Summary of facts: A Muslim bus operator alleged that her employer pressured her to abandon her religious practice of wearing a hijab at work and mocked her in front of fellow employees. Her employer then fired her after a no-fault collision in which no one was injured, when drivers involved in hundreds of similar or worse collisions were allowed to keep their jobs. The employee sued her employer in federal district court for religious discrimination under Title VII of the 1964 Civil Rights Act. The district court granted summary judgment for the employer. In doing so, the court applied a controversial legal framework, concluding that the employee had failed to disprove the employer’s stated reasons for terminating her, while ignoring evidence that would allow a reasonable jury to find her religious practice and protected conduct was a motivating factor in her termination. The U.S. Court of Appeals for the Ninth Circuit panel affirmed. The employee is now asking the U.S. Supreme Court to hear her case.

RFI’s position: Under Title VII of the 1964 Civil Rights Act, religious practice includes conduct—what an employee wears, when she prays, what she eats—and conduct is what workplace rules govern. An employer that acts against religious exercise can therefore nearly always point to a facially neutral rule. Under the analytical framework used by the lower courts, such a workplace rule is sufficient to deny a religious discrimination plaintiff’s claims in summary judgment proceedings. That framework cannot be squared with the Supreme Court’s holding that an employer may not make an applicant’s religious practice a factor in employment decisions or with the favored treatment Title VII affords religious practice. For workers who belong to religious communities, the consequence is that Title VII’s protections are least available precisely where religious practice is most visible. The petition should be granted.

Read the brief here.