Can someone file a racial discrimination lawsuit against a member of the same race? What about when a person's actual race is in question (as in the Rachel Dolezal/NAACP case earlier this year)?
Gunster attorney Roger Feicht discusses the issue in depth in a Sept. 17 article on HR.BLR.com, an online resource for HR professionals.
Title VII of the Civil Rights Act of 1964 protects individuals against discrimination based on a variety of protected statuses, including race. Federal courts have held that racial discrimination claims under can indeed be brought against members of the same race under Title VII, Feicht says.
However, federal court decisions across the country are inconsistent when it comes to apparent misperceptions regarding a plaintiff's race or national origin, he adds. This includes a case involving a plaintiff's misrepresentations about his own race/ethnicity, in which the court concluded the plaintiff could move forward with a Title VII claim, despite the employer's mistaken perception of the plaintiff's national original.
Read the article by Roger Feicht: Racial identity and workplace discrimination (Business & Legal Resources, HR and Employment Law News, 9/17/15). Also: Tackling intraracial, transracial claims under Title VII (Law360, 10/7/15)
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