In its 2023 Groff decision, the U.S. Supreme Court expanded employers’ obligations to accommodate employees’ religious beliefs under Title VII. In response to a growing number of religious discrimination claims, lower federal courts have begun taking a harder look at whether employees’ requested accommodations are based on religious beliefs or for other, more secular reasons. A new decision from the Ninth Circuit Court of Appeals (which includes California) demonstrates these courts’ increasing willingness to distinguish between religious and non-religious motivations.
In Detwiler v. Mid-Columbia Medical Center, the plaintiff was a hospital administrator who objected to her employer’s COVID-19 vaccination requirement on professed religious grounds. The hospital granted her an exemption from the mandate but required her to wear a mask during work and undergo regular testing through the use of nasal swabs. The plaintiff then asked for an exemption from the swabbing requirement because the swabs contained what she viewed as a potential carcinogen. She requested remote work or alternative testing, both of which the hospital rejected as impractical. When the plaintiff refused testing, she was terminated and sued, claiming failure to provide a religious accommodation.
A divided Ninth Circuit panel affirmed dismissal of the suit for failure to state a claim under Title VII. The court noted that the plaintiff’s objections to the nasal swabs were based on health, not religious, concerns. It rejected her arguments that her characterization of her body as a "temple of God" and her statement that she had prayed over the requirement were sufficient to characterize her request as religious in nature.
The Ninth Circuit rejected this reasoning on the basis that the connection between her objections and religious beliefs was tenuous and that her concerns appeared based on medical studies involving the alleged carcinogen. While declining to articulate a specific pleading standard for religious accommodation claims under Title VII, the court said that general professions of religious beliefs not tied to specific tenets were not adequate to meet the pleading standard.
In the past, federal courts have understandably shied away from making judgments about the sincerity of litigants’ religious beliefs. The loosening of the requirements to provide accommodations and the accompanying increase in claims citing this standard appear to have motivated some federal judges to take a closer look at the difference between religious and secular motivations for requested accommodations.
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