Opinion ID: 2976627
Heading Depth: 3
Heading Rank: 1

Heading: standard of review

Text: The ERA whistleblower provision, 42 U.S.C. § 5851(c), mandates that this Court’s review of the final decision of the DOL shall conform to the Administrative Procedures Act (“APA”), 5 U.S.C. § 706. Pursuant to the APA, this Court may reverse the agency’s findings and conclusions if they are found to be “arbitrary, capricious, an abuse of discretion, or otherwise not in accordance with law” or “in excess of statutory jurisdiction” or “unsupported by substantial evidence.” 5 U.S.C. § 706. Certainly, this is a highly deferential standard of review, and requires this Court to defer to the inferences that the DOL derives from the evidence. Varnadore v. Secretary of Labor, 141 F.3d 625, 630 (6th Cir. 1998). Any factual determinations by the Department of Labor “must be affirmed if they are supported by substantial evidence,” which is “more than a scintilla, but less than a preponderance, of the evidence.” R.P. Carbone Constr. Co. v. Occupational Safety & Health Rev. Comm’n, 166 F.3d 815, 818 (6th Cir. 1998). Substantial evidence is “such relevant evidence as a reasonable mind might accept as adequate to support the conclusion reached.” Id. Moreover, this court “will not normally disturb the credibility assessments of the Board or an administrative law judge, ‘who has observed the demeanor of the witnesses.’” Litton Microwave Cooking Prods. Div., Litton Sys., Inc. v. NLRB, 868 F.2d 854, 857 (6th Cir. 1989), citing NLRB v. Baja’s Place, 733 F.2d 416, 421 (6th Cir. 1984)). Finally, if there is substantial evidence in the record as a whole to support the DOL’s conclusions, this Court may not reverse, “even if [the court] could justifiably have made a different choice judging the matter de novo.” NLRB v. Brown-Graves Lumber Co., 949 F.2d 194, 196 (6th Cir. 1991).