The US Supreme Court began hearing arguments on Wednesday in an Ohio woman’s claim that she was denied a promotion and demoted because she is straight in a case that could make it easier for people from “majority backgrounds,” such as white or heterosexual people, to pursue workplace discrimination claims.
The plaintiff, Marlean Ames, is asking the justices to revive her civil rights lawsuit against her employer, Ohio’s Department of Youth Services, after lower courts threw it out. The arguments were ongoing.
Ames, 60, has argued that she was discriminated against because she is heterosexual in violation of a landmark federal anti-discrimination law. Ames said she had a gay supervisor in 2019 when she was passed over for a promotion in favor of a gay woman and demoted in favor of a gay man – both of whom, she asserted, were less qualified than her.
At issue is the requirement by some US courts that plaintiffs from majority groups provide more evidence than minority plaintiffs to show they faced discrimination under Title VII of the Civil Rights Act of 1964. This law prohibits discrimination based on race, religion, national origin and sex – including sexual orientation.
These courts have said the higher bar is justified because discrimination against those workers is relatively uncommon.
The Cincinnati, Ohio-based 6th US Circuit Court of Appeals concluded in 2023 that Ames had not shown the required “background circumstances” indicating that a defendant accused of workplace bias is “that unusual employer who discriminates against the majority.”
The law behind the case
Xiao Wang, the lawyer arguing for Ames, told the justices that the Supreme Court has said in prior rulings that “Title VII aims to eradicate all discrimination in the workplace.”
“But the background circumstances rule doesn’t do that, doesn’t eradicate discrimination,” Wang said. “It instructs courts to practice it by sorting individuals into majority and minority groups based on their race, their sex or their protected characteristic” and applying an evidentiary presumption against plaintiffs “based solely on their being in a majority group, however you define it.”
“But that’s not consistent with the statute that tells us that we’re supposed to protect all individuals from individual discrimination based on the individual case,” Wang added.
Conservative Justice Amy Coney Barrett asked Wang to address the concern expressed by Ohio that ruling in favor of Ames would “throw the door wide open to Title VII suits, because now everybody can say, ‘Hey, this was discrimination on the basis of race, gender, et cetera.'”
The NAACP Legal Defense & Educational Fund and other civil rights groups told the Supreme Court in a legal filing that Ames is asking the justices “to interpret Title VII in a way that ignores the realities of this country’s persisting legacy of discrimination in evaluating disparate-treatment claims.”
They said the “background circumstances” inquiry lets courts account for the reality of historical and present-day discrimination “against certain minority groups like Black and/or LGBTQ people, and the virtual absence of widespread discrimination targeting certain majority groups like white people and straight people.”
A ruling in favor of Ames could bolster the growing number of lawsuits by white and straight workers claiming illegal bias – often called “reverse discrimination – amid a backlash by conservatives and Republicans against initiatives promoting diversity, equity and inclusion in the workforce.
On his first day back in office last month, Republican President Donald Trump ordered the dismantling of such policies in federal agencies and encouraged private companies to follow suit.
Ames started working in the Department of Youth Services, which oversees Ohio’s juvenile corrections system, in 2004, and was promoted in 2014 to administrator of the department’s program aimed at complying with federal standards for preventing sexual abuse in its facilities.
In 2019, Ames interviewed for a newly created “bureau chief” position, but was not offered the job. It was filled by a gay woman who had not applied for the post. Department leaders said Ames lacked the vision and leadership skills needed for the new position, according to court filings.
Around the same time, Ames learned she was being demoted to her previous secretarial role, resulting in an annual pay cut from about $100,000 to $60,000. A gay man was selected to take her place.
Ames sued in federal court in 2020 seeking monetary damages. The office of Republican Ohio Attorney General Dave Yost in court papers defended the employment actions concerning Ames as part of a department restructuring.
The 6th Circuit ruled against Ames, concluding that she could not show the required “background circumstances,” including that a gay person made the employment decisions in favor of gay people. The two people who had authority in those personnel decisions, the 6th Circuit noted, were straight.
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