Walker Specialty: Asbestos Abatement and the Construction Pension Withdrawal Exception

In Walker Specialty Construction, Inc. v. Board of Trustees of the Construction Industry and Laborers Joint Pension Trust for Southern Nevada, No. 24-1560 (9th Cir. Jan. 5, 2026), the Ninth Circuit held that Walker’s asbestos-abatement work qualified as building-and-construction-industry work for the multiemployer pension withdrawal-liability exception. It affirmed summary judgment for the employer.

The decision concerns an employer’s pension-plan withdrawal assessment. It does not decide an individual worker’s pension eligibility, unpaid wages, workers’ compensation, or an asbestos-injury claim. Those distinctions matter before using the case to evaluate a construction-related dispute.

The withdrawal assessment followed the end of Nevada operations

Walker performed asbestos abatement and demolition in southern Nevada and contributed to the Trust’s multiemployer pension plan. It stopped operating in the state and stopped contributing in 2019. In 2021, the Trust assessed approximately $2.84 million in withdrawal liability. Walker sought review, made disputed quarterly payments while review proceeded, and initiated arbitration. The arbitrator ruled for the Trust; the district court later ruled for Walker. Walker Specialty Construction, slip op. at 4–6.

The Multiemployer Pension Plan Amendments Act generally makes a withdrawing employer responsible for its share of unfunded vested benefits. The disputed statutory exception recognizes the distinctive, transient nature of construction work, where a contractor’s departure need not eliminate the local base of covered projects and contributing employment. That policy does not make every business that performs work at a building exempt.

Other conditions were agreed; the industry definition was disputed

The opinion describes the exception under 29 U.S.C. § 1383(b), including conditions concerning substantially all covered employees’ work, the plan’s coverage, and the employer’s cessation and resumption of covered work. Here, the parties agreed that the plan primarily covered construction-industry employees, that Walker ceased work in the jurisdiction and did not resume it within five years, and that substantially all Walker employees performed asbestos abatement. The appellate dispute was whether that work belonged to the building and construction industry. Id. at 7–8.

A contractor assessing its own position must therefore distinguish a contested legal definition from the other facts already agreed in Walker. The case does not excuse an employer from establishing the remaining statutory requirements or justify ignoring an assessment, review process, arbitration requirement, or payment obligation.

Construction includes qualifying repairs and alterations

The Trust urged a definition focused on forming or erecting a new structure. The court instead examined the established meaning the National Labor Relations Board had given the same phrase under the Taft-Hartley Act before Congress enacted the pension exception. That meaning included erection, maintenance, repair, and alterations essential to a building or structure’s usability. Congress’s use of that settled phrase supported carrying its established meaning into the pension statute. Id. at 9–15.

The court did not rely on Chevron deference to an agency. It answered the Trust’s Loper Bright argument by explaining that it was applying statutory-interpretation principles to Congress’s use of established language. Nor did the court erase the exception’s boundaries. The opinion distinguishes supplying materials and superficial work from the structural alterations and repairs involved in Walker’s operations.

The actual abatement work supplied the answer

The record showed asbestos removal from walls, roofs, and floors, including demolition of affected material and substantial changes that enabled renovation or demolition and made structures usable without the asbestos hazard. The court rejected the characterization of the work as merely scraping surfaces. It concluded that Walker’s work fit the established construction-industry meaning and affirmed the employer’s entitlement to summary judgment. Id. at 16–17.

The result turns on work performed, not simply a company’s trade name or a generic construction-industry code. A business that markets itself as an environmental contractor still needs records showing what covered employees actually did. Conversely, demolition or remediation is not excluded merely because workers take material away rather than build something new.

Separate the assessment record from a worker’s benefit question

For an employer assessment, gather the plan documents, collective-bargaining agreements, contribution history, assessment and review correspondence, arbitration papers, payment records, and evidence of actual operations. Project contracts, scopes of work, employee duties, locations, and the dates operations stopped or resumed can help counsel evaluate which statutory conditions are disputed. Do not assume that one favorable industry classification resolves every condition.

For a worker asking whether retirement benefits are vested or payable, identify the individual plan and benefit determination instead. Walker did not adjudicate those entitlements. Our employment practice page provides a route to discuss the documents and issue involved. This historical analysis explains the January 5 holding; later procedures and authority should be checked against the actual dispute before action.