The EEOC just pulled the plug on its most comprehensive harassment guidance. Some federal guardrails are gone, but the law is not – and neither are employers’ obligations.
TL;DR: The EEOC has rescinded its 2024 Enforcement Guidance on Harassment in the Workplace. The statutes prohibiting harassment did not change, but the agency withdrew its most detailed explanation of how it interpreted those laws in practice. Employers now need to rely more directly on statutory text, court decisions, state and local law, and the EEOC’s remaining harassment resources when shaping policies, training, and investigations.
📄 Read the EEOC’s press release announcing the rescission
The guidance that just vanished
In April 2024, the EEOC issued its Enforcement Guidance on Harassment in the Workplace, a consolidated document explaining how the agency evaluated harassment claims under statutes such as the Civil Rights Act of 1964 (Title VII), the Americans with Disabilities Act (ADA), and the Age Discrimination in Employment Act (ADEA). It addressed hostile work environment standards, employer liability, investigative duties, and corrective action.
It also covered modern issues like remote harassment, online conduct, and social media behavior.
For many employers, it functioned as a convenient, centralized reference for how the EEOC said it viewed harassment law in practice.
That reference point is now gone from the EEOC’s website.
The archived guidance remains available here: Enforcement Guidance on Harassment in the Workplace (2024)
Why the EEOC pulled it
The explanation starts with leadership and priorities.
When President Trump appointed Andrea R. Lucas as Acting Chair of the EEOC in January 2025, the EEOC’s own press release announcing her appointment described her agenda as centered on evenhanded enforcement of employment civil rights laws, fidelity to statutory text, and alignment with presidential executive orders. It also emphasized protecting sex-based distinctions in the workplace and resisting policymaking through agency guidance.
That signaled a different philosophy about guidance. This EEOC would be far less willing to use guidance documents to expand or reshape civil rights law and far more focused on enforcing statutes as written.
One of the core problems, as Chair Andrea Lucas framed it, was that the guidance conflicted with the biological and binary definition of sex reflected in federal policy and executive orders, including the legal significance of that distinction for women’s rights to single-sex spaces in the workplace.
Another core objection was that the guidance expanded Title VII beyond its statutory text. In this EEOC’s view, the document did not simply interpret existing law. It attempted to redefine what constituted unlawful “sex” harassment through agency commentary rather than through legislation or binding judicial precedent.
At bottom, this was a dispute about how far Bostock v. Clayton County should be read to go. The prior EEOC treated Bostock as a springboard for broader policy positions in the harassment context. This EEOC rejected that approach and viewed Bostock as resolving a narrower question about discrimination in hiring and firing.
From that perspective, rescinding the guidance was almost inevitable. If Bostock was not meant to reshape harassment law, then a guidance document built on that assumption could not stand.
What did not change
The rescission did not repeal a single statute.
Title VII still prohibits harassment based on race, color, religion, sex, and national origin.
The ADA still prohibits disability-based harassment.
The ADEA still prohibits age-based harassment.
Employers still must prevent harassment, investigate complaints, and take prompt corrective action. Employees still have the same legal protections.
What changed is the loss of the EEOC’s most detailed interpretive guide for applying those laws to real-world workplace situations.
The EEOC still maintains general harassment resources here. Those materials, however, are far less prescriptive than the 2024 guidance.
Practical takeaways for employers
The guidance helped employers understand the EEOC’s enforcement lens. It never changed the legal standards or reduced liability.
Re-anchor policies in statute and case law.
If your anti-harassment policy mirrors language or examples drawn from the 2024 guidance, revisit it. Policies should track statutory standards and binding judicial decisions, not a document the EEOC no longer stands behind.
Rework training to focus on legal standards.
Training should teach what harassment is under the law, how complaints are reported, how investigations work, and why retaliation is prohibited.
Treat investigations as proof of compliance, not a substitute for it.
Documentation has always been central to harassment compliance. It remains the primary way employers show that they took complaints seriously and acted appropriately.
Give state and local law more attention.
Many jurisdictions impose harassment standards that go beyond federal law. Those rules may increasingly define what best practices look like.
Bottom line
Employers no longer have an EEOC harassment roadmap, but they still have a legal obligation to get it right.