�鶹��Ƶ

Anna Stapleton: While Stanley was employed as a firefighter, the city changed its policy regarding its provision of health insurance for retirees. While the city previously offered insurance until age 65 to all those who retired either after 25 years of service or after fewer than 25 years because of a disability, following the policy change, it offered insurance until age 65 only to those retirees with at least 25 years of service. For those who retired earlier, regardless of disability, it offered insurance for only 24 months.

After the policy change, Stanley retired because of a disability and did so with fewer than 25 years of service. So 24 months after her retirement, the city cut off her health insurance. Stanley then sued the city and federal district court, asserting that providing different health insurance benefits to those who retire with a disability from those who retire after 25 years of service violated the ADA's prohibition on discrimination on the basis of disability.

Kannon Shanmugam: What did the lower courts end up doing here?

Anna Stapleton: So the district court dismissed Stanley's ADA claim, concluding that Stanley was not a qualified person because the discrimination she alleged – receipt of the reduced health care benefits – did not take place until after she retired, at which point she did not hold or desire the relevant employment position.

The Eleventh Circuit affirmed on the same basis, but in so doing, recognized a division in authority between federal courts of appeals. While the Sixth, Seventh, and Ninth Circuits had taken the same position, the Second and Third Circuits had taken the opposite view. The Supreme Court granted certiorari to resolve that split.

Kannon Shanmugam: A lot of the decisions we've been discussing this season have been unanimous, but this decision was kind of a fractured mess. Anna, can you help us sort through these opinions?

Anna Stapleton: Yeah, absolutely. So seven justices ultimately affirmed the Eleventh Circuit's holding that as a retiree, Stanley was not a qualified person within the meaning of Title I of the ADA, and so could not challenge the termination of her health insurance under that law.

Justice Gorsuch, writing for the court in two of the three parts of his opinion, explained that the statutory text clearly excludes Stanley from the definition of a qualified person. The definition is written in present tense, signaling that a qualified person must be able to do the job they seek or hold at the time they suffer discrimination.

And that conclusion is reinforced by other aspects of the statute, including the definition of “reasonable accommodation,” which describes the kinds of accommodations that would help current employees or applicants, but not former employees.

And it also gives meaning to textual differences between Title I of the ADA and Title VII of the Civil Rights Act of 1964, which prohibits employment discrimination against employees without any temporal qualifier.

But the third part of Justice Gorsuch's opinion, which garnered only three votes, goes on to address a question first raised in petitioner's merits briefing, whether the facts alleged in her complaint describe someone who did hold or seek a job when the challenged act of discrimination occurred.

That could be so if the discriminatory policy came into effect while Stanley was still employed and was disabled. The problem was that while true, those facts were not actually alleged in her complaint, and she did not adequately preserve that theory below.

Justice Thomas, joined by Justice Barrett, concurred in parts one and two of Justice Gorsuch's opinion and concurred in the judgment. But he wrote separately to express concern about litigants raising questions at the merit stage that had not been presented in the cert briefing.

Justice Sotomayor concurred in part and dissented in part. She would hold that when an employer makes a discriminatory change in post-employment benefits that a retiree earned while qualified and employed, the employer discriminates against the person in her capacity as a qualified individual.

Nevertheless, Justice Sotomayor would be a fifth vote for the view expressed in part three of Justice Gorsuch's opinion, that someone who had a disability and was subjected to a discriminatory policy change before retiring could sue even after retirement, but that Stanley had not preserved that theory in this particular case.

And finally, Justice Jackson dissented. In her view, Congress intended the statute's limitation to qualified individuals to protect employers from having to employ those who cannot do the work, not to cut off the rights of those who had already finished it. And like Justice Sotomayor, she would have said that Title I bars discrimination against an individual in her capacity as a qualified person, even if she's no longer on the job.

Kannon Shanmugam: So Anna, it seems on the one hand as if the court shut the door on claims by retirees, but on the other hand, maybe the court left the door open just a sliver.

Anna Stapleton: Yeah, I think that's right. So on the whole, the majority articulates a clear rule. To bring suit, an individual must show that they were a qualified person either in or seeking a job at the time the discrimination occurred.

But the plurality opinion from Justice Gorsuch illuminates the many ways in which retirees or others who have left jobs can still seek relief under Title I for discrimination that occurred while they were employed.

I would also say that for litigants, it's worth noting that two members of the court expressed serious frustration about the kind of bait and switch that parties sometimes try to pull by introducing new issues or theories at the merit stage that weren't present in the cert briefing.

But of course, five justices were willing to address the merits of the new issue raised here and query whether that may only encourage the practice.

Kannon Shanmugam: I suspect that it probably will, since it almost worked in this case for Ms. Stanley. But in any event, thank you, Anna, for that very helpful explanation of the court's fractured opinions in Stanley. And if you have any questions about the court's decision in Stanley, please feel free to reach out either to Anna or to me. And that brings us to the end of today's episode. We hope you enjoyed it.

For more information about Paul, Weiss's Supreme Court and Appellate Litigation Practice, please visit us at our website, paulweiss.com. And please subscribe to “Court Briefs” wherever you listen to your podcasts. And if you did enjoy today's episode, please rate and review us on your favorite platform. We'll be back again soon with another episode. But until then, thank you for joining us and take care.