Washington, D.C., January 13, 2025 – The ERISA Industry Committee (ERIC) filed an amicus brief last week urging the U.S. District Court for the Eastern District of Tennessee to grant a motion for summary judgment in McKee Foods Corporation v. BFP, Inc. In its brief, ERIC asked the court to affirm that Tennessee’s “any willing pharmacy” law is preempted by the Employee Retirement Income Security Act (ERISA).
In McKee, the plaintiff is challenging a Tennessee law requiring that “any willing pharmacy” be included in a prescription drug plan’s provider network, including self-insured prescription drug plans governed by ERISA. The brief asks the court to permanently halt enforcement of the Tennessee law because ERISA preempts it.
“ERIC member companies provide benefits, including prescription drug coverage, to diverse industries. Self-insured plans utilize pharmacy networks to obtain certain benefits and cost savings, which are passed on to plan participants. While ERIC supports federal legislation to reform pharmacy benefit managers, the Tennessee law interferes with employers’ ability to design and administer plans that reflect the needs of their workforce,” said Tom Christina, Executive Director of the ERIC Legal Center. “The preemption provision that Congress included in ERISA gives the court a basis for protecting employers and employees from the harms created by this law.”
According to ERIC, ERISA preempts the Tennessee law because that law directly interferes with prescription-drug benefit plan design and administration by:
(1) Restricting plan sponsors’ ability to design pharmacy networks for their plans; and
(2) Limiting the ability of plan sponsors to implement effective cost-savings measures for their plans.
Christina added, “ERISA’s preemption provision was designed so that the employee benefit plans of employers operating in multiple states would not be forced to conform to a patchwork of differing state regulations. The core principle of ERISA is to provide the private sector the autonomy to design employee benefit plans that serve the needs of their workforce, and we urge the court to preserve that independence.”
ERIC is a national advocacy organization exclusively representing the largest employers in the United States in their capacity as sponsors of employee benefit plans for their nationwide workforces. With member companies that are leaders in every economic sector, ERIC is the voice of large employer plan sponsors on federal, state, and local public policies impacting their ability to sponsor benefit plans. ERIC member companies offer benefits to tens of millions of employees and their families, located in every state and city across the country.
Morgan, Lewis & Bockius LLP prepared the amicus brief, which is available here
