Dive Brief:
- The U.S. Equal Employment Opportunity Commission on Tuesday filed a lawsuit alleging that Apple failed to accommodate a Jewish worker’s faith and then fired him because of his religion and in retaliation for complaining of religious discrimination (EEOC v. Apple, Inc.), according to court documents.
- Soon after converting to Judaism, the worker, a 16-year veteran of the company’s Reston, Virginia, store, allegedly was denied a request for a religious accommodation to have Fridays and Saturdays off to observe the Sabbath by his new manager. The manager also disciplined the worker and eventually terminated him under the pretext he violated the company’s grooming policies, EEOC said in a news release.
- Apple’s alleged actions violate Title VII of the Civil Rights Act of 1964, which prohibits employers from failing to accommodate religious practices, from discriminating against employees based on religion and from retaliating against an employee for complaining about or opposing discrimination, EEOC said. Apple did not immediately respond to a request for comment.
Dive Insight:
The lawsuit is the latest in a series filed by EEOC relating to religious accommodations, which has been a focus of both the agency and the Trump administration.
“Employees should not have to violate their religious beliefs to keep their jobs or live in fear of retribution because they requested an accommodation,” EEOC Philadelphia Regional Attorney Debra Lawrence said in a statement. “The EEOC is committed to protecting the religious rights of employees in the workplace.”
While employers may be exempted from providing religious accommodation if they can prove undue hardship, the bar for undue hardship was raised under the landmark 2023 U.S. Supreme Court decision in Groff v. DeJoy.
In the Apple lawsuit, EEOC called for a permanent injunction enjoining Apple from engaging in religious discrimination and retaliation and ordered the company to implement training and policies that ensure its operations are free from religion-based discrimination and retaliation.
EEOC has pursued similar cases before. On Sept. 19, for example, the agency announced P.F. Chang’s would pay $80,000 to settle a charge alleging that an Alabama restaurant refused to hire an applicant who requested Sundays off because of his religious beliefs.
