous provision referred to in subsection (a) or (b), if doing so would be equally effective for protecting these rights and would promote uniform application of federal law across the executive branch.

(d) Effective date
Subsections (a) and (b) took effect on whichever came first: the effective date of the regulations issued under subsection (c), or October 1, 1998.