Does COVID-19 qualify as a natural disaster under the WARN Act's natural disaster exception?

QUESTIONS PRESENTED The Worker Adjustment and _ Retraining Notification (“WARN”) Act, 29 U.S.C. § 2101 et seq., generally requires employers to provide sixty days’ notice prior to a mass layoff or plant closing. However, the WARN Act contains an exception to the sixty-day notice requirement “if the plant closing or mass layoff is due to any form of natural disaster, such as a flood, earthquake, or the drought currently ravaging the farmlands of the United States.” 29 U.S.C. § 2102(b)(2)(B). This case presents two questions which were each decided differently by the district court and the court of appeals: (1) Does COVID-19 qualify as a natural disaster under the WARN Act’s natural disaster exception, 29 U.S.C. § 2102(b)(2)(B)? (2) What causal connection is required to trigger the WARN Act’s natural disaster exception, which applies when a plant closing or mass layoff is due to any form of natural disaster?