A recent U.S. Supreme Court case, Muldrow v. City of St. Louis, has now made it easier to succeed on a claim of discrimination against an employer. The Chicago-based Seventh Circuit Court of Appeals has already started to implement this new ruling into its own decisions. It is also currently considering adopting new jury instructions for discrimination cases under Title VII. Employees and employers alike should be aware of these changes, as they could significantly impact how discrimination claims are litigated.
What is Title VII?
“Title VII” refers to a specific section of the federal Civil Rights Act of 1964. It protects employees from workplace discrimination on the basis of certain characteristics, including race, color, religion, sex, and national origin. So, for example, if an employer refuses to promote an employee on the basis of race, that employee may have a Title VII claim against her employer.
What Qualifies as “Discrimination”?
Until recently, the bar for establishing discrimination under Title VII was fairly high. Courts interpreted the law to mean that the negative effects of discrimination needed to be “significant” to invoke Title VII. Claims involving less serious harm were barred.
For example, the Seventh Circuit once stated that denial of a discretionary bonus on the basis of a protected characteristic might not meet the bar for a Title VII claim. It similarly held that placing an employee on a performance improvement plan (“PIP”) was not sufficiently severe for Title VII, nor was changing an employee’s hybrid work schedule.
What Did Muldrow Change?
In Muldrow, the Supreme Court lowered the bar for claiming discrimination under Title VII by removing the requirement that discrimination be “significant.” Now, employees need only show that they suffered “some harm” related to their employment.
How federal courts will apply the newly lowered “harm” threshold remains to be seen. After all, Muldrow was decided less than a year ago, a blink of an eye in the federal courts.
But the Seventh Circuit has already given some indication of how far the bar has been lowered. A few months after Muldrow, the Seventh Circuit decided Thomas v. JBS Green Bay, Inc., where it held that three adverse actions all exceeded the new bar for demonstrating discriminatory “harm” under Title VII: 1) deferred trainings, 2) denial of an employee’s preferred vacation schedule, and 3) not considering family circumstances when assigning shifts.
And, as mentioned earlier, the Seventh Circuit is now modifying its jury instructions to reflect the Supreme Court’s new controlling decision. This means that Illinois juries deciding Title VII discrimination cases will be provided with instructions that imply a lower threshold for proving discrimination.
Retaliation Retains a Heightened Standard
There is one small caveat. The Muldrow court carefully distinguished between discrimination claims and retaliation claims, and it held that retaliation claims must still meet the higher “significant” harm standard. So, if an employee complains about discriminatory treatment and the employer retaliates against the employee due to that complaint, the harm from the retaliation must still be “significant” to pursue a claim.
Both employees and employers should stay informed about future updates to Title VII. By understanding these updates, parties can better navigate their new rights and potential liabilities under the law.