Digital Discrimination and Tech Accountability

• Mobley v. Facebook, Inc., No. 16 Civ. 06440 (N.D. Cal.), Communications Workers of America v. Facebook (EEOC), Spees v. Facebook (EEOC) – Negotiated groundbreaking settlements of three class cases challenging discrimination on Facebook’s ad platform in jobs, housing, and credit based on age, gender, race, and national origin, with Facebook agreeing to make far reaching changes to its ad platform to prevent discrimination, including creating a special mandatory portal for the creation of job, housing, and credit ads without discriminatory filtering options.

• Bradley v. T-Mobile and Amazon.com, No. 17 Civ. 07232 (N.D. Cal.) - Settled the first federal court action to challenge an employer’s practice of steering digital job ads away from workers based on a protected status.

• Communications Workers of America v. Target (EEOC) - Settled claims over how Target directed job ads on social media only to younger workers within certain age ranges, with Target committing to maintain and expand its practices to advance the recruitment and hiring of older workers.

• Job Advertising Discrimination Charges (EEOC) - Obtained the first-of-its-kind decision from the EEOC that employers violate and Title VII of the Civil Rights Act and the Age Discrimination in Employment Act by steering their digital job ads away from women and older people, and won numerous cause findings from the EEOC against employers who steered job ads away from women or older people on Facebook.

• Bride v. Snap Inc., No. 21 Civ. 06680 (C.D. Cal.) - Negotiated a settlement with Snap in a lawsuit challenging dangerous anonymous messaging apps that led to the bullying of teenagers and the suicide of a teenager. In response to the action, Snap decided to ban anonymous messaging apps from its social media platform.

Employment Discrimination

• Rotondo v. JPMorgan Chase, No. 19 Civ. 2328 (S.D. Ohio) – Obtained the first class action settlement of a case in which fathers claimed gender discrimination based on the denial of parental leave to fathers, with Chase paying $5 million to settle with over 1,000 fathers and modifying its policy to make it fully gender neutral.

• Cote v. Wal-Mart Stores, Inc., No. 15 Civ. 12945 (D. Mass.) – Obtained a $7.5 million settlement on behalf of a class of current and former Wal-Mart employees who challenged Wal-Mart’s prior policy of not providing spousal health insurance benefits to employees with same-sex spouses as a Title VII violation, with all Class Members who submitted claim forms receiving payments that were at least several times the value of the health insurance benefits they were denied over a three-year period.

• Levs v. CNN & Turner Broadcasting, No. 410-2014-00427 (EEOC) – Obtained a settlement in an action that challenged the amount of paid parental leave biological fathers were given by CNN and Turner Broadcasting as a violation of Title VII’s sex discrimination ban.

• Awan v. House of Representatives – Obtained a $850,000 settlement for five former House of Representatives IT staffers who became the target of right-wing conspiracy theories and were wrongfully terminated by dozens of House offices.

• Freedom to Work v. Exxon Mobil, No. 2013SN35023 (Ill. Dept. Hum. Rights) – Represented a civil rights group that used paired employment testing to reveal Exxon’s alleged bias against LGBTQ applicants and obtained a cause finding from the Illinois Department of Human Rights in favor of the civil rights group.

• Dukes v. Walmart Stores, Inc., No. 01 Civ. 2252 (N.D. Cal.) – Defeated Walmart’s attempt to dismiss and strike the largest gender discrimination employment class action in U.S. history following the Supreme Court’s denial of class certification.

Credit Discrimination, Fair Housing, & Disability Rights

• Keepseagle v. U.S. Department of Agriculture, No. 99 Civ. 03119 (D.D.C.) – Obtained a $760 million settlement for Native American farmers and ranchers who were denied farm loans by the Department of Agriculture from 1981 to 1999, as well as far-reaching programmatic relief.

• Greater New Orleans Fair Housing Action Center v. U.S. Department of Housing and Urban Development, No. 08 Civ. 01938 (D.D.C.) – Obtained $469 million of voluntary reforms in response to the lawsuit and negotiated a $62 million settlement in a Fair Housing Act class action challenging racial discrimination in the nation’s largest housing rebuilding program in post-Katrina New Orleans.

• National Fair Housing Alliance v. Wells Fargo & Co., No. 09-12-0708-8 (HUD) – Obtained a $42 million settlement with Wells Fargo in a Fair Housing Act action brought by 13 fair housing groups challenging the failure to properly maintain and market foreclosed properties in predominantly black and Latino communities nationally.

• Equal Rights Center v. Equity Residential, No. 06 Civ. 01060 CCB (D. Md.) – Represented a local fair housing organization in massive accessibility fair housing lawsuit involving hundreds of properties, defeating summary judgment on organizational standing and winning summary judgment on the merits, which led to a landmark settlement.

• Jolliff v. Uber Technologies, No. 16 Civ. 605 (E.D. Va.) – Represented a blind woman who was denied access to an Uber because she was accompanied by a service animal in an ADA Title III action that settled confidentially.

• Farmer v. Sweetgreen, Inc., No. 16 Civ. 2103 (S.D.N.Y.)  – Represented a putative class of blind persons who claimed a large restaurant chain had an inaccessible web site to order food in an action that settled with the chain making its web site accessible.

Defamation

• Awan v. Daily Caller, Inc. et al., No. 2020 CA 000652B (D.C. Super.) - Obtained a confidential settlement with the Daily Caller and former Daily Caller reporter Luke Rosiak in an action alleging that five former House of Representatives IT staffers were defamed by a book published by Salem Media Corp. and authored by Rosiak, and defeated Rosiak and Salem’s special motions to dismiss under the D.C. Anti-SLAPP Act.

Servicemembers and Veterans Rights

• Huntsman v. Southwest Airlines Co., No. 17 Civ. 3872 (N.D. Cal.) – Obtained USERRA settlement estimated to be worth up to $19 million for up to 2,000 Southwest Airlines pilots who were denied pension and sick leave benefits between 2001 and 2018.

• Hall v. L-3 Communications, No. 15 Civ. 231 (E.D. Wash.) – Obtained the first class settlement of a USERRA hiring bias pattern-or-practice case, with each class member getting over $28,000 from a $2 million settlement fund and the defense contractor making pro-reservist reforms to its hiring and leave policies.

• Tuten v. United Airlines, Inc., No. 12 Civ. 01561 (D. Colo.) – Obtained a $6.15 million settlement for 1,200 United pilots in a USERRA action that challenged the failure to make the proper pension contributions during periods of military leave from 2001 to 2012, with all Class Members receiving at least 100% of their potential lost benefits.

• Martin v. State of Washington, No. 14-2-00016-7 (Wash. Super. Ct.) – Obtained a settlement worth about $15 million in wages and pension benefits for 878 Washington State Patrol Troopers denied veterans’ preferences in hiring and promotions over several decades.

• Allman v. American Airlines, Inc. Pilot Retirement Program Variable Income Plan, No. 14 Civ. 10138 (D. Mass.) – Obtained about $6.5 million settlement for over 1,200 American Airlines pilots in a USERRA / ERISA action challenging the failure to make the proper pension contributions during periods of military leave from 1997 to 2011, with all Class Members received at least 100% of their potential lost benefits.

• Cunningham v. Federal Express Corp., No. 17 Civ. 845 (M.D. Tenn.) – Obtained a class settlement for over 4,000 reservists who claimed they were denied proper pension credit for periods of military leave from 1996 to 2008, providing benefits to the Class worth at least several million dollars and all Class Members receiving at least 100% of their potential lost pension benefits.

• Clarkson v. Alaska Airlines, Inc., 59 F.4th 424 (9th Cir. 2023) – Won the reversal of summary judgment in a class action in which the plaintiffs claimed that Alaska and Horizon Airlines had an obligation to provide paid leave to reservists during periods of short-term military leave, with the Court holding that a jury must decide whether short-term military leave is comparable to jury duty leave, bereavement leave, sick leave, and vacation.

• Travers v. Federal Express Corp., 8 F.4th 198 (3rd Cir. 2021) – Won the reversal of a dismissal of a class action in which the plaintiffs claimed that Federal Express has an obligation to provide paid leave to reservists during periods of short-term military leave, with the Third Circuit holding that paid leave is right or benefit that must be provided equally to employees on military leave and comparable non-military leaves.

• White v. United Airlines, Inc., 987. F.3d 616 (7th Cir. 2021) - Won the reversal of a dismissal of a class action in which the plaintiffs claimed that United Airlines has an obligation to provide paid leave to reservists during periods of short-term military leave, with the Seventh Circuit holding that paid leave is right or benefit that must be provided equally to employees on military leave and comparable non-military leaves.

• Hill v. U.S. Postal Service, No. 4H310009104 (EEOC Federal Sector) – Obtained an $11 million settlement in a nationwide class action challenging the Postal Service’s pre-offer medical inquiries that violated the Rehabilitation Act.

• Podliska v. House Benghazi Committee and Rep. Trey Gowdy, No. 15 Civ. 2037 (D.D.C.) – Obtained a settlement for a former investigator of the House Benghazi Committee who alleged that he was terminated in violation of USERRA due to his military service, which the Washington Post reported as one of the largest discrimination settlements with a House of Representative office.

• Savage v. Federal Express, 856 F.3d 440 (6th Cir. 2017) – Briefed and argued a successful appeal in one of the first appellate decisions on the formula that employers must apply to determine the pension or retirement benefits of reservists who take military leave, and later obtained a settlement of the case.

• Quick v. Frontier Airlines, No. 15 Civ. 765 (D. Colo.) – Obtained confidential settlement of litigation in which an Army reservist and commercial pilot claimed he was denied reemployment and other rights and benefits under USERRA.

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