The U.S. 6th Circuit Court of Appeals recently jettisoned a required prima facie element for establishing a Title VII religious accommodation claim based upon the Supreme Court’s holding in Muldrow v. City of St. Louis. No longer must a plaintiff show that he was discharged or disciplined for failing to comply with an employment requirement that conflicts with his sincerely held religious beliefs or practices. In Bilyeu v. UT-Battelle, LLC,[1] the 6th Circuit held that a court cannot dismiss a Title VII religious accommodation claim “simply because the plaintiff’s only harm is having to choose between violating his religious beliefs and violating workplace policies.”[2]

Jeffrey and Jessica Bilyeu, a Christian married couple, worked at the Oak Ridge National Laboratory, which is managed by UT-Battelle. In August 2021, UT-Battelle announced a mandatory Covid vaccination policy, to which the Bilyeus objected on religious grounds. After the deadline passed for accommodation applications, UT-Battelle announced that employees who requested a religious accommodation would have to go on unpaid leave until the end of the pandemic. However, the indefinite unpaid leave requirement did not apply to employees who were granted medical accommodations. Shortly before the mandatory policy took effect, Mrs. Bilyeu was granted a medical accommodation because she was a breastfeeding mother. As a result, she did not miss work or pay. Mr. Bilyeu, however, was forced to go on indefinite unpaid leave.

The Bilyeus then sued UT-Battelle, asserting Title VII claims for religious disparate treatment, failure to accommodate, and retaliation arising from the vaccine mandate. Mrs. Bilyeu’s claims were dismissed by the district court for lack of standing, which the 6th Circuit upheld. As for Mr. Bilyeu’s claims, the district court dismissed them on summary judgment solely because Mr. Bilyeu did not suffer a materially adverse employment action, i.e., that unpaid leave was not considered materially adverse because Mr. Bilyeu is “simply not being paid for time that he has not worked.”[3]

The 6th Circuit reversed the summary judgment rulings as to Mr. Bilyeu. In doing so, the court explained that the Supreme Court’s holding in Muldrow v. City of St. Louis[4] required a new analysis. In Muldrow, the Supreme Court held that Title VII does not require a plaintiff to show “that the harm incurred was significant” or that it was “serious, or substantial, or any similar adjective suggesting that the disadvantage to the employee must exceed a heightened bar.”[5] The Supreme Court thus eliminated the “material” requirement that lower courts had added to the prerequisite of an adverse employment action.[6] Prior to Muldrow, the 6th Circuit’s Title VII prima facie standard required a showing that the plaintiff experienced an adverse employment action, which was interpreted to require a “material adverse action.”[7] But Muldrow has now abrogated that 6th Circuit standard.[8] Because the district court had solely relied on the now-abrogated “materially adverse” standard, the 6th Circuit vacated the grant of summary judgment.[9]

Most importantly, the 6th Circuit in Bilyeu revised the religious accommodation prima facie standard. Previously, the standard required a plaintiff to show that he: (1) holds a sincere religious belief that conflicts with an employment requirement; (2) has informed the employer about the conflicts; and (3) was discharged or disciplined for failing to comply with the conflicting employment requirement.[10] The 6th Circuit had long held that a plaintiff cannot satisfy prong three of this standard without showing that he has suffered “some independent harm caused by a conflict between his employment obligation and his religion.”[11] But the 6th Circuit found that Muldrow’s holding was squarely at odds with the third prong of this standard.

The “independent harm” requirement clashes head-on with Muldrow. Saying that an employee needs to suffer a harm that is independent from having to violate his religious beliefs to comply with a policy at work is just another way of saying that the employee needs to face some harm beyond the discrimination itself. After all, the harm in a failure-to-accommodate case is the inability to comply with workplace policies while also complying with the tenets of the employee’s faith. So just as Muldrow bars courts from forcing Title VII plaintiffs to show that they have suffered a “materially adverse impact,” we hold that, under Muldrow, a court cannot dismiss a Title VII complaint simply because the plaintiff’s only harm is having to choose between violating his religious beliefs and violating workplace policies.[12]

Thus, the 6th Circuit struck the third prong (dubbed the “independent harm” requirement”) from its prima facie standard for a Title VII religious accommodation claim. Because summary judgment was granted on Mr. Bilyeu’s accommodation claim because of the now-abrogated “independent harm” requirement, the 6th Circuit vacated the district court’s decision.[13]

So what does the prima facie standard for a Title VII religious accommodation claim look like now, and how will this affect claims going forward? The 6th Circuit did not articulate a new standard. However, it seems logical to conclude that the prima facie standard now only includes two prongs: (1) that the plaintiff holds a sincere religious belief that conflicts with an employment requirement; and (2) that the plaintiff has informed the employer about the conflict. Once a plaintiff establishes a prima facie case, the burden then shifts to the employer to show that (1) it offered the plaintiff a reasonable accommodation or (2) it could not have reasonably accommodated the plaintiff’s religious beliefs without undue hardship.[14] Most disputes in religious accommodation claims focus on whether a reasonable accommodation was offered or whether no accommodation could be offered because of undue hardship. Thus, elimination of the “independent harm” prong does little to resolve most cases. However, it does allow cases with no backpay damages (but potential for compensatory damages) to move forward in litigation. Will this encourage more plaintiffs to assert religious accommodation claims even in the absence of lost wages? Time will tell.

Doug Hamill is a member of Mikel & Hamill PLLC in Chattanooga and former chair of the TBA Labor & Employment Section.  He primarily represents individuals in employment law matters.  He can be reached at dhamill@mhemploymentlaw.com.