“Because of the past mismanagement of Washington’s Employment Security Department and the widespread confusion that was caused by new programs implemented in response to the COVID-19 financial crisis, this decision potentially effects tens of thousands of people in our state,” said Weisman’s attorney Timothy Ford. “It allows ESD to seize property without any kind of judicial process or court order whenever it decides that a person has been overpaid unemployment benefits—even if the overpayment was not their fault but ESD’s. It does this by interpreting the words of a federal statute to mean something completely different from what the US Supreme Court has said they mean.”