Summary: In one of his last acts before leaving office, outgoing New Jersey (NJ) Governor Phil Murphy signed Assembly Bill (AB) 3451 on January 17, 2026, amending the New Jersey Family Leave Act (NJ FLA) to apply to smaller employers and ease employee eligibility requirements.
AB 3451 also expands job protection for employees receiving benefits under NJ temporary disability insurance (TDI) and NJ family leave insurance (FLI) programs. The amendments in AB 3451 take effect on July 17, 2026.
Read on for more details and employer next steps ahead of the July 17, 2026 effective date.
NJ Family Leave Act (NJ FLA) Highlights
Background
NJ FLA provides covered employees with 12 weeks of unpaid, job-protected leave during a 24-month period for the following qualifying reasons:
- To care for or bond with a child, as long as the leave begins within one (1) year of the child’s birth or placement for adoption or foster care,
- To care for a family member who has a serious health condition,
- To care for a family member who has been isolated or quarantined because of suspected exposure to a communicable disease (including COVID-19) during a state of emergency,
- To provide required care or treatment for a child if their school or place of care is closed by order of a public official due to an epidemic of a communicable disease (including COVID-19) or other public health emergency during a state of emergency.
NJ FLA does not provide leave for an employee’s own serious health condition.
"Family member" under the NJ FLA is defined broadly to mean a child, parent, parent-in-law, sibling, grandparent, grandchild, spouse, domestic partner, or one partner in a civil union couple, or any other individual related by blood or marriage to the employee, and any other individual that the employee shows to have a close association with the employee, which is the equivalent of a family relationship.
Intermittent/Reduced Schedule Leave
Eligible employees can take a consecutive block of up to 12 weeks or can take leave on an intermittent or reduced schedule.
Reinstatement Rights/Job Protections
When returning to work from NJ FLA leave, an employee must be restored to their original or an equivalent position with the same pay, status, benefits, and other terms and conditions of employment.
Additionally, the use of NJ FLA leave cannot result in a loss of any employment benefit that accrued before the start of an employee’s leave. Employees who would have been terminated because of layoffs had they not been on leave are not entitled to reinstatement but retain their rights under any applicable layoff and recall systems. Employers may not retaliate against someone for taking or attempting to take leave under the NJ FLA.
Maintenance of Health Benefits
During NJ FLA leave, employers must maintain group health plan coverage of the employee under the same conditions as if the employee continued to work.
NJ TDI/NJ FLI
As a reminder, NJ TDI provides income replacement cash benefits for up to 26 weeks to employees who cannot work due to pregnancy, childbirth recovery, or a serious physical or mental health condition or other disability unrelated to their job.
NJ FLI provides income replacement cash benefits for workers for up to 12 weeks to bond with a new child (including adopted and foster children), care for a family member with a serious physical or mental health condition, or to handle certain matters related to domestic or sexual violence.
Click here for a Risk Strategies article for a high-level refresher on NJ TDI and NJ FLI, including rates for 2026.
AB 3451 Amendments
The table below highlights the AB 3451 amendments, reflecting the expansions to NJ FLA, NJ TDI, and NJ FLI, effective July 17, 2026[1]:
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Leave Benefit Requirement
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Applicable to NJ FLA, NJ TDI, and/or NJ FLI
|
Current Law
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Effective July 17, 2026
|
|
Covered employers: Employee count threshold
|
NJ FLA
|
30 or more employees (including employees working in and outside of New Jersey) during at least 20 or more calendar workweeks in the current or immediately preceding calendar year.
|
15 or more employees (including employees working in and outside of New Jersey) during at least 20 or more calendar workweeks in the current or immediately preceding calendar year.
|
|
Covered employees: Tenure and hours worked threshold
|
NJ FLA
|
Employees who:
- work in New Jersey,
- worked for their employer for at least 12 months; and
- worked at least 1,000 base hours during the 12-month period before the leave.
|
Employees who:
- work in New Jersey,
- worked for their employer for at least three (3) months; and
- worked at least 250 base hours during the 12-month period before the leave.
|
|
Job protections/ reinstatement rights
|
NJ TDI & NJ FLI
|
Not applicable.
Currently, both NJ TDI and NJ FLI do not provide job protection to employees.
|
Employers will be required to reinstate returning employees who have received NJ TDI or NJ FLI benefits to the same position they held before the leave or to a position with equivalent seniority, status, benefits, pay, and other terms and conditions of employment.
Employees will also retain any rights under a layoff and recall system, including a collective bargaining agreement, as if they had not taken leave.
NOTE: Under this amendment, employers would presumably have employees taking NJ TDI leave eligible for up to 26 weeks of job-protected leave.
Additionally, small employers not covered under NJ FLA (those with fewer than 15 employees) would presumably have employees eligible for job-protected leave benefits under both NJ TDI and FLI.
Further clarifying guidance from the state (or even courts) on these open questions would be welcome.
|
|
Sequencing of leave benefits
|
NJ TDI & NJ FLI
|
Not applicable.
|
Employees who qualify for both paid sick leave under the NJ Earned Sick Leave law and either NJ TDI or NJ FLI will have the right to choose the order in which they use each type of paid leave. However, they may not use more than one type of leave benefit simultaneously during any period.
NOTE: Under this amendment, employees presumably will not be able to continue to “top off”(or supplement) their weekly NJ TDI/NJ FLI benefits with their NJ Earned Sick Leave law time to receive up to 100% of their average weekly wage.
Further clarifying guidance from the state would be welcome.
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Employer Next Steps
The amendments in AB 3451 significantly broaden which employers will be subject to NJ FLA protections, and expand which employees will be covered by NJ FLA. Moreover, they add job protection rights for employees receiving benefits under NJ TDI and NJ FLI programs.
Employers with New Jersey-based employees are advised to take the following steps, in consultation with their leave advisors/consultants and/or employment/labor counsel, ahead of the July 17, 2026, effective date:
- Monitor employee count and start preparing now to become a covered employer under NJ FLA if you currently employ 15-29 employees.
- Review and update timekeeping/attendance systems for tracking purposes of the new “250 base hours” expansion for NJ FLA protections:
- Employers should note the reduced employee tenure and hours worked threshold requirements under NJ FLA as detailed above.
- Review and update leave policies/handbooks, procedures, employee communications, and practices.
- Train Human Resources team members and other supervisory employees who manage New Jersey-based employee leaves on these upcoming leave expansions, particularly the new job protections under NJ TDI and NJ FLI, and the new NJ leave benefits sequencing rights for employees.
- Monitor the following New Jersey state webpages for anticipated further guidance and model notices/forms (for posting and distribution) when available.
- NJ FLA accessed here
- NJ TDI accessed here
- NJ FLI accessed here
Risk Strategies is here to help. Contact your Risk Strategies account team with any questions, or contact us directly here.
[1] Six months after enactment into law.
