The panel affirmed the district court’s grant of summary judgment in favor of Walker Specialty Construction, Inc., in Walker’s action against the Board of Trustees of the Construction Industry and Laborers Joint Pension Trust, contesting withdrawal liability under the Multiemployer Pension Plan Amendments Act, an amendment to the Employee Retirement Income Security Act that imposes liability on employers that withdraw from multiemployer pension plans.

The panel held that Walker was exempt from withdrawal liability under the MPPAA because its asbestos abatement work qualified it for the “building and construction industry” exception to liability. The panel concluded that, as the agency tasked with enforcing the Labor Management Relations Act, the only other statute in which Congress had previously used the term “building and construction industry,” the National Labor Relations Board established a settled meaning for the term to include not only the erection of new buildings, but also maintenance, repair, and alterations that are essential to a building or structure’s usability. The panel inferred that Congress’s intent to incorporate the NLRB’s definition into the MPPA was plain from its use of the same language in both statutes. The panel concluded that, under the NLRB’s comprehensive definition, Walker’s asbestos abatement work was within the building and construction industry, and it therefore qualified for the liability exemption.

https://cdn.ca9.uscourts.gov/datastore/opinions/2026/01/05/24-1560.pdf