United States Court of Appeals

For the Seventh Circuit

Chicago, Illinois 60604

Submitted April 1, 2022*

Decided April 1, 2022 

Before

DIANE S. SYKES, Chief Judge

FRANK H. EASTERBROOK, Circuit Judge

MICHAEL B. BRENNAN, Circuit Judge

No. 21-3001 

TANIKA BEAULIEU,

Plaintiff-Appellant, 

v. 

NEWQUEST MANAGEMENT OF 

ILLINOIS, LLC, 

Defendant-Appellee.

Appeal from the United States District 

Court for the Northern District of Illinois, 

Eastern Division. 

No. 1:17-cv-05672 

Martha M. Pacold, 

Judge. 

O R D E R

Tanika Beaulieu resigned from NewQuest Management of Illinois, LLC, and then 

sued the company for race discrimination and retaliation. See 42 U.S.C. §§ 2000e-2, 

2000e-3. She accuses the company of harassing her and denying her a promotion, better 

pay, and more benefits. Beaulieu disobeyed the court’s rules when responding to

* We have agreed to decide the case without oral argument because the briefs and 

record adequately present the facts and legal arguments, and oral argument would not 

significantly aid the court. FED. R. APP. P. 34(a)(2)(C). 

NONPRECEDENTIAL DISPOSITION

To be cited only in accordance with FED. R. APP. P. 32.1
No. 21-3001 Page 2 

NewQuest’s statement of facts in its motion for summary judgment, and the district 

court entered summary judgment for NewQuest. On appeal, Beaulieu contends that the 

judgment is wrong because a court reporter altered a deposition transcript and the 

judge did not assess all the evidence. But the charge of alteration is unsubstantiated and 

the material evidence undisputedly warrants judgment for NewQuest; thus we affirm. 

We review the entry of summary judgment de novo, construing the record 

evidence in Beaulieu’s favor. See Khungar v. Access Cmty. Health Network, 985 F.3d 565, 

572 (7th Cir. 2021). Beaulieu, who identifies herself as African-American, worked in 

customer service at NewQuest, a healthcare management company. She contends that 

she was racially harassed soon after she started working at the company in 2014. At that 

time, she reported to Juan Salas, a Hispanic man. According to Beaulieu, Salas called 

her stupid, yelled at her in front of peers, and sat so close to her at meetings that his spit 

landed on her as he talked. When she later reported to a new supervisor, Beaulieu says 

that Salas still scolded her before her peers and chastised her about unscheduled breaks. 

(Beaulieu also says that a director touched her back, criticized her, and may have prankcalled her.) Deeming Salas a racist, Beaulieu complained to management about him. 

Beaulieu also contends that NewQuest denied her a promotion, pay, and other 

benefits. She interviewed for the promotion, but NewQuest hired a different AfricanAmerican woman. Before it made that decision, Beaulieu had overheard two words

(“your people”) used in an unknown context as Salas, one of the interviewers, spoke to 

the other interviewer, an African-American manager. Beaulieu also says that NewQuest 

paid her less than a Hispanic employee who had worked at the company longer. 

Finally, Beaulieu did not receive some discretionary benefits. First, nine customerservice workers received bonuses (four were African-American), but Beaulieu did not. 

Second, some employees (but not Beaulieu) could work from home or sometimes leave 

early on holidays. NewQuest permitted employees to work from home if they met 

performance-based criteria, had a work area at home, and could support NewQuest’s

technology. At least six African-American employees met these criteria during 

Beaulieu’s employment. Relatedly, NewQuest reprimanded Beaulieu for skipping work

entirely on a day when, because of inclement weather, NewQuest allowed workers who 

showed up to leave early. 

Beaulieu resigned in March 2016. Before she resigned, she had missed work for 

an approved medical appointment; NewQuest mistakenly recorded the absence as a 

“no-show” and fired her. It quickly acknowledged its mistake and restored her 

employment status. Shaken by the experience, Beaulieu resigned anyway. 
No. 21-3001 Page 3 

Beaulieu sued NewQuest alleging race discrimination and retaliation in violation 

of Title VII of the Civil Rights Act of 1964, 42 U.S.C. §§ 2000e-2, 2000e-3. When 

NewQuest moved for summary judgment, Beaulieu opposed NewQuest’s statement of 

facts, but she did not comply with Rule 56(c) of the Federal Rules of Civil Procedure 

and Local Rule 56.1(b)(3). Therefore, the district judge permissibly ruled, Beaulieu’s 

unsupported assertions did not create disputed questions of fact. See Patterson v. Ind. 

Newspapers, Inc., 589 F.3d 357, 359–60 (7th Cir. 2009). In her response, Beaulieu argued 

that the court reporter had altered the transcript of Salas’s deposition at NewQuest’s 

direction. Beaulieu wanted the court reporter to “release the tape” of the deposition, but 

she did not deny that she received it. On the substance, the judge ruled that Beaulieu’s 

claims about harassment and the denial of promotion, bonus, and other benefits failed 

because, among other problems, no evidence suggested that these actions were 

motivated by her race or complaints of discrimination. The judge also ruled that the 

evidence did not support Beaulieu’s claim that she was constructively discharged. 

On appeal, Beaulieu argues that the judge ignored some evidence that supports 

her claims. First, she maintains in a declaration that the court reporter altered several 

parts of the transcript of Salas’s deposition. Yet she never swears to what statements 

from Salas the court reporter omitted, as she must in order to create a disputed fact. 

See FED. R. CIV. P. 56(c)(4). Instead, she declares that Salas testified that another manager 

made a racially motivated joke, but this is not evidence of the transcript’s alteration 

because in his deposition Salas conceded so much. Second, Beaulieu argues that she did 

not receive some discovery that she requested from NewQuest. But she does not specify 

the discovery that she needed or why it was material. Therefore, this argument goes 

nowhere. See Williams v. Bd. of Educ., 982 F.3d 495, 511 (7th Cir. 2020).

Beaulieu next argues unpersuasively that the judge improperly “weighed” the 

evidence that she considered. We begin with the claim of race discrimination, which 

required Beaulieu to supply evidence that her race motivated NewQuest’s actions. 

See Khungar, 985 F.3d at 573. Beaulieu furnished nothing suggesting that the

unpleasantness she described (name-calling, scolding, close encounters, discipline), the 

privileges she did not receive (remote-work, extra time off), or the denial of promotion

and more pay occurred because of her race. For example, Beaulieu did not show that 

any hostility she attributes to managers was directed against only workers of her race. 

And because Beaulieu did not assert that someone’s stray racial joke affected the 

performance or oversight of her work, it cannot support her claim. See Gorence v. Eagle 

Food Ctrs., Inc., 242 F.3d 759, 762 (7th Cir. 2001). Nor did Beaulieu contradict, as she 
No. 21-3001 Page 4 

must, NewQuest’s evidence that it extended remote-work privileges only to employees 

who met its race-neutral criteria. Likewise, no evidence suggests that the ambiguous

comment she overheard (about a manager’s “people”) after she interviewed for the 

promotion—which went to an African American—was about race. Finally, the 

undisputed evidence shows that pay differences and bonuses (which were also 

awarded to African Americans) were based on tenure and performance. 

Beaulieu has similarly not presented sufficient evidence for a reasonable 

factfinder to conclude that NewQuest retaliated against her because she complained

about discrimination. See Khungar, 985 F.3d at 578. All that she can point to is 

“suspicious timing” between her complaints and the various incidents over the next 

year that she describes. But given the delay between her complaints and the adverse 

events, timing is not enough here to support an inference of retaliation. See Kidwell v. 

Eisenhauer, 679 F.3d 957, 966 (7th Cir. 2012). 

Finally, the judge correctly ruled that Beaulieu did not support her constructivedischarge claim. The workplace she describes, combined with NewQuest’s quickly 

corrected mistake about her “no-show,” did not suggest that race doomed her 

employment prospects; nor was it an environment so unbearably racially charged that 

she had to resign. See Fischer v. Avanade, Inc., 519 F.3d 393, 409–11 (7th Cir. 2008). 

AFFIRMED