Articles Posted in Discrimination and Unlawful Harassment

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In 2015, the U.S. Equal Employment Opportunity Commission determined that a federal agency that denied an employee equal access to a common bathroom/facility corresponding to the employee’s gender identity discriminated based on sex and could not restrict a transgender employee to a single-user restroom. About five years later, the Supreme Court ruled that discrimination based on transgender status is sex discrimination in violation of Title VII.

Yesterday, the EEOC announced a lawsuit against several employers claiming that forbidding transgender workers from using restrooms consistent with their gender identity contributed to a hostile work environment based on their sex.
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Today’s lesson is about the interplay between the Americans with Disabilities Act, which requires employers to accommodate known disabilities absent undue hardship, and the Pregnant Workers Fairness Act, which took effect last year and also requires an employer to accommodate known limitations related to, affected by, or arising out of pregnancy, childbirth, or related medical conditions unless doing so will result in an undue hardship. Continue reading

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I’ve read this post and this post about this recent lawsuit about seven current and former employees who claim they were forced to work with ‘Nazi sympathizers.’ They allege that the company hired and promoted a white employee with a swastika tattoo on his face and ties to a white nationalist group.

If true — and remember that these are just allegations in a complaint — that’s awful.

But let’s change the facts. Continue reading

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Last week, we discussed an FMLA policy that your business needs to rip from its employee handbook and burn with fire. This week, we revisit an Americans Disabilities Act policy that should end up on the paper shredder: the 100% healed policy.

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Folks, I’ve lost track of the number of disability accommodation requests on which I’ve counseled human resources concerning employee requests to work full-time from home. So, when I came across a recent decision from the United States Court of Appeals for the District of Columbia Circuit involving a failure-to-accommodate claim where the employer insisted on a 100% telework accommodation, I read with interest, as we lawyers like to say.

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André Koehne, CC BY-SA 3.0, via Wikimedia Commons

Early in my career, I learned that it’s bad form for a lawyer to accuse another party of having “lied.” Judges generally frown upon this.

So, you can imagine that my interest was piqued when I read an Eighth Circuit decision issued yesterday weighing “the appropriate sanction for a plaintiff who lied in a deposition and withheld information.”

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“Doing What’s Right – Not Just What’s Legal”
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