{"id":6577,"date":"2024-04-30T17:00:00","date_gmt":"2024-05-01T00:00:00","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/biddle.com\/blog\/?p=6577"},"modified":"2024-04-29T14:06:43","modified_gmt":"2024-04-29T21:06:43","slug":"what-muldrow-may-mean-for-federal-contractors","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/biddle.com\/blog\/2024\/04\/30\/what-muldrow-may-mean-for-federal-contractors\/","title":{"rendered":"What Muldrow May Mean for Federal Contractors"},"content":{"rendered":"\n<p>Even if you don\u2019t obsess over legislative and judicial developments the way we do, it has been hard to escape coverage of the Supreme Court\u2019s <a href=\"https:\/\/www.supremecourt.gov\/opinions\/23pdf\/22-193_q86b.pdf\">recent decision<\/a> in <em>Muldrow v. City of St. Louis, Missouri, et al<\/em>, regarding the evidentiary standard for plaintiffs bringing a Title VII discrimination claim based not on hiring or firing, or even promotion decisions, but <em>transfers<\/em>. And the Court\u2019s decision could very well have meaningful implications for federal contractor employers.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p><strong><u>Muldrow Case Background:<\/u><\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>A Seargent with the St. Louis Police Department alleged that she was transferred because of her sex in violation of Title VII. Her complaint included many particulars describing the \u201charm\u201d caused by the alleged discrimination, such as loss of prestige, loss of access to higher officials, loss of her FBI clearance and the \u201ctake-home\u201d car that came with it, and the loss of her regular schedule that did not generally include working weekends.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>But the District Court dismissed the case on summary judgement because the plaintiff had not shown <em>enough<\/em> harm, or that the harm was <em>substantial<\/em> enough to trigger Title VII. Summary judgment was upheld on appeal, and Seargent Muldrow found herself headed to the Supreme Court.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>What the Court decided surprised a few. They unanimously rejected what they viewed as a \u201chigher standard\u201d for proving a discrimination claim, but they differed quite a bit on what the standard should be, collectively landing on the new \u201csome harm\u201d standard. It was Brett Kavanaugh (not Sotomayor, not Kagan, and not Brown Jackson) who rejected even that standard as too high, noting that when it comes to Title VII cases, the <em>discrimination<\/em> is the harm, and no further showing of how \u201cbad\u201d it is should be necessary.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p><strong><u>OFCCP Enforcement:<\/u><\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>We now have a uniform federal standard of proof for Title VII transfer cases, and that is where federal contractors may start to feel some impact beyond the narrow confines of the ruling.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>Yes, employers are more vulnerable to transfer discrimination claims in jurisdictions that previously applied the now-rejected higher standard of proof, but that is not unique to federal contractors. The ancillary impact will be from the OFCCP.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>Up to this point, courts have been split on the contours of a \u201ctransfer claim.\u201d That is likely a major contributing factor to the OFCCP\u2019s general enforcement priorities, which generally do not \u201clook for\u201d transfer issues like they do with hiring, promotion, termination, and compensation. The agency will absolutely process a transfer complaint, but would have to be careful about the standard of proof they apply based on the jurisdiction where the claim was filed. They don\u2019t like to do that.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>With a clear standard, however, the OFCCP is not only much freer to pursue transfer complaints but can now look at the extent to which they want to investigate potential transfer issues in audits.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>The framework is already there. The OFCCP focuses on hires, promotions, and terminations because those are the \u201cbig three\u201d employment transactions you will find at pretty much any employer. They are not <em>limited<\/em> to those types of employment transactions, however. The Uniform Guidelines require contractors to evaluate their \u201cselection processes,\u201d and that has long been interpreted to include selection (or not) for promotion, and selection for termination.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>The argument, \u201cit\u2019s not an employment decision, it\u2019s just moving people around,\u201d never had much merit. And reorganizations, mergers, acquisitions, and regular ol\u2019 transfers can absolutely include prohibited discrimination. Further, Title VII jurisprudence has long recognized \u201cadverse impact discrimination\u201d where an otherwise neutral process (like a reorganization) can nonetheless have an impermissible discriminatory effect.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>And unlike LGBTQ+ discrimination, expanding enforcement into the transfer arena does not require the implementation of new self-identification.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>Will the OFCCP dive deeper into the murky waters of transfers now that the Supreme Court has swept the path? Time will tell, but a federal law enforcement agency just got a new traffic lane cleared and available for use, and we are not going to bet against them using it.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>The OFCCP already complains in audits when terminations from an AAP job group outnumber the people <em>in<\/em> the job group at the start of the year (because they insist on performing a pretty questionable analysis) and will demand \u201ctransfer summaries\u201d to reconcile the numbers. When they start asking for transfer summaries as a matter of course, we will know they are exploring that new road. And that road may very well lead to \u201ctransfer IRAs.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>If you have questions about this or any other OFCCP-related matter, please feel free to contact us at <a href=\"mailto:BCGi@Biddle.com\">BCGi@Biddle.com<\/a>.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>Even if you don\u2019t obsess over legislative and judicial developments the way we do, it has been hard to escape coverage of the Supreme Court\u2019s recent decision in Muldrow v. City of St. Louis, Missouri, et al, regarding the evidentiary standard for plaintiffs bringing a Title VII discrimination claim based not on hiring or firing, [&hellip;]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":101017,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_genesis_hide_title":false,"_genesis_hide_breadcrumbs":false,"_genesis_hide_singular_image":false,"_genesis_hide_footer_widgets":false,"_genesis_custom_body_class":"","_genesis_custom_post_class":"","_genesis_layout":"","footnotes":""},"categories":[4,617,596],"tags":[143,79,616],"class_list":{"0":"post-6577","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","6":"category-eeo-news","7":"category-federal-contractors","8":"category-scotus","9":"tag-federal-contractor","10":"tag-ofccp","11":"tag-scotus","12":"entry"},"yoast_head":"<!-- This site is optimized with the Yoast SEO plugin v27.5 - https:\/\/yoast.com\/product\/yoast-seo-wordpress\/ -->\n<title>What Muldrow May Mean for Federal Contractors &#187; Biddle Consulting Group News<\/title>\n<meta name=\"description\" content=\"Exploring Muldrow v. City of St. Louis case: the Supreme Court&#039;s latest ruling on Title VII discrimination claims. Uncover the implications for federal contractors and the evolving evidentiary standards in employment law.\" \/>\n<meta name=\"robots\" content=\"index, follow, max-snippet:-1, max-image-preview:large, max-video-preview:-1\" \/>\n<link rel=\"canonical\" href=\"https:\/\/biddle.com\/blog\/2024\/04\/30\/what-muldrow-may-mean-for-federal-contractors\/\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:locale\" content=\"en_US\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:type\" content=\"article\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:title\" content=\"What Muldrow May Mean for Federal Contractors &#187; Biddle Consulting Group News\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:description\" content=\"Exploring Muldrow v. City of St. Louis case: the Supreme Court&#039;s latest ruling on Title VII discrimination claims. Uncover the implications for federal contractors and the evolving evidentiary standards in employment law.\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:url\" content=\"https:\/\/biddle.com\/blog\/2024\/04\/30\/what-muldrow-may-mean-for-federal-contractors\/\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:site_name\" content=\"Biddle Consulting Group News\" \/>\n<meta property=\"article:publisher\" content=\"https:\/\/www.facebook.com\/pages\/Biddle-Consulting-Group-Inc\/283128085965\" \/>\n<meta property=\"article:published_time\" content=\"2024-05-01T00:00:00+00:00\" \/>\n<meta name=\"author\" content=\"Matt Nusbaum\" \/>\n<meta name=\"twitter:card\" content=\"summary_large_image\" \/>\n<meta name=\"twitter:creator\" content=\"@BiddleCG\" \/>\n<meta name=\"twitter:site\" content=\"@BiddleCG\" \/>\n<meta name=\"twitter:label1\" content=\"Written by\" \/>\n\t<meta name=\"twitter:data1\" content=\"Matt Nusbaum\" \/>\n\t<meta name=\"twitter:label2\" content=\"Est. reading time\" \/>\n\t<meta name=\"twitter:data2\" content=\"4 minutes\" \/>\n<script type=\"application\/ld+json\" class=\"yoast-schema-graph\">{\"@context\":\"https:\\\/\\\/schema.org\",\"@graph\":[{\"@type\":\"Article\",\"@id\":\"https:\\\/\\\/biddle.com\\\/blog\\\/2024\\\/04\\\/30\\\/what-muldrow-may-mean-for-federal-contractors\\\/#article\",\"isPartOf\":{\"@id\":\"https:\\\/\\\/biddle.com\\\/blog\\\/2024\\\/04\\\/30\\\/what-muldrow-may-mean-for-federal-contractors\\\/\"},\"author\":{\"name\":\"Matt Nusbaum\",\"@id\":\"https:\\\/\\\/biddle.com\\\/blog\\\/#\\\/schema\\\/person\\\/e0e808959d05f4436bc59e1938a6ed23\"},\"headline\":\"What Muldrow May Mean for Federal Contractors\",\"datePublished\":\"2024-05-01T00:00:00+00:00\",\"mainEntityOfPage\":{\"@id\":\"https:\\\/\\\/biddle.com\\\/blog\\\/2024\\\/04\\\/30\\\/what-muldrow-may-mean-for-federal-contractors\\\/\"},\"wordCount\":770,\"publisher\":{\"@id\":\"https:\\\/\\\/biddle.com\\\/blog\\\/#organization\"},\"keywords\":[\"Federal Contractor\",\"OFCCP\",\"SCOTUS\"],\"articleSection\":[\"EEO News\",\"Federal Contractors\",\"SCOTUS\"],\"inLanguage\":\"en\"},{\"@type\":\"WebPage\",\"@id\":\"https:\\\/\\\/biddle.com\\\/blog\\\/2024\\\/04\\\/30\\\/what-muldrow-may-mean-for-federal-contractors\\\/\",\"url\":\"https:\\\/\\\/biddle.com\\\/blog\\\/2024\\\/04\\\/30\\\/what-muldrow-may-mean-for-federal-contractors\\\/\",\"name\":\"What Muldrow May Mean for Federal Contractors &#187; Biddle Consulting Group News\",\"isPartOf\":{\"@id\":\"https:\\\/\\\/biddle.com\\\/blog\\\/#website\"},\"datePublished\":\"2024-05-01T00:00:00+00:00\",\"description\":\"Exploring Muldrow v. 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