EEOC Proposes to Rescind All EEO Reporting and Recordkeeping Requirements

On July 21, 2026, the U.S. Equal Employment Opportunity Commission (EEOC) voted to approve a proposed rule which would rescind a series of agency demographic reporting requirements, most notably the EEO-1 Form, which private employers of 100 or more employees have been required to file for decades. The agency also proposed to repeal similar requirements for unions (the EEO-3 report), state and local governments (EEO-4), public-school systems (EEO-5), and institutions of higher education (EEO-6) (collectively, the “EEO Reports”). Finally, EEOC has proposed rescinding the related recordkeeping and record preservation requirements supporting these reports. The proposal is expected to be published in the Federal Register shortly for starting a 30-day public comment period. After that, EEOC will review and consider the comments submitted and adopt a final rule. 

In general, the EEO-1 reports require employers to submit aggregated demographic information regarding their workforce broken down by establishment and one of the ten EEO-1 job categories. Historically, EEOC has maintained that these reports assist the agency in its enforcement of civil rights laws, as well as employer self-assessment of their own workforce composition.

In support of the proposed rescission, EEOC Chair Andrea Lucas (R) offered three justifications: first, that the collection of demographic information relating to sex and race may have the unintended consequence of leading employers to engage in unlawful discrimination based on perceived imbalances in the data (or, alternately, that an employer with no such discrepancies may incorrectly assume it is in compliance with the law); second, that the collection of this information raises potential constitutional concerns; and third, that the recordkeeping and reporting requirements impose a substantial burden on employers and the Commission that is not justified by the benefit obtained from this information. The proposal to rescind the EEO Reports were approved on a vote of two to one, with Chair Lucas and Commissioner Brittany Panuccio (R) voting for the proposal and Commissioner Kalpana Kotagal voting against.

Given the portal for filing did not open in May of this year as anticipated, the timing of any final rule remains uncertain. In particular, it is unclear whether the rule would affect or cancel the 2025 EEO-1 reporting cycle, which was expected to have been filed in May or June using workforce data from the fourth quarter of 2025, or whether it would instead eliminate reporting obligations beginning with the 2026 reporting cycle (filed in 2027) and beyond. 

A question many employers have asked is if EEOC no longer requires submission of this information, is it still required that they voluntarily collect this demographic information from employees; alternately, if it is not required, is it permissible to do so?

The answer is not as simple as it may first appear. First, employers must remain mindful of existing state and/or local reporting requirements.  A number of states, including Massachusetts, Illinois, and California, currently require employers to report workforce demographic information and/or compensation data. Some states go further, such as Illinois, requiring employee-level demographic reporting rather than aggregate reporting. If EEOC’s rescission of federal reporting requirements is finalized, we predict that other states—notably “blue” states with Democratic leadership—may act to fill the gap and adopt state law reporting regimes.  As a result, employers will likely still need to collect demographic information from some or all employees to comply with state law requirements. 

Other states, such as Colorado, have introduced legislation to mimic federal reporting. Colorado enacted HB 26-1207 (Disclosure of Demographic Workforce Data), this year which requires certain private employers conducting business in the state and employing at least 100 workers to begin submitting EEO-1 demographic workforce data to the Colorado Secretary of State beginning July 1, 2027. The law expressly provides that employers must continue reporting this information even if the federal government repeals or discontinues the EEO-1 reporting requirement. Colorado also specifies that the required reporting must use the EEO-1 data format that existed on March 1, 2026.

Second, while the focus of the EEOC in the second Trump Administration has been on so-called “illegal DEI” and the elimination of any consideration of race or sex that might disadvantage so-called “majority” applicants or employees in the workplace, it is important to note that traditional theories of discrimination—both disparate treatment and disparate impact—remain available under both federal and state law. Put more simply, employers may still choose to survey the demographics of their workforces to ensure that they do not have policies that discriminate on the basis of race, ethnicity, or sex in any direction or against any protected category and examine any perceived discrepancies.

That said, employers should be mindful that the collection of this information should be on a voluntary basis only. In addition, employers should have in place important safeguards to ensure the information is used only for reporting or self-auditing purposes, and is in no way used in making any employment decision, whether positive or negative. Further, employers that wish to collect and use demographic data to audit their policies and practices will be best served by doing so in a privileged audit conducted under the auspices of legal counsel.

Littler’s WPI will continue to keep readers apprised of developments.