Dive Brief:
- A farm labor contractor has agreed to resolve allegations that it discriminated against a pregnant visa holder, the U.S. Equal Employment Opportunity Commission announced Thursday.
- The employee — a pregnant, female H-2A visa employee from Mexico — requested unpaid time off to attend medical appointments related to her pregnancy. EEOC claimed that her employer, Family Fresh Harvesting, LLC, fired her and sent her on a bus to Mexico. EEOC filed a charge against the employer alleging it discriminated against the employee on the basis of her sex in violation of Title VII of the Civil Rights Act.
- Family Fresh Harvesting agreed to pay monetary damages to the employee and provide employment law compliance training to all of its employees as part of a conciliation agreement with EEOC. The company also will send an electronic notice in both English and Spanish to employees stating its commitment to providing reasonable accommodations to pregnant employees and hiring employees irrespective of their sex or pregnancy.
Dive Insight:
Title VII’s discrimination prohibitions apply to all workers at covered employers, according to EEOC guidance, and that includes full-time, part-time, seasonal and temporary workers regardless of their citizenship or immigration status.
In fact, one EEOC guidance document describes a scenario in which an immigrant employee who is pregnant requests three months of paid leave, but whose company denies her request despite having a policy that allows sick employees to take up to three months of such leave. Such conduct constitutes pregnancy discrimination, which is a type of unlawful sex discrimination, according to EEOC.
Pregnancy bias is at the forefront of the agency’s recent legal activity. In September alone, EEOC filed at least three separate lawsuits involving claims under the Pregnant Workers Fairness Act, each focusing on accommodation requests denied to employees. The commission has also cracked down on hiring discrimination against pregnant workers; it sued a Texas barber school for refusing to hire a pregnant job candidate because the employer was allegedly concerned about having more than one pregnant worker on staff simultaneously.
Meanwhile, the public sector saw a $45 million settlement agreement in August between U.S. Customs and Border Protection and a class of pregnant workers who alleged CBP placed them on light duty without allowing them to remain in their regular roles, with or without accommodation, in violation of federal law.