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Sonderling Announces the Launch of the Labor Department's Opinion Letter Program, Jun. 8, 2025

June 8, 2025 · U.S. Department of Labor · 0:01:42

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What happened

Deputy Secretary of Labor Keith Sonderling announced the launch of the Department of Labor’s department-wide opinion letter program in a department message released on June 8, 2025. “Opinion letters are a powerful set of tools to help workers, employers, unions, industry groups, and all other stakeholders to understand how federal labor law applies to real life situations,” as he described them. Across five DOL agencies, he said, the public can request opinion letters and receive easy-to-understand responses providing actionable results to improve compliance.

Sonderling named the five participating components as he listed them: the Wage and Hour Division issuing opinion letters; the Occupational Safety and Health Administration issuing letters of interpretation; the Employee Benefits Security Administration providing advisory opinions and informational letters; the Veterans’ Employment and Training Service issuing opinion letters; and the Mine Safety and Health Administration launching an information hub providing centralized compliance assistance for the mining industry. He directed viewers to the department’s new opinion letter landing page to search existing letters or submit a new request.

Why it matters

The opinion letter program is the guidance half of the Sonderling Labor Department’s compliance-first approach: written, requestable answers on how the law applies, issued across five agencies at once, paired in the same summer with the department-wide self-audit initiative he announced the following month. For employers and workers alike, it restored a channel for getting the department’s position in writing before a dispute, rather than only after an investigation.

Scoreboard watch

Scoreboard watch: the department-wide opinion letter program launched June 8, 2025, spanning the Wage and Hour Division, OSHA, EBSA, VETS, and MSHA, as Sonderling announced it. Flagged for the scoreboard editor; no entry is published from this page.

Sources: U.S. Department of Labor, “Deputy Secretary Keith Sonderling Announces Launch of Opinion Letter Program” (Jun. 8, 2025, embedded above; remarks as delivered by Deputy Secretary Sonderling).