I have served as a State Senator for the Middlesex and Worcester district since January 2009. I devote all my work as State Senator to delivering for those I represent. On Beacon Hill, I serve as the Senate-Chair of the Joint Committee on the Judiciary and the Senate Vice-Chair of the Joint Committee on Election Laws. I also am the Senate-Chair of the Clean Energy, Criminal Justice Reform, Medicare For All, and MBTA Caucuses.
An Act to protect injured workers during and after the COVID-19 pandemic (S.D.1182)
Currently, no state agency has power or ability to investigate workers’ compensation retaliation complaints or to enforce the current workers’ compensation anti-retaliation law. This bill fills this gap in the law. It would empower the Attorney General’s Office as the state agency that could conduct an investigation and resolve retaliation complaints. The bill also creates a rebuttable presumption of employer retaliation when an adverse action against a worker takes place within 90 days of the employee exercising rights under the workers’ compensation law, including when an employee makes a workers’ compensation claim due to contracting COVID-19.