Ronnie Coleman v. Chevron Phillips Chemical Company, L.P.
AdministrativeLaw EmploymentDiscrimina
Whether the Fifth Circuit's rigid, four-part test for dismissing discriminatory remarks as legally irrelevant "stray remarks" unless made by a final decision-maker —a test this Court implicitly rejected in Reeves v. Sanderson Plumbing Products, Inc., 530 U.S. 133 (2000) —impermissibly usurps the jury's role of weighing evidence and assessing credibility.
Whether an employer may escape liability when a supervisor with blatant discriminatory animus initiates and proximately causes a termination, simply because the final sign-off comes from an ostensibly unbiased official —a question that has divided the circuits and on which the Fifth Circuit's analysis is in direct tension with this Court's holding in Staub v. Proctor Hospital, 562 U.S. 411 (2011).
Whether the Fifth Circuit's requirement that plaintiffs produce a "nearly identical" comparator to prove disparate treatment imposes an evidentiary burden so severe that it functionally immunizes employers from liability, in direct conflict with the more flexible and realistic "all material respects" standard adopted by a majority of other circuits.
Whether the Fifth Circuit's rigid evidentiary standards for employment discrimination claims impermissibly restrict plaintiffs' ability to prove discrimination and survive summary judgment