Hoyer Law Group, PLLC

09/02/2026

Big win for whistleblowers yesterday. The Eleventh Circuit reversed a district court ruling that had declared the False Claims Act’s qui tam provisions unconstitutional, a decision that had put every pending whistleblower fraud case in Florida, Georgia, and Alabama at risk.

The Court held that private citizens who bring these cases, called relators, are not “officers of the United States,” so the Appointments Clause doesn’t apply to them. That means whistleblowers can keep bringing fraud claims against Medicare, defense contractors, and other government programs in this circuit with confidence.

We break down the ruling and what it means going forward:

For more than a year, whistleblowers, defense contractors, healthcare providers, and government fraud lawyers have been watching one case out of Tampa. On

08/07/2026

Great morning at Bucs training camp courtesy of our friends at 8am! Partner Sean Estes and his son got the VIP treatment in the Legends area, breakfast included, and they somehow caught a rare stretch of not-brutal Tampa weather in August.

Bonus: pretty much every local sports mascot showed up to say hello. Always great to see Thunder Bug in the summer!

Thank you to 8am for the hospitality!

07/31/2026

Great evening at Top Shelf Sports Lounge for Family Friendly Tampa Bay’s quarterly networking event. The initiative, part of Thrive by Five, celebrates local businesses that invest in their people through paid leave, flexible schedules, quality healthcare, and competitive wages.

Thanks to Diana Santangelo and the Thrive by Five team for another great event, and to Avocat Group and Top Shelf for hosting.

If you lead a Tampa Bay business, take a look at the Family Friendly designation. It is worth your time!

07/28/2026

Two practical blogs for employers this month.

Layoffs: the legal risk usually does not hit on the day the notices go out. It shows up in the weeks after, in the messaging, the severance paperwork, and who ends up carrying the extra work: https://www.hoyerlawgroup.com/after-the-layoff-how-employers-can-rebuild-trust-and-avoid-legal-risk/

Overtime: if you have a unionized workforce, there are only two ways a contract can legally restructure OT. Miss the hour limits and the exemption disappears, retroactively: https://www.hoyerlawgroup.com/when-a-union-contract-can-change-overtime-rules-two-exceptions-employers-should-know/

Questions on either, you know where to find us!

A reduction in force is one of the hardest decisions any organization makes. Even when the business case is clear, the human impact is not. Jobs are lost,

07/21/2026

For the employers and HR folks who follow us, discrimination and retaliation enforcement is heating up. Three recent reads.

The EEOC published a new enforcement plan running through 2029, and it spells out exactly what the agency plans to go after, including DEI programs: https://www.hoyerlawgroup.com/the-eeoc-has-a-new-enforcement-plan-heres-what-employers-need-to-know/

On that note, a federal appeals court just rejected a claim that mandatory DEI training created a hostile work environment. A win for employers, but the court left the door open, so how you run the training still matters: https://www.hoyerlawgroup.com/tenth-circuit-rejects-dei-training-hostile-work-environment-claim-but-the-door-isnt-closed/

And retaliation has been the number one EEOC charge for 17 years straight. You can lose a retaliation case even when the original complaint had no merit: https://www.hoyerlawgroup.com/workplace-retaliation-what-it-is-who-it-affects-and-what-every-employer-should-do-about-it/

If any of these have you second-guessing a policy, we are glad to take a look.

07/17/2026

Fraud enforcement is shifting rapidly this year, and the theme running through it all is the same: whistleblowers matter more than ever. A few blogs we have written recently, if you want to dig in.

The Supreme Court’s Escobar decision turned 10 this year and still shapes almost every False Claims Act case: https://www.hoyerlawgroup.com/a-decade-later-the-escobar-decision-still-shapes-whistleblower-cases/

DOJ is moving to fast-track certain benefits fraud cases, which can put more of the work on the whistleblower who steps forward: https://www.hoyerlawgroup.com/doj-moves-to-fast-track-whistleblower-cases-involving-benefits-fraud/

Federal agencies scaling back enforcement does not make the risk go away. It just moves it to private whistleblowers and their attorneys: https://www.hoyerlawgroup.com/what-shrinking-federal-enforcement-really-means-for-your-business/

And investigators are leaning on AI to catch suspicious healthcare billing, but they still need people on the inside to explain what really happened: https://www.hoyerlawgroup.com/how-federal-investigators-are-using-ai-to-catch-healthcare-fraud-and-why-whistleblowers-still-matter-more-than-ever/

If you are weighing whether to report something, it is worth having a confidential conversation before you do anything.

Ten years ago, on June 16, 2016, the United States Supreme Court decided a False Claims Act case that quietly reshaped how fraud against the government is

07/04/2026

Happy 4th of July from all of us at Hoyer Law Group, PLLC.

This year, as America marks its 250th, we are especially reminded of the principles that shaped our country: liberty, accountability, courage, and the rule of law.

We hope everyone has a safe and meaningful Independence Day.

Hoyer Law Group, PLLC, is a full-service law firm with a nationwide practice that protects employees, advises small businesses, and represents whistleblowers. We are nationally recognized attorneys and tenacious investigators with decades of experience.

06/29/2026

A recent Tenth Circuit ruling is a useful look at why some disability discrimination cases hold up, and others don’t. The employer won on summary judgment, and the reasons are basically a checklist: prompt investigation of the complaint, multiple decision-makers, and contemporaneous performance documentation. Good lessons for employers building defensible practices and for employees thinking about what evidence actually matters.

A recent federal appeals court decision offers a useful blueprint for employers navigating one of the trickiest areas of employment law: disability

06/22/2026

Many employment agreements contain a clause that shortens the window an employee has to sue. The Fourth Circuit just held that those clauses are unenforceable when applied to discrimination claims under Title VII and the ADEA, and the Sixth Circuit has reached the same conclusion. Worth a read whether you signed one of these agreements or you're an employer still using them.

If you signed an employment agreement before your first day of work, you may not have read every line. Most people don’t. But buried in some of those