Background
San Francisco Bay Area Rapid Transit District adopted a COVID-19 vaccination requirement in October 2021. Although BART found 70 employees potentially eligible for religious exemptions, it concluded that none could be accommodated without undue hardship. Employees who remained unvaccinated were required to retire, resign, or face termination.
Six former employees sued under Title VII and California’s Fair Employment and Housing Act, alleging that BART failed to accommodate their sincere religious objections. After a jury found against BART on its undue-hardship defense, it awarded the employees a combined $7,824,580. The district court denied BART’s motions for judgment as a matter of law and a new trial. The employees conditionally cross-appealed the dismissal of their Free Exercise claims, and Ryan Rivera also challenged the failure to reinstate him.
The Court’s Holding
The Ninth Circuit affirmed. BART was not entitled to judgment as a matter of law because substantial evidence supported the jury’s finding that accommodating the six employees would not have imposed an undue hardship. Under the Supreme Court’s Groff standard, BART had to establish a substantial, excessive, or unjustifiable burden—not merely that alternatives such as masking and distancing were less safe than vaccination. Public-health guidance carried weight but was not dispositive, and the guidance on which BART claimed to have relied was not introduced into evidence.
The employees’ jobs generally involved minimal close contact with the public or coworkers, and BART identified no evidence that they were unable or unwilling to mask or take similar precautions. The court also upheld the denial of a new trial, concluding that the verdict was not against the clear weight of the evidence and that counsel’s violations of an evidentiary order were cured and caused no demonstrated prejudice. It dismissed the Free Exercise cross-appeal as moot and found no plain error in awarding Rivera front pay rather than reinstatement because he had elected front pay below.
Key Takeaways
- An employer does not prove undue hardship merely by showing that a proposed religious accommodation carries some additional safety risk.
- Whether alternatives to vaccination create an undue hardship requires a fact-specific assessment of the employer’s business, the employee’s duties, workplace contact, and available precautions.
- Public-health guidance may carry special weight, but it is not conclusive, and after-the-fact expert testimony need not be accepted by a jury as proof of what informed the employer’s decision.
Why It Matters
The decision applies Groff’s heightened undue-hardship standard to religious objections to workplace vaccination mandates. It confirms that employers must demonstrate a substantial burden tied to the particular workplace and employees rather than rely on a categorical claim that any measure less effective than vaccination is unreasonable.
Judge Nelson separately criticized the district court’s analysis of the unreviewed Free Exercise claims, arguing that Ninth Circuit precedent treats a discretionary exemption system as not generally applicable and therefore subject to strict scrutiny. That discussion was a concurrence, however, and did not alter the panel’s holding affirming the employment-discrimination judgment.