Thursday saw the U.S. Supreme Court block enforcement of President Joe Biden's vaccinate-or-test-weekly mandate for private employers, but the day wasn't a total defeat for the White House. In a separate ruling released simultaneously, the court ruled that Biden's mandate requiring health care workers to vaccinate was valid.

Although experts Corporate Counsel spoke to said the outcome was unsurprising, they also agreed in-house counsel shouldn't take the ruling as an excuse to be less vigilant.

With the federal mandate struck down, employers and their counsel must contend with a patchwork of laws that vary across state, county and even city lines, attorney Jay Seegers said. Seegers, a partner specializing in labor and employment at Baker & Hostetler, said keeping those myriad laws in mind would be his top advice to in-house counsel.