Discrimination

  • April 01, 2025

    9th Circ. Won't Revive Wash. Atty's Bias Firing Suit

    An attorney can't revive his complaint alleging the Washington State Attorney General's Office fired him based on his PTSD diagnosis linked to being a closeted gay Mormon youth, after the Ninth Circuit said the case was time-barred and was an attempt to relitigate claims already tossed.

  • April 01, 2025

    Nurse's Job Denial Dispute With Senior Home Stays In Court

    A senior living home operator must face a federal lawsuit claiming it violated the New York City Human Rights Law by retracting a nurse's job offer because she refused to consent to a credit check, a New York federal judge ruled, denying the company's bid to compel arbitration.

  • April 01, 2025

    7th Circ. Revives Officer's Back Pay Bid In ADA Row

    The Seventh Circuit reinstated Tuesday a former corrections officer's back pay request that was rejected by a lower court after a jury found the county sheriff he worked for violated disability bias law by subjecting him to an unnecessary medical exam, but didn't owe him any damages.

  • April 01, 2025

    Ex-Exec Accuses Deutsche Bank Of Audit Lies, Retaliation

    A former high-ranking official with Deutsche Bank has sued the bank for whistleblower retaliation and libel over what he said was a false human resources complaint concocted to fire him for cause after he flagged the bank's alleged lies to federal regulators about operational control issues.

  • April 01, 2025

    NBA Wants No Extra Shot At Vax Discrimination Claim For Ref

    Former NBA referee Leroy Richardson lost in a "final and binding" arbitration of his religious discrimination claim against the league, and thus should not be awarded a win in his suit over his firing for refusing a COVID-19 vaccination, the NBA has told a New York federal court.

  • April 01, 2025

    Legal Carveout For Staff Sinks DA Aide's Pregnancy Bias Suit

    A top aide to Atlanta's former district attorney who alleged she was fired for getting pregnant falls under an exception to federal anti-discrimination law as an elected official's staffer, the Eleventh Circuit said Tuesday, backing the dismissal of her bias suit.

  • April 01, 2025

    DC Circ. Ruling Bodes Ill For Potential EEOC Challenges

    A D.C. Circuit panel recently allowed President Donald Trump's dismissal of two agency officials to move ahead, a development experts said darkened the outlook for the potential legal challenges that the fired U.S. Equal Employment Opportunity Commission members may bring over their January ousters.

  • April 01, 2025

    Mich. Justices Urged To Reject Shorter Worker Suit Deadlines

    A trial lawyers' association has advocated for the Michigan Supreme Court to end employers' ability to contractually shorten the limitations period for employee lawsuits, saying such contract terms weaken workers' civil rights protections. 

  • April 01, 2025

    Seattle Schools Must Face Teacher's Retaliation Lawsuit

    A Washington state appeals court breathed new life into a Seattle public schoolteacher's suit claiming she was punished for reporting that elementary school personnel mistreated students of color, faulting a trial court's conclusion that she hadn't done enough to satisfy presuit obligations.

  • April 01, 2025

    Chipotle To Pay $20K To Wrap Up EEOC Religious Bias Suit

    A Chipotle in Kansas will pay $20,000 to end a U.S. Equal Employment Opportunity Commission suit alleging a supervisor pulled part of a hijab off a Muslim employee's head after repeatedly asking to see her hair, according to a federal court filing.

  • April 01, 2025

    NYC Must Face Sanitation Workers' Discrimination Suit

    A federal judge declined to toss a group of sanitation agents' suit accusing New York City of unlawfully picking white, male garbage collectors to move into better-paying sanitation police jobs, though he shrank the time frame covered by some of the agents' claims.

  • March 31, 2025

    9th Circ. Won't Stay Injunction On Transgender Troop Ban

    A Ninth Circuit panel on Monday denied the federal government's bid for an emergency stay that would have allowed the U.S. Department of Defense to move forward with the Trump administration's ban on transgender military service following a Washington federal judge's decision to block the prohibition last week.

  • March 31, 2025

    Apple Beats Suit From Actor Who Refused COVID Shot

    A California appellate court held Friday that Apple Studios had the right to pull an offer for actor Brent Sexton after he refused to get vaccinated against COVID-19, ruling that a lower court should've thrown out the actor's suit.

  • March 31, 2025

    Hegseth Wants Single Fitness Standard For Combat Roles

    Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth has ordered military leaders to revise their physical fitness standards for service members in combat roles, saying the standards need to be "sex-neutral," with no exceptions for current troops.

  • March 31, 2025

    US DOT Taps Quinn Emanuel To Probe FAA Diversity Hiring

    The U.S. Department of Transportation said Monday that it has hired Quinn Emanuel Urquhart & Sullivan LLP to investigate claims that the Federal Aviation Administration is continuing to prioritize diversity, equity and inclusion when hiring air traffic controllers in defiance of the Trump administration's sweeping anti-DEI policy.

  • March 31, 2025

    NY Law Allows Ex-Thompson Hine Atty's Harassment Suit

    A former Thompson Hine LLP income partner who accused the firm of allowing a "toxic boys club" to flourish at its New York office may continue to pursue the bulk of her harassment claims, a federal judge ruled Monday, finding that a New York law ending forced arbitration of sexual harassment claims invalidates an arbitration agreement.

  • March 31, 2025

    Va. Judge Halts Firings Of Intelligence Officers In DEI Posts

    A Virginia federal judge on Monday blocked the Trump administration from following through with terminating intelligence officers assigned to diversity, equity and inclusion roles in the CIA and U.S. Office of the Director of National Intelligence.

  • March 31, 2025

    School District Argues To Toss Ex-Athletic Director's Bias Suit

    The former athletic director for a Western Pennsylvania school district failed to show the connection between her second pregnancy and her firing a month after returning from leave, the school district said in a motion to dismiss the ex-employee's federal lawsuit Monday.

  • March 31, 2025

    Levi Strauss 'Sandbagged' By Bias Case Witness, Court Told

    Levi Strauss urged the California federal judge overseeing a former marketing director's sex-discrimination suit to exclude the woman's therapist from testifying at trial about the alleged emotional distress she suffered while employed by the denim manufacturer, saying Monday that the company was "sandbagged" at the last minute with the witness.

  • March 31, 2025

    Ex-Starbucks Barista Can't Reopen Age, Disability Bias Suit

    A trial court didn't misstep when it asked jurors to fix an inconsistent verdict in a lawsuit claiming Starbucks fired a barista because he was in his 50s and had a neck injury, the Ninth Circuit ruled Monday, refusing the worker's bid to upend the coffee giant's jury win.

  • March 31, 2025

    Car Auction Co. Pays $175K To End EEOC Race Bias Suit

    A car auction company has agreed to pay a Black former worker $175,000 to close a U.S. Equal Employment Opportunity Commission suit claiming leadership failed to step in when he complained that colleagues regularly called him racial slurs, sometimes more than a dozen times a day.

  • March 31, 2025

    Ex-Bridgewater Execs Forced To Arbitrate Discrimination Suit

    A Connecticut federal judge on Monday agreed to force arbitration of a dispute from two former Bridgewater Associates LP executives alleging discrimination against the multibillion-dollar asset management firm.

  • March 31, 2025

    US Steel Beats Fired Medical Pot Patient's Fed. ADA Fight

    A Pennsylvania federal judge on Friday granted U.S. Steel summary judgment on a medical cannabis patient's Americans with Disabilities Act claims in a lawsuit alleging the steel giant wrongfully fired him for his medical marijuana license and off-the-job marijuana use.

  • March 31, 2025

    10th Circ. Hands Server New Trial In Sexual Harassment Case

    The Tenth Circuit granted a former server a new trial Monday on her sexual harassment and retaliation claims against a golf club restaurant, citing "puzzling" jury findings that cleared the restaurant of wrongdoing but awarded the server $125,000 in damages.

  • March 31, 2025

    Judge Says Ga. School's Bias Defenses 'Odd' And 'Odder'

    A Georgia chiropractic school must face a former groundskeeper's claims that he was fired on bogus grounds because he reported his boss for helping his girlfriend steal company time, after a federal judge dinged the school Monday for the "weakness" of its defenses and suggested it may have falsified records to justify the worker's ouster.

Expert Analysis

  • Big Business May Come To Rue The Post-Administrative State

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    Many have framed the U.S. Supreme Court’s recent decisions overturning Chevron deference and extending the window to challenge regulations as big wins for big business, but sand in the gears of agency rulemaking may be a double-edged sword, creating prolonged uncertainty that impedes businesses’ ability to plan for the future, says Todd Baker at Columbia University.

  • A Timeline Of Antisemitism Legislation And What It Means

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    What began as hearings in the House of Representatives Committee on Education and the Workforce has expanded to a House-wide effort to combat antisemitism and related issues, with wide-ranging implications for education, finance and nonprofit entities, say attorneys at Morgan Lewis.

  • Colo. Ruling Adopts 'Actual Discharge' Test For The First Time

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    After a Colorado court’s recent decision in Potts v. Gaia Children, adopting for the first time a test for evaluating an actual discharge claim, employers must diligently document the circumstances surrounding termination of employment, and exercise particular caution when texting employees, says Michael Laszlo at Clark Hill.

  • It's Time For Nationwide Race-Based Hair Protections

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    While 24 states have passed laws that prohibit race-based hair discrimination, this type of bias persists in workplaces and schools, so a robust federal law is necessary to ensure widespread protection, says Samone Ijoma and Erica Roberts at Sanford Heisler.

  • After Chevron: EEOC Status Quo Will Likely Continue

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    As the legal landscape adjusts to the end of Chevron deference, the U.S. Equal Employment Opportunity Commission’s rulemaking authority isn’t likely to shift as much as some other employment-related agencies, says Paige Lyle at FordHarrison.

  • After Chevron: Various Paths For Labor And Employment Law

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    Labor and employment law leans heavily on federal agency guidance, so the U.S. Supreme Court’s decision to toss out Chevron deference will ripple through this area, with future workplace policies possibly taking shape through strategic litigation, informal guidance, state-level regulation and more, says Alexander MacDonald at Littler.

  • FIFA Maternity Policy Shows Need For Federal Paid Leave

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    While FIFA and other employers taking steps to provide paid parental leave should be applauded, the U.S. deserves a red card for being the only rich nation in the world that offers no such leave, says Dacey Romberg at Sanford Heisler.

  • What 2 Rulings On Standing Mean For DEI Litigation

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    Recent federal court decisions in the Fearless Fund and Hello Alice cases shed new light on the ongoing wave of challenges to diversity, equity and inclusion initiatives, with opposite conclusions on whether the plaintiffs had standing to sue, say attorneys at Moore & Van Allen.

  • Eye On Compliance: A Brief History Of Joint Employer Rules

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    It's important to examine the journey of the joint employer rule, because if the National Labor Relations Board's Fifth Circuit appeal is successful and the 2023 version is made law, virtually every employer who contracts for labor likely could be deemed a joint employer, say Bruno Katz and Robert Curtis at Wilson Elser.

  • Top 5 Issues For Employers To Audit Midyear

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    Six months into 2024, developments from federal courts and regulatory agencies should prompt employers to reflect on their progress regarding artificial intelligence, noncompetes, diversity initiatives, religious accommodation and more, say Allegra Lawrence-Hardy and Lisa Haldar at Lawrence & Bundy.

  • Tailoring Compliance Before AI Walks The Runway

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    Fashion industry players that adopt artificial intelligence to propel their businesses forward should consider ways to minimize its perceived downsides, including potential job displacements and algorithmic biases that may harm diversity, equity and inclusion efforts, say Jeffrey Greene and Ivory Djahouri at Foley & Lardner.

  • Where Anti-Discrimination Law Stands 4 Years After Bostock

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    On the fourth anniversary of the U.S. Supreme Court's landmark Bostock ruling, Evan Parness and Abby Rickeman at Covington take stock of how the decision, which held that Title VII protects employees from discrimination because of their sexual orientation and gender identity, has affected anti-discrimination law at the state and federal levels.

  • Politics In The Workplace: What Employers Need To Know

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    As the 2024 election approaches and protests continue across the country, employers should be aware of employees' rights — and limits on those rights — related to political speech and activities in the workplace, and be prepared to act proactively to prevent issues before they arise, say attorneys at Littler.