CHICAGO — A federal judge has ended a lawsuit that accused J.B. Pritzker’s campaign organization of discrimination against a transgender employee.
In January 2019, Emma Todd sued JB For Governor in federal court in Chicago, alleging violations of Title VII of the federal Civil Rights Act “for discrimination based on sex” when a supervisor fired her from her role as a Springfield field organizer in late March 2018. Todd had earlier filed a discrimination charge with the Equal Employment Opportunity Commission, which granted her the right to sue.
Todd’s complaint said she “received good evaluations and feedback on her work performance” from August 2017 through January 2018 and added there was nothing in her “employment file to indicate that she had performance problems on the job.” She pegged the start of her problems to the February 2018 hiring of a new supervisor, Raynal Sands, who allegedly “viewed transgender identity as a sexual fetish, asked about transgender sexual habits in a prurient manner and stated that Ms. Todd was ‘the reason people don’t like transgender people.’ ”
In addition to “animus against transgender women,” Todd alleged, Sands also treated Todd differently from other employees, “highly scrutinized and criticized” her work performance and in March started telling other employees she planned to fire Todd, despite not using the campaign’s prescribed corrective action process.
According to Tharp, the campaign argued Todd’s dismissal was part of a batch of layoffs coinciding with the end of the primary election. But Todd maintained six staffers involved in that process recommended she be let go “at least in part, on bias-tinged negative information about Todd’s performance from” Sands, Tharp wrote. The judge explained this position is known as “the cat’s paw theory” through which a plaintiff must prove someone “harbored discriminatory animus.”
Tharp said the theory failed because Todd didn’t have evidence “a reasonable jury could conclude that Sands’ behavioral reports about Todd were motivated or inappropriately colored by discriminatory animus.” Notwithstandin allegations of Sands’ transphobic comments, Tharp said the record shows Sands flagged several legitimate performance concerns about Todd’s performance to supervisors.
Among those allegations are an explicit cartoon in Todd’s work area; that Sands and a volunteer believed Todd called the volunteer a “bitch;” and that Todd arrived 15-30 minutes late to an important campaign event, leaving three people outside waiting for a venue to open.
“Where Sands relayed these behavioral issues through email, those emails provided a relatively straightforward recounting of the incident at issue,” Tharp said, noting Todd’s allegations lacked evidence Sands “mischaracterized, hyperbolized, or otherwise overstated Todd’s behavioral issues due to her alleged bias.” Tharp also said Sands only looked into Todd’s conduct following a volunteer’s complaint or Todd reporting an issue, including some “behavioral deficiencies” her previous supervisors addressed.
Furthermore, Tharp wrote, “Todd does not present any evidence that she was reprimanded or counseled for behavioral issues that went unaddressed with other campaign employees, or that Sands made negative reports about Todd regarding conduct that she excused for others.”
Tharp also said Todd’s allegations lack evidence her layoff was the direct result of Sands’ negative reports about her work. He said the campaign showed evidence only one supervisor saw Sands’ email asking that Todd be fired, senior decisionmakers were unaware of Sands’ request and “campaign officials had serious concerns about Todd’s judgment based on several incidents.”
Ultimately, Tharp wrote, “a reasonable jury could conclude neither that Sands’ behavioral reports were discriminatory in motive or content nor that Sands’ transphobic bias was the proximate cause of the campaign’s decision to include Todd in the post-primary layoffs.”
The Law Offices of Joanie Rae Wimmer, of Oak Park, represented Todd.
Pritzker's campaign was represented by attorney William B. Stafford, and others with the firm of Perkins Coie, of Seattle.