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The
justices took up a case involving St. Louis police officer
Jatonya Muldrow, who is seeking to revive claims that she was
transferred to an undesirable post to make way for a male
officer. Muldrow appealed a lower court's ruling that the
conduct by the police department could not form the basis of a
discrimination lawsuit.
The Supreme Court will hear the case in its next term, which
begins in October.
Many of the thousands of discrimination lawsuits filed each year
involve workers who allege they were transferred for
discriminatory reasons, including as a way to force them to quit
their jobs.
President Joe Biden's administration in May urged the court to
take up the issue, saying rulings by lower courts dismissing
such litigation misinterpreted federal anti-discrimination laws
that only apply to "adverse employment actions" driven by bias.
The Supreme Court on Friday took no action on a separate case
questioning whether paid suspensions count as adverse employment
actions under Title VII of the Civil Rights Act of 1964.
The lower courts said that to state a claim under Title VII,
workers must show that they suffered a material harm or
significant change in their employment status such as a firing,
demotion or decrease in pay.
Muldrow has said she was transferred out of an intelligence unit
by a new supervisor who wanted a man in the position. The
department has said officers are routinely transferred and the
plaintiff's supervisor transferred more than 20 officers when he
took over the unit.
(Reporting by Daniel Wiessner in Albany, New York; Editing by
Will Dunham)
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