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On May 15, 2025, the Department of Labor, Department of Health and Human Services, and the Treasury Department (collectively, the “Agencies”) released a statement regarding the Agencies’ recent request for abeyance of a lawsuit filed by the ERISA Industry Committee (“ERIC”) in the U.S. District Court for the District of Columbia that challenged certain aspects of Mental Health Parity and Addiction Equity Act (MHPAEA) Final Rule (“2024 Final Rule”) relating to nonquantitative treatment limitation comparative analyses (“NQTL analyses”). While the lawsuit is in abeyance, the Agencies indicted that they intend to review the 2024 Final Rule in light of President Trump’s recent Executive Order 14219 (“Ensuring Lawful Governance and Implementing the President’s Department of Government Efficiency Deregulatory Initiative”) which requires the Agencies to identify regulations which, among other things, may impose undue burdens on small businesses or significant costs on private parties. During this time, the Agencies will consider whether the 2024 Final Rule will be rescinded or modified through agency regulatory processes, including notice and comment periods.

The statement also expresses the Agencies’ policy that the 2024 Final Rule will not be enforced prior to 18 months following the end of the ERIC lawsuit. As set forth in the statement, this only applies to provisions of the 2024 Final Rule that were added since the 2013 MHPAEA final rule was implemented by the Agencies. It does NOT impact the statutory provisions of the Consolidated Appropriations Act, 2021 (“CAA 2021”) which imposes written MHPAEA comparative analyses on plan sponsors. Accordingly, employers are still required to maintain written NQTL analyses pursuant to the CAA 2021; however, the comparative analyses will not include some of the data collection, design and application, and fiduciary certification requirements included in the 2024 Final Rule at this time.

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