On Feb. 26, 2018, the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Second Circuit held for the first time in Zarda v. Altitude Express, 883 F.3d 100 (2d Cir. 2018), that Title VII of the 1964 Civil Rights Act protects against workplace sexual orientation discrimination. Although this landmark ruling rightfully garnered national attention as a historic civil rights victory, its unique procedural posture also raised questions in a different legal context: administrative law.

Courts have wrestled with the level of deference they should give to administrative agency interpretations of federal law. While it is settled law under Chevron, U.S.A. v. Nat’l Res. Def. Council, 467 U.S. 837, 843-44 (1984), that agency interpretations of ambiguous statutes merit “controlling weight,” courts have not resolved how to address competing interpretations by different agencies in the same case. This is precisely the circumstance that arose at the en banc oral argument in Zarda.