Showing posts with label standing. Show all posts
Showing posts with label standing. Show all posts

Thursday, April 11, 2024

Sixth Circuit Affirms Dismissal of All But Two Claims of Religious Discrimination Based on COVID-19 Vaccine Mandate

Last month, the Sixth Circuit affirmed the dismissal of all but two claims filed by employees who claimed that the hospital employer’s initial blanket denial of their religious objections to the COVID-19 vaccine constituted religious discrimination in violation of Title VII and the Ohio Civil Rights Act.   Saval v. MetroHealth System, No. 23-3672 (6th Cir. 3/20/24).   The employer had reversed its decision and ultimately granted all of the religious exemption requests.  Thus, the employees who remained employed never suffered any concrete injury to justify litigation from “conclusory” allegations of the emotional distress caused over 36 days while they were forced choose between their jobs and their religious convictions or from the employer’s ability to reverse course again in the future.  Several of the employees had resigned before the employer denied the exemption requests, and thus, also lacked any injury from the employer’s initial denial decision.  However, two employees could sue for disparate treatment and failure to accommodate when they resigned more than 18 days after their requests were denied even though the employer had granted some medical exemption requests. 

According to the Court’s opinion, in August 2021, the hospital announced that all employees needed to obtain the vaccine by the end of October unless they requested a valid medical or religious exemption.  The employer received hundreds of exemption requests and stayed the compliance deadline for those employees while it worked through each of the requests.  While the employer granted some medical exemption requests, it denied all of the religious exemption requests in February on the grounds that the employees could not perform their jobs remotely, no reasonable accommodation was available and it would be an undue hardship to the employer.   It gave the employees 45 days to comply, but 36 days later, abruptly changed course on March 15 and granted all of the exemption requests.   Nine employees resigned before that 36th day and filed suit.  They were joined by 36 other employees who remained employed by the hospital.  The trial court granted the employer’s motion to dismiss for lack of standing (i.e., were still employed and suffered no injury from the temporary denial) and failure to state a claim.  The Court affirmed the dismissal for all but the first two plaintiffs who had resigned after their exemptions had been denied but before the hospital reversed its decision. 

The Court affirmed dismissal for lack of standing because 36 employees did not suffer any injury from the temporary denial of the exemption requests.  It rejected their claims of mental anguish from having to chose between their jobs and their religious beliefs and threat that the employer could reverse its decision again in the future.  The Court found their allegations of past distress to be too conclusory to be actionable and “fears about a future denial were ‘contingent on future events that may never come to pass, which is a much ‘too speculative’ state of affairs ‘to satisfy the well-established requirement that threatened injury must be ‘certainly impending.’”

The Court analyzed the allegations of the first nine employees to determine whether they stated valid claims for constructive discharge -- i.e., whether they were forced to resign.  Six of these nine could not establish constructive discharge because they had resigned before their exemption requests had been denied in February.  An additional employee’s claim was denied because she had never filed a formal exemption request.

The Court’s majority agreed that the first two plaintiffs stated valid claims for constructive discharge because they requested exemptions, those exemptions were denied, they were denied the right to appeal and they were given a date to comply or be fired.   The trial court had determined that they resigned prematurely (albeit more than halfway through the 45 day period), but the Court disagreed.

The Court also reversed the trial court that these plaintiffs failed to state a claim for religious discrimination: “Plaintiffs 1 and 2 allege [the employer] failed to accommodate their religious beliefs by blanket-denying their vaccine exemption requests. They also assert that [it] treated them differently because of their religion.”  The first two employees “just need to plausibly allege that they were denied a religious accommodation and treated differently because of their religion.”

Further, these two employees alleged a plausible claim of failure to accommodate.  “The heart of the failure-to-accommodate claim is that an employer discharges (or otherwise discriminates against) an employee for failing a job-related requirement instead of abiding by its “statutory obligation to make reasonable accommodation for the religious observances” of its employees.”

The Court also found that these two employees plausibly plead a disparate treatment case.  They “alleged that [the employer] categorically denied all religious exemption requests while granting some nonreligious exemption requests—that is, that [it] treated them differently with respect to a condition of employment because of their religion.”

In concurring, one judge questioned whether this was really a constructive discharge case when the employees had been told when they would be terminated and could have sought a preliminary injunction to prevent an unlawful job termination. 

NOTICE: This summary is designed merely to inform and alert you of recent legal developments. It does not constitute legal advice and does not apply to any particular situation because different facts could lead to different results. Information here can change or be amended without notice. Readers should not act upon this information without legal advice. If you have any questions about anything you have read, you should consult with or retain an employment attorney.