Race Discrimination/Harassment Lawsuit Against Seattle Related to Its “Race and Social Justice Initiative” Thrown Out
From Judge Jamal Whitehead’s opinion today in Deimert v. City of Seattle(W.D. Wash.):
It is unlawful for an employer to discriminate against any employee because of their race. Recognizing the stubborn and pernicious effect of racism against minorities, many employers have adopted Diversity, Equity, and Inclusion (“D.E.I.”) initiatives to combat discrimination and harassment in the workplace.
Plaintiff Joshua Diemert, a white man, alleges that his employer, Defendant City of Seattle (“City”), discriminated against him because of his race. He argues that the City’s Race and Social Justice Initiative (“RSJI”)—the City’s D.E.I. program—created a hostile-work environment by “infusing race into all City functions” and “reduc[ing] [him] to an embodiment of his race.”  He also alleges the City retaliated against him when he opposed the supposed harassment.
Controlling precedent makes clear that the legal protections against workplace discrimination apply with equal force regardless of the plaintiff’s race. Yet we must acknowledge what history and common sense tell us: instances of discrimination against the majority are rare and unusual. Diemert does not present that rare and unusual case here. Contrary to his claims, D.E.I. programs aimed at addressing racial inequalities against Black people and other minorities are not by their very nature discriminatory against whites. And while it is apparent that Diemert personally rejects the RSJI, as is his right, the details he alleges about its discriminatory effect are not so objectively severe or pervasive as to create a racially hostile-work environment against white people in general or him in particular. The same is true about the sweeping claims Diemert makes about his co-workers’ and supervisors’ alleged race-based conduct, which lack specificity and factual support. Put plainly, more is required of Diemert under the law to demonstrate an unlawful hostile-work environment.
Because Diemert’s claims do not stack up against the time-honored tests for proving unlawful employment discrimination and retaliation, the Court must grant the City’s summary judgment motion and dismiss Diemert’s case.
The opinion is over 12,000 words long, and I can’t fully analyze it now; you can read it its entirety here. But here’s a short excerpt that rejects Diemert’s claim that the initiative created a racially hostile environment for him:
Diemert argues that the “City’s [RSJI] … la[id] the foundation for all the racial harassment … [he] would face.” It’s clear that Diemert found RSJI messaging incorrect and offensive: he testified that he believes white privilege does not exist and is an “incorrect stereotype”; that it is offensive to state that the United States was built on a system of white supremacy; and that it is offensive to state that it is not appropriate to be color-blind when it comes to race. But the Court rejects the notion that the RSJI and programs like it are inherently racist, as Diemert suggests.
The claim that efforts to address racism in the workplace—such as D.E.I. initiatives—are themselves racist presents a striking paradox. According to their proponents, these programs aim to promote fairness and inclusion by acknowledging and addressing racial disparities—they are designed to ensure that all individuals have access to opportunities. Critics, however, argue that explicitly focusing on race or addressing racial inequalities perpetuates division and unfairness. For them, the cure is worse than the
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