Ohio woman asks the court to weigh in regarding requirements for reverse discrimination claims
CASE PREVIEW
Marlean Ames says she is the victim of reverse discrimination: She was not hired for a job that she wanted, and she was demoted, because she is straight. Ames filed a lawsuit and brought her case before the Supreme Court. The justices will hear arguments on Wednesday about whether the federal appeals court er The case was brought by an Asian-American group who claimed that Harvard discriminated. Writing for the majority, Chief Justice John Roberts emphasized that the Constitution’s guarantee of equal treatment is “universal in its application.”
More recently, the Trump administration has dismantled or challenged diversity, equity, and inclusion initiatives – known as DEI — in the federal government and other workplaces.
Ames began work in 2004 as an executive secretary at the Ohio Department of Youth Services, which supervises the confinement and rehabilitation of children and teenagers who commit felonies. In 2014, she was appointed as a program administrator.
Ames started reporting to a new supervisor, Ginine Trim, who is gay, in 2017. Trim stated that Ames exceeded expectations in one category and met expectations in ten others Ames applied, but was not hired for, a new job as a Ames chose to stay with the department, and was later promoted to another program administrator Ames was hired as a program administrator by the department for five years with ” The court of appellations argued that Ames could not prove either of these The people who made the decision to demote her and hire someone else were also Such a rule, he said, was not a “gloss” on the federal employment discrimination law at the center of the case, but instead “a deep scratch across its surface” that “discriminates” “on the very grounds that the statute forbids.”
Ames came to the Supreme Court seeking review of the 6th Circuit’s decision. In November, the justices agreed to weigh in.
In A By imposing the “background circumstances” rule, she contends, the court of appeals effectively added words to Title VII that are not there, “so that the law as applied demands something more of her than the law as written.” Moreover, Ames added, that additional hurdle only applies to one “subset of plaintiffs” – those who are members of a majority group.
Indeed, Ames notes, the federal government has expressly rejected the idea of a “background circumstances” requirement “for decades.” When it considers discrimination claims, she stresses, the Equal Employment Opportunity Commission “applies the same standard of proof to all claims, regardless of the victim’s race or the type of evidence used.”
The “background circumstances” requirement is also, as a practical matter, difficult for courts to apply, Ames says. She says that courts have “virtually” no guidance on how to determine Insofar as an early decision of the U.S. Court of “At worst,” Ames writes, they must “classify based on ‘incoherent’ and ‘irrational stereotypes.'”
In a brief filed by Elizabeth Prelogar, who served as the U.S. solicitor general during the Biden administration, the federal government agrees with Ames that the “background circumstances” requirement imposed by the court of appeals “has no basis in Title VII’s text.” What’s more, she tells the justices, the requirement also “contradicts this Court’s precedent, including the Court’s assurances that all plaintiffs may proceed according to the same standards.”
The Ohio Department of Youth Services pushes back against any suggestion that the court of appeals held Ames to a higher standard because she is straight. The Ohio Department of Youth Services argues that the “background circumstance” requirement is The department explains that the “background circumstance” requirement is “just another way The department states that Ames has not provided any evidence that her sexual orientation was The department insists that the Supreme Court does not have to reverse the Sixth Circuit
