The District of Columbia recently enacted a temporary (now expired) statutory amendment of D.C. Code Ann. Section 32-1503(a-1) to allow individuals to receive workers' compensation benefits under D.C. law even if they had also received or were receiving worker's compensation benefits for the same injury or death under the law of another jurisdiction. This legislation is being sought to become permanent following the expiration of the temporary status of the amendment.

This temporary legislation marked a dramatic shift in the previously interpreted law of well over two decades that established that an employee who obtains benefits in another jurisdiction is not entitled to seek additional benefits in the District. The law, as it was, played a pivotal role for employees and their counsel's in deciding what jurisdiction to establish their claim and on the other side how to formulate certain defenses.