may please the court because first aqua sokoloff from representing the poem veronica danielson in this case at this time i'd like to reserve two minutes for rebuttal if i can the government the court below in this case advocate an impossibly high standard for avoiding summary judgment that most players would never be able to reach on any fact pattern in short the government the court below would do away with wrong by jury all together in favor of trial by affidavit where the only fact finder on a plane is factual claims is one individual judge where that be the case our community whose only role in our justice system is in the form of a jury is that it's really served by the court itself and the diversity of experience that a jury with a cross section of socio economic racial ethnic and gender backgrounds would be lost the court below should not allow coach should not be allowed to hold itself out as litigants a jury of peers when deciding on fact issues where a jury trial has been requested as it has been here as this court's well aware summary judgment is not appropriate against a party unless there is no dispute of material facts and a nonmoving party fails to make it where the where the disputed facts the disputed it's undisputed that by december eleventh two thousand and fifteen dennison's manager tran was aware of the grievance that was filed and resolved over her wages over wages  that is in trans trans declaration so beginning beginning in two thousand and sixteen there's no way there is no less than twelve adverse employment actions that when aggravated could be found to be retaliation under the authority recently thomas vs county riverside indeed numerous times with government sites and their brief that these facts are disputed specifically on page three of the government's brief minutes that the foundational predicate fact about the underlying waves that is in dispute from the government's brief i quote the parties dispute whether danielson was authorized to work overtime that day and again on page seven eight were dangerous and claims that she notified supervisor don jackson that your return mail to the station in contrast jackson so there was a period of time in january i think it was where she had requested to go to a shift that was she was only required to work eight hours correct she couldn't they couldn't force or to work overtime and she couldn't volunteer to work overtime so it's a big writing the first the first restriction she went on was a voluntary eight hour restriction alternately on january twentieth two thousand and sixteen she went onto the medically restricted eight hour list right and so she brought mail back to the post office the end of her eight hour shift she was required to notify she was required to notify right however on numerous and it was up to the post office to figure out what to do with the with that minute is correct numerous times during january february and march after tran knew that she was on the medically restricted eight hour list she would pack her mail up in the morning to go out on a route and she would ask for it ask for instruction about what to then do when she needed to bring the mail back to stay within her medical use for action and typically the answer would either be what it would be called into the office later and we will tell you what to do at that time at which time the management team would typically ignore her call how is all that an adverse action so i'm glad you asked that question because the adverse action is simply that well there's numerous adverse action but the one that i'm not the best the ones about the the one that you're asking about is that she's on a medically restricted eight hour list she is instructed to call the office later about what to do with the mail the management team ignores her and in this case she has three choices she can either continue to deliver the mail in which case she would be working beyond her medical restriction you know so in the case where where they were as numerous times happen she did not get a response from her superiors she can either continue to deliver the mail on the clock exceeding her medical restriction which then makes her her restriction look spurious or she can bring the mail back because they have communicated with her and her discipline or she can work off the clock and again put herself in in the situation where she may very well be disciplined there's literally nothing that she can do now or discipline did they ever did  supervisor ever disciplined her or a writer or a counselor for for bringing mail back to the station when she was on that limitation that is correct yes logan they do that because she didn't tell anybody she brought back extra mile that's a disputed fact she was told supervisor jackson she she says by her by affidavit in her desk in her to in her deposition that she informed jackson that she was bringing back the mail she was already on the eight hour list at that point and within that week she went into the medically restricted eight hour list because of the harassment that she was receiving up to that point so she received a letter of warning at that point in late january and it was my  overtime amount great we have the statements of my client we have the declaration in the deposition testimony of my client and we have been able to examine person any of the adverse parties all we have is their declarations disputed facts there is actually you know and i would like to talk you know more specifically the retaliation angle on march eleventh after again telling so this is the pattern of retaliation  to a situation where early in the week janus and would typically ask what to do you know to stay within a restriction her management team would typically say delay the third class mail and on march eleventh they you know she was told to do call it delayed the first class mail again which i try and that's what our car the third class mail again at which point tran knows that the mail will have to be delivered the next day and on march twelfth she gets on the intercom to the entire incentives and says over the intercom there will be no auxiliary assistance even for even for people even for letter carriers that are on the medically restricted eight hour list to the best of our investigation and knowledge there were no other people in that station there on the medically really restricted eight hour list at sobrante so i just saw anderson how that affected your client she's being and now she's being called out in front of a you know a station where people know that she's on a medically restricted list where it's pretty common knowledge that she'd been suffering this harassment from her supervisors and her manager gets on the intercom and says there's not going to be any auxiliary assistance for people on the medically restricted eight hour list and that is pointed directly at one person  point it out rhonda danielson your argument is that's going to defy the turf somebody at the postal office from filing a wage going i mean the argument is is that in isolation none of these things may very well add up to what we would typically call adverse action but when you take you know a months long pattern and campaign of retaliation toward the person you know whereas you know you take these whole things into him as a can you say you know what does this look like it looks like a calculat pattern to harass and retaliate this progress this person because she exerted her protected right of saying you guys took my wages good morning may it please the court sara more ahead here on behalf of meghan brennan the postmaster general the district court correctly granted summary judgment because danielson failed to establish the required elements of her prime aphasia case of retaliation except for a single letter of warning she received for violating a known workplace rule danielson did not suffer any adverse actions it's undisputed that as to that letter of warning the supervisor who issued it didn't even know that she had  filed a complaint in any way about her wages setting aside the letter of warning the issues that danielson complains about are the type of actions that the burlington case has described as  has just said that the issue with the intercom when supervisor tran made an announcement over the intercom that was singling danielson out that's not supported by the record she did not use her name in that announcement and there is no evidence in the record that other coworkers knew that danielson was on the eight hour list trans declaration also states that there was another employee at that time who was on the eight hour list so that announcement in no way singled out danielson it applied to everyone and it was not an adverse  action danielson cannot aggregate actions that are trivial in context into an adverse action that that principles highlighted in the burlington case and in the supreme court's other cases like amtrak the morgan and harris v forklifts forklifts systems which explains the difference between a retaliation or discrimination case danielson is alleging retaliation vs a hostile work environment case which danielson is not alleging in amtrak and harris the supreme court explained that it discrimination or retaliate and claim involves discrete acts whereas a hostile work environment claim involves a series of actions over time that by themselves may seem insignificant but in concert may contribute to a hostile work environment in contrast in cases like this courts look to each discrete act to determine if it was retaliatory or adverse in briefing before the district court the government argued that a hostile work environment claim was neither legally nor factually cognize a bill here plaintiff abandoned that claim before the district court and before this court but is now seeking to do an end run around that and try to use hostile work environment type analysis to establish a retaliation claim the case law doesn't support that result in analyzing her claims and to determine whether an adverse action occurred it's important to look at the fact in context for example danielson alleges that on one occasion on december twenty ninth she requested forty five minutes of overtime but was only granted thirty minutes of overtime it's important to note that six other employees requested overtime on that day and all of their requests were denied so the fact that danielson was granted thirty minutes of overtime when no one else was granted overtime is not an adverse action similarly on the days that she claims she was denied auxilary assistance she doesn't allege any adverse consequences to herself and the released officer post office is responsibility to figure that mail that's exactly right she knew that she could return the mail any under livered mail at the end of the day to the postal service and then it became the postal service responsibility really duty was to alert them that she was bringing back mail that's exactly right she just had to notify the supervisor that she had done so in the reasons for that so they would know what was coming back and why so they could determine the best way to handle that situation in addition as set forth in the other residence in the record all employees sometimes receive less overtime and they request her go last less auxilary assistance there they requested that happen to danielson both before and after her complaint it happened to other employees too it was simply not an adverse action it's also important to consider the context of the allegations that she alleges about the staring for example because the allegations in her brief don't always match the evidence in the record in her brief she describes the the staring as menacing and intimidating but her own declaration to which she cites doesn't use those or any similar words and describes it more as supervisor tran describes it as common every day workplace  monitoring of an employee's work history and was required to do danielson also complains the trans behavior drastically changed towards her on nov twenty eighth but that allegation actually undermines her allegations because even under danielson version of the facts the earliest date that any supervisor was aware of her wage complaint was november thirtieth in some there's no evidence of an adverse action other than the letter of warning there is no evidence of any causal connection between her wage complaint and any adverse action and there is no evidence a pretext whatsoever at the employer has set forth legitimate non retaliatory reasons for all actions taken and danielson did not come back with  voluntary eight hour list and there is a medically restricted eight hour list there are two different things to our knowledge for our credentials and is the only one on the medically restricted listen that station on that day and the announcement was essentially i'm paraphrasing there will be no auxiliary assistance for those on the medically restricted on the eight hour medically restricted list as far as you know behavior changing towards dentists and on november twenty eighth undermining our claim is  is is not accurate because if you're asking your boss who knows that she has you know that it's undisputed that those wages were were taken and if you're asking about your wages on november twenty eighth even if that has not activated the retaliation clause of the of the the claim yet the manager knows that you're asking about your wages if you come in you ask about your wages and she has taken your wages a week or two or whatever  before hand she has a pretty good idea of what you're asking about as far as i want to really quickly touch on the gravity of the fact claims and how the court below we should make it really quick but i'm sorry i'm sorry  the the the claims in this case were more agree just more significant economically to veronica daniels and she carried the mail over time regularly for nearly twenty years and she went on the medically restricted eight hour list she lost much more than nine thousand dollars that was cited in thomas thank you thank you this concludes the argument on the day of some case and should be submitted then we'll turn