MIGUEL GARCIA, et al. v. R. ALEXANDER ACOSTA, et al.
Civil Action No. 18-1968 (RDM)
UNITED STATES DISTRICT COURT FOR THE DISTRICT OF COLUMBIA
June 24, 2019
MEMORANDUM OPINION AND ORDER
The Immigration and Nationality Act (“INA“),
Plaintiffs—four agricultural workers and a farmworkers labor union—bring this action against the Secretary of Labor and the Department of Labor (collectively, “the Secretary“) under the Administrative Procedure Act (“APA“),
The matter is before the Court on Defendants’ motion to dismiss for lack of subject-matter jurisdiction, or, in the alternative, to transfer the case to the U.S. District Court for the Northern District of Illinois or to stay the case. Dkt. 9. Defendants argue that the case should be dismissed because Plaintiffs’ challenges to the five specific certifications are moot and their policy and practice claims are unripe. Id. at 17–22. If the Court declines to dismiss the action, Defendants request that the Court transfer the case to the Northern District of Illinois—where the Department of Labor‘s Chicago National Processing Center is located—or, at the very least, stay the case to provide the Secretary with time to initiate a rulemaking to “modernize” the H-2A visa program. Id. at 22–26. For the reasons explained below, the Court will grant in part and deny in part Defendants’ motion to dismiss. The Court will grant the motion to dismiss with respect to Plaintiffs’ wrongful certification claims and will deny the motion with respect to Defendants’ policy and practice claims. The Court will also deny Defendants’ motion to transfer or to stay the case.
I. BACKGROUND
A. Statutory and Regulatory Background
Congress created the H-2A visa program to address temporary shortages of agricultural labor in the United States. See
At issue in this case is the “Offered Wage Rate” provision of the regulations, which requires employers participating in the H-2A visa program to “offer, advertise in [their] recruitment, and pay” workers the highest of four wages:
[1] the [Adverse Effect Wage Rate] (“AEWR“)], [2] the prevailing hourly wage or piece rate, [3] the agreed-upon collective bargaining wage, or [4] the Federal or State minimum wage, except where a special procedure is approved for an occupation or specific class of agricultural employment.
This case focuses on the remaining wage measure: “the prevailing hourly wage.” The regulations define “prevailing wage” to mean the “wage established pursuant to
Plaintiffs are four U.S. agricultural workers and an agricultural labor organization. Dkt. 1 at 3 (Compl. ¶ 5). The individual plaintiffs—Miguel Garcia, Alberto Olvera Gomez, Jose Botella Avila, and Gerard Princilus—are lawful permanent residents of Texas, Arizona, and Florida, who travel to “agricultural businesses across the country” to obtain “temporary agricultural employment.” Id. at 4–5 (Compl. ¶¶ 8–12). Each alleges that he would have sought and accepted work from at least one of the five employers whose certifications are at issue if that employer had paid the “prevailing wage,” instead of the lower wage certified by the Secretary. Id. at 10–13 (Compl. ¶¶ 33, 36, 39, 42, 45). Plaintiff Farm Labor Organizing Committee (“FLOC“) is “a farmworker labor union, with nearly 8,000 members throughout the eastern half of the United States,” “[m]any” of whom are “Mexican nationals participating in the H-2A guestworker program.” Id. at 5 (Compl. ¶ 13). FLOC alleges that its members “are being paid a wage lower than that required by the Offered Wage Rate provision” of the H-2A regulations. Id. Together, the individual plaintiffs and FLOC challenge the Secretary‘s “policy and practice” of disregarding the “prevailing wage” when certifying H-2A employers, and they challenge five specific certifications, which, they say, permitted the employers to “offer[] a wage rate lower than the prevailing wage,” in violation of the Offered Wage Rate provision. Id. at 3 (Compl. ¶ 4).
1. Plaintiffs’ Policy and Practice Claims
The complaint asserts five claims under the APA, three of which concern the Secretary‘s alleged “policy and practice” of disregarding the “prevailing wage” rate when issuing H-2A certifications. Dkt. 1 at 15–17 (Compl. ¶¶ 57–65) (hereinafter the “policy and practice claims“). Plaintiffs allege that the Secretary has adopted “a policy of deferring to surveys conducted by . . . SWAs . . . to determine the prevailing wage” and that, “[w]here an SWA does not conduct a wage survey, or where the SWA issues ‘no finding’ as to a prevailing wage rate,” the Secretary “grants temporary employment certifications without determining the prevailing wage and without applying the prevailing wage element of the Offered Wage Rate provision.” Id. at 8–9 (Compl. ¶¶ 27–28). As a result, in the absence of an SWA‘s determination of the “prevailing wage,” the Secretary permits employers to pay workers the highest of three wages: “the legal state or [f]ederal minimum, the agreed-upon collective bargaining wage rate[,] or the [AEWR].” Id. (Compl. ¶ 29). Plaintiffs allege that, “[p]ursuant to this policy and practice, [the Secretary] has granted hundreds of temporary labor certifications where the offered wage rate is lower than the prevailing wage rate, as calculated by [the Department of Labor‘s] Bureau of Labor Statistics based on its [Occupational Employment] [S]urvey.” Id. (Compl. ¶ 30).
Plaintiffs allege (1) that the Secretary‘s “policy and practice” is “contrary to the Offered Wage Rate provision,” id. at 15 (Compl. ¶ 57); (2) that the “policy and practice” is “arbitrary and capricious because it reflects a failure to consider an important, relevant, and statutorily-mandated factor,” id. at 16 (Compl. ¶ 61); and (3) that the “policy and practice . . . constitutes a de facto rule” allowing the Secretary “to grant temporary employment certifications without regard to the prevailing wage,” id. at 16–17 (Compl. ¶¶ 62–63), which the agency adopted without “comply[ing] with the rulemaking requirements of the APA,” id. at 17 (Compl. ¶ 64). By way of relief, Plaintiffs ask the Court to declare that the Secretary‘s policy and
2. Plaintiffs’ Wrongful Certification Claims
Plaintiffs’ remaining two claims challenge the Secretary‘s certification of five employers for the 2018 season: McCabe Agribusiness, Inc. (Montana), Peri & Sons Farms, Inc. (Nevada), Daniels Produce, LLC (Nebraska), United Agronomy, LLC (North Dakota), and Del Valle Fresh, Inc. (South Carolina). Id. at 9–12 (Compl. ¶¶ 31, 34, 37, 40, 43) (hereinafter “the wrongful certification claims“). Plaintiffs allege that each of these five employers applied for a temporary foreign labor certification with a wage that was lower than the “prevailing wage,” “as calculated by the Occupational Employment Survey [“OES“] and published on the OFLC‘s own website.” Id. They further allege that, “[b]y approving each of the five job orders discussed above, [the Secretary] has both caused lower wages to be offered for those jobs and adversely affected the wages for U.S. workers in other jobs in those industries and states.” Id. at 13 (Comp. ¶ 46). The individual plaintiffs allege that the lower wages deterred them from applying for and accepting these jobs—for which they were otherwise qualified—and that they would have applied if offered the prevailing wage. Id. at 10–13 (Compl. ¶¶ 33, 36, 39, 42, 45); see also Dkt. 11-1 at 2 (Avila Decl. ¶ 8); Dkt. 11-2 at 2 (Gomez Decl. ¶ 8); Dkt. 11-3 at 2 (Princilus Decl. ¶ 8).
Plaintiffs allege that the Secretary‘s “grant of each of the five wrongful certifications . . . was contrary to law,” Dkt. 1 at 14 (Compl. ¶ 51), and arbitrary and capricious, id. at 15 (Compl. ¶ 54). By way of relief, Plaintiffs ask the Court to declare the Secretary “violated the APA by granting the five wrongful certifications” and to “declare unlawful and [to] set aside the wrongful certifications” themselves. Id. at 17 (Compl. Prayer).
C. Procedural Background
Plaintiffs filed suit in August 2018. Dkt. 1. In October 2018, Defendants moved to dismiss this action for lack of subject-matter jurisdiction, Dkt. 9-1 at 17–22, and moved, in the alternative, to transfer the case to the U.S. District Court for the Northern District of Illinois, id. at 22–24, or to stay the case pending issuance of a proposed rule, “which could substantially affect the entire nature of the case,” id. at 25. Before the Court could rule on the motion, Defendants filed a notice of administrative action informing the Court that the Department had “submitted its Notice of Proposed Rulemaking [(“NPRM“)], regarding the H-2A non-immigrant visa program . . . to the Office of Information and Regulatory Affairs (‘OIRA‘) on January 28, 2019.” Dkt. 20 at 1. The ninety-day period for OIRA‘s review was set to expire on April 28, 2019, subject to a “one-time” extension of “no more than 30 days.” Id. To date, the Secretary has yet to publish the contemplated NPRM, nor has he provided the Court with an update regarding its status.
II. ANALYSIS
A. Motion to Dismiss
Defendants contend that the Court lacks subject-matter jurisdiction because Plaintiffs’ wrongful certification claims are moot and because Plaintiffs’ challenges to the Secretary‘s policy and practice are unripe. Dkt. 9-1 at 17–22. “At the motion to dismiss stage, courts assess
For the reasons explained below, the Court will grant the Secretary‘s motion to dismiss Plaintiffs’ wrongful certification claims as moot but will deny his motion to dismiss Plaintiffs’ policy and practice claims as unripe.
1. Plaintiffs’ Wrongful Certification Claims Are Moot
“To invoke federal jurisdiction, a plaintiff must [have] a ‘personal stake’ in the outcome of the action,” and that personal stake “‘must be extant at all stages of review, not merely at the time the complaint is filed.‘” United States v. Sanchez-Gomez, 138 S. Ct. 1532, 1537 (2018) (first quoting Genesis Healthcare Corp. v. Symczyk, 569 U.S. 66, 71 (2013); then quoting Preiser v. Newkirk, 422 U.S. 395, 401 (1975)). In general, a claim becomes moot and falls “outside the jurisdiction of the federal courts” if the required personal stake—or concrete interest—ceases to exist at any point in the litigation. Id. That rule, however, is subject to at least two exceptions, including an exception for claims that are “capable of repetition, yet evading review.” Spencer v. Kemna, 523 U.S. 1, 17 (1998). The question posed here is whether that exception applies to Plaintiffs’ wrongful certification claims.
It is undisputed that the five specific certifications at issue have expired. See Dkt. 10 at 13 (acknowledging that the latest certification expired on December 1, 2018). The Court, accordingly, cannot provide any meaningful relief with respect to those five certifications—in other words, an order setting them aside at this point would have no practical consequence. Plaintiffs do not dispute this premise but instead argue that their wrongful certification claims fall within the capable-of-repetition-yet-evading-review exception to the mootness doctrine. That exception applies when “(1) the challenged action [is] in its duration too short to be fully litigated prior to cessation or expiration, and (2) there [is] a reasonable expectation that the same complaining party [will] be subject to the
(alterations in original) (internal quotation marks and citation omitted). Although the “annual nature of the certification process would normally lead to the conclusion that any challenge would evade review, ‘[a] litigant cannot credibly claim his case “evades review” when he himself has delayed its disposition.‘” Grass Works Lawn Care, No. 18-cv-1581, 2019 WL 1981087, at *6 (D.D.C. May 3, 2019) (quoting Armstrong v. FAA, 515 F.3d 1294, 1296 (D.C. Cir. 2008)). That is the circumstance here, and it precludes Plaintiffs from relying on the capable-of-repetition-yet-evading-review exception.
The case law in this Circuit is clear. A plaintiff seeking to invoke the exception must “make a full attempt to prevent his case from becoming moot, an obligation that includes filing for preliminary injunctions and appealing denials of preliminary injunctions.” Newdow v. Roberts, 603 F.3d 1002, 1009 (D.C. Cir. 2010); see also Grass Works Lawn Care, 2019 WL 1981087, at *6 (concluding challenge was moot where plaintiff “waited four months . . . to file suit and never timely requested a preliminary injunction or other expedited relief“); PETA v. U.S. Fish and Wildlife Serv., 59 F. Supp. 3d 91, 98 (D.D.C. 2014) (concluding challenge was moot where plaintiff failed to move for preliminary relief). “The capable-of-repetition doctrine is not meant to save mooted cases that may have remained live but for the neglect of the plaintiff.” Newdow, 603 F.3d at 1009.
Here, Plaintiffs failed to make a “full attempt” to obtain timely review of their wrongful certification claims. Id. Although the Secretary issued the first of the five wrongful certifications on February 12, 2018, see Dkt. 10 at 13, Plaintiffs waited until August 23, 2018, to file suit—more than six months later. Plaintiffs, moreover, never moved for preliminary relief and never requested expedited briefing, even though two of the certifications were due to expire before briefing on the motion to dismiss was complete and all five certifications were due to expire within two weeks of that deadline. See id. Because Plaintiffs “cannot credibly claim [that their] case ‘evades review’ when [they themselves] ha[ve] delayed its disposition,” Grass Works Lawn Care v. Acosta, 2019 WL 1981087, at *6 (quoting Armstrong, 515 F.3d at 1296), the Court will dismiss their wrongful certification claims as moot.
2. Plaintiffs’ Policy and Practice Claims Are Ripe
That, however, does not end Plaintiffs’ suit. “It is well-established that[,] if a plaintiff challenges both a specific agency action and the policy that underlies that action, the challenge to the policy is not necessarily mooted merely because the challenge to the particular agency action is moot.” City of Houston v. Dep‘t of Hous. and Urban Dev., 24 F.3d 1421, 1428 (D.C. Cir. 1994) (citing Payne Enters. v. United States, 837 F.2d 486 (D.C. Cir. 1988); Better Gov‘t Ass‘n v. Dep‘t of State, 780 F.2d 86 (D.C. Cir. 1986)). To the contrary, even “if a plaintiff‘s specific claim has been mooted, it may nevertheless seek declaratory relief forbidding an agency from imposing a disputed policy in the future, so long as the plaintiff has standing to bring such a forward-looking challenge and the request for declaratory relief is ripe.” Id. at 1429. The Court must assess, as a result, whether Plaintiffs’ policy and practice claims are justiciable. For present purposes, the Secretary does not dispute that the Department of Labor has a policy and practice of ignoring the prevailing wage or deferring to “no finding” reports by SWAs to calculate
The ripeness doctrine subsumes two inquiries: first, “the Article III requirement of standing, which requires a [plaintiff] to allege inter alia an injury-in-fact that is ‘imminent’ or ‘certainly impending,‘” and, second, “prudential reasons for refusing to exercise jurisdiction.” Am. Petroleum Inst. v. EPA, 683 F.3d 382, 387 (D.C. Cir. 2012) (first quoting Nat‘l Treasury Emps. Union v. United States, 101 F.3d 1423, 1427–28 (D.C. Cir. 1996); then quoting Nat‘l Park Hospitality Ass‘n v. Dep‘t of Interior, 538 U.S. 803, 808 (2003)). The second of those inquiries, which is all that is at issue here, is designed to “prevent the courts, through avoidance of premature adjudication, from entangling themselves in abstract disagreements over administrative policies, and also to protect the agencies from judicial interference until an administrative decision has been formalized and its effects felt in a concrete way by the challenging parties.” Abbott Labs. v. Gardner, 387 U.S. 136, 148–49 (1967). To achieve this goal, courts must evaluate two factors before proceeding: “the fitness of the issue for judicial decision and the hardship to the parties of withholding court consideration.” Id. at 149. Under the fitness prong of this test, courts must consider [1] whether the claim raises a question that “is ‘purely legal, [2] whether consideration of the issue would benefit from a more concrete setting, and [3] whether the agency‘s action is sufficiently final.‘” Atl. States Legal Found. v. EPA, 325 F.3d 281, 284 (D.C. Cir. 2003) (citation omitted). Under the hardship prong, courts must ask whether the challenged administrative action is likely to have a “direct and immediate effect” on the “primary conduct” of the plaintiff. Toilet Goods Ass‘n v. Gardner, 387 U.S. 158, 164 (1967) (citation omitted); see also Nat‘l Park Hospitality Ass‘n, 538 U.S. at 810. In the context of APA challenges, however, once it is determined that “an issue is clearly fit for review, there is no need to consider ‘the hardship to the parties of withholding court consideration,’ because there would be no advantage to be had from delaying review,” Action for Children‘s Television v. FCC, 59 F.3d 1249, 1258 (D.C. Cir. 1995) (internal citations omitted); see also Cohen v. United States, 650 F.3d 717, 735 (D.C. Cir. 2011).1
Turning first to the “fitness” inquiry, the Court concludes that the issues
The crux of the Secretary‘s argument is that he “is currently reconsidering” the H-2A implementing regulations and, thus, there exists “too much speculation regarding whether the [Department‘s] wage methodology will still affect the Plaintiffs.” Dkt. 9-1 at 21; see also Dkt. 12 at 12 (noting that the Department “is currently amending the H-2A program regulations and reconsidering the H-2A wage methodology“). But it is the government, and not the Plaintiffs, that asks the Court to speculate. There is no dispute that the existing regulations require that an employer seeking an H-2A certification pay its employees the highest of four wages, including the “prevailing hourly wage.”
The government nonetheless posits, based solely on a “joint cabinet statement” and the Department of Labor‘s Fall 2018 regulatory agenda, that the Secretary “is considering possible amendments of different areas of the existing H-2A regulations, including the methodology used to establish the required wage rate for the H-2A program.” Dkt. 9-2 at 3–4 (Thompson Decl. ¶ 11) (emphasis added). The mere “consideration” of “possible” amendments that might alter the existing legal landscape, however, hardly renders the existing, binding regulations in “flux.” Likewise, a “joint cabinet statement” noting that “the Departments of State, Agriculture, Labor, and Homeland Security are embarking on a process to modernize the H-2A visa program by clarifying and improving the regulations governing the program” promises no relief and sets no timeline. Id. at 3 (Thompson Decl. ¶ 6). According to the Secretary‘s last notification to the Court, the Office of Management and Budget was required to complete its review of the NPRM by the end of May 2019, Dkt. 20 at 1–2; that date is now past, and the Secretary has not informed the Court that he has—or will imminently—promulgate an NPRM, much less that an ongoing rulemaking is likely to change § 655.120(a) in material respects.
The government‘s speculation is far from enough to show that the Offered Wage Rate provision is in flux. But even if a rulemaking was in progress, and even if the NPRM proposed to modify § 655.120(a) in material respects, “[t]he
Because Plaintiffs’ claims are clearly fit for review, the Court need not consider the hardship prong of the ripeness inquiry. See Atl. States Legal Found., 325 F.3d at 284. But even if the Court were to do so, Plaintiffs have offered plausible allegations and uncontested evidence sufficient to show that, absent judicial relief, Plaintiffs risk continued harm in the form of depressed wages and lost job opportunities. Cf. Comite de Apoyo a Los Trabajadores Agricolas v. Perez, 774 F.3d 173, 184 (3d Cir. 2014) (“CATA“) (“[T]he possibility . . . [of] some future rulemaking that may or may not lead to a change in the rules does not ameliorate the harm that DOL‘s current use of those rules is causing plaintiffs now.“). Plaintiffs allege that the Secretary has a continuing policy and practice of disregarding the prevailing wage, at least whenever the relevant SWA fails to specify a prevailing wage rate. Dkt. 1 at 2, 9 (Compl. ¶¶ 3, 29). According to Plaintiffs, that was the case in 35 states and territories between 2015 and 2018. Dkt. 10-2 at 1 (Schell Decl. ¶ 4). Plaintiffs also offer the declaration of Baldemar Velasquez, the President of FLOC, who attests that “[e]very season, FLOC members work in H-2A jobs where state workforce agencies have not conducted a wage survey” and are thus paid a wage that is lower than the prevailing wage. Dkt. 10-3 at 2 (Velasquez Decl. ¶¶ 5–6). Finally, the individual plaintiffs allege that they “regularly travel[] to farms located in other states to obtain well-paid, temporary agricultural employment.” Dkt. 1 at 4 (Compl. ¶ 8). Accepting the truth of Plaintiffs’ allegations, as the Court must do at this stage of the litigation, the Court concludes that the individual plaintiffs will continue to lose higher-wage job opportunities if the Secretary continues his policy and practice of certifying wages lower than the “prevailing wage” calculated by OES.2 Cf. id. at 10–13 (Compl. ¶¶ 33, 36, 39, 42, 45) (alleging that they would not travel to other areas of the United States for employment
accordingly, deny Defendants’ motion to dismiss with respect to Plaintiffs’ policy and practice claims.
B. Motion to Transfer
Defendants argue in the alternative that the Court should transfer the case to the United States District Court for the Northern District of Illinois, where “the materials related to the allegedly wrongful certifications are located.” Dkt. 9-1 at 22. Pursuant to
1. Venue Is Not Proper in the Northern District of Illinois
The Secretary‘s motion fails at the first step because he has not shown that venue is proper in the Northern District of Illinois. The federal-entity venue provision provides in relevant part:
A civil action in which a defendant is an officer or employee of the United States or any agency therefor acting in his official capacity . . . or an agency of the United States, or the United States, may, except as otherwise provided by law, be brought in any judicial district in which (A) a defendant in the action resides, (b) a substantial part of the events or omissions giving rise to the claim occurred . . . or (C) the plaintiff resides if no real property is involved in the action.
Venue, then, is proper in the Northern District of Illinois only if “a substantial part of the events or omissions
2. The Public and Private Interest Factors Also Weigh Against Transfer
In any event, the balance of interests weighs against transferring the case from this Court to the Northern District of Illinois. With respect to the parties’ interests, the Court concludes that Plaintiffs’ choice of forum outweighs the inconvenience, if any, that the government might suffer because “materials related to the allegedly wrongful certifications are located at . . . [the Department of Labor‘s] Chicago National Processing Center.” Dkt. 9-1 at 22–23. As explained above, Plaintiffs’ claims do not turn on the Chicago National Processing Center‘s adjudication of any specific application; rather, Plaintiffs are challenging the Secretary‘s nationwide policy and practice of certifying wages below the prevailing wage for the H-2A visa program. Because the Department is headquartered here, the senior officials responsible for setting national policy are presumably located here, and any documentation relating to national policy is likely located here, the private interest factors weigh against transfer.
Consideration of the public interest factors supports the same result. The Secretary does not contend that the
The Court will, accordingly, deny Defendants’ request to transfer the case to the District Court for the Northern District of Illinois.
C. Motion to Stay
Finally, the Secretary moves to “stay all proceedings in this case until April 26, 2019,” Dkt. 9-1 at 27, the date by which the Secretary initially anticipated “that its plan for additional rulemaking concerning the challenged wage-rate issued in this case [would have been] better known,” id. at 9. That date has now passed, and the Secretary has failed to inform the Court that he has—or will imminently—issue a NPRM proposing to amend § 655.120(a) in relevant respects. It, accordingly, appears that the Secretary‘s request for a stay is moot.
Even assuming that the Secretary‘s request for a stay is still operative, however, the Court is unpersuaded. The Court, to be sure, has broad discretion to stay a case pending the outcome of proceedings in another forum. See Hisler v. Gallaudet Univ., 344 F. Supp. 2d 29, 35 (D.D.C. 2004) (“[A] trial court may, with propriety, find it is efficient for its own docket and the fairest course for the parties to enter a stay of an action before it, pending resolution of independent proceedings which bear upon the case.” (citation omitted)). But the Supreme Court has cautioned that, “if there is even a fair possibility that the stay . . . will work damage to someone else,” the movant must “must make out a clear case of hardship or inequity in being required to go forward.” Landis v. N. Am. Co., 299 U.S. 248, 255 (1936). The Secretary contends that a stay is warranted here because the Department “is currently engaged in rulemaking on the H-2A program, the results of which could substantially affect the entire nature of the case.” Dkt. 9-1 at 25. For the same reasons that the Secretary‘s inchoate plan to issue an NPRM does not undercut the fitness of Plaintiffs’ claims for adjudication, the Court concludes that a stay is unwarranted.
In light of the uncertainties regarding the contemplated NPRM discussed above, and the risk that the existing policy and practice of certifying wages lower than the prevailing wage defined by the OES, Dkt. 10 at 29–30, will cause Plaintiffs concrete harm in the near future, the balance of equities tips decidedly against staying the litigation. See Landis, 299 U.S. at 255. Ultimately, the Secretary‘s only argument in favor of a stay invokes the interests of judicial economy. Dkt. 12 at 18. That is not enough, especially where it is not “certain” that the “proposed rulemaking . . . will moot the case.” Am. Hosp. Ass‘n v. Dep‘t of Health and Human Servs., 2018 WL 5777397, at *2 (D.D.C.
The Court will, accordingly, deny the Secretary‘s request to stay the litigation.
CONCLUSION
For the foregoing reasons, it is hereby ORDERED that Defendants’ motion to dismiss, Dkt. 9, is GRANTED in part and DENIED in part. Plaintiffs’ challenges to the five identified certifications are hereby dismissed as moot.
It is further ORDERED that Defendants’ motion to transfer or stay the case, Dkt. 9, is DENIED.
It is further ORDERED that the parties shall appear for a status conference on July 9, 2019, at 11:00 a.m. in Courtroom 21 to discuss further proceedings in this case.
SO ORDERED.
RANDOLPH D. MOSS
United States District Judge
Date: June 24, 2019