Opinion ID: 152605
Heading Depth: 3
Heading Rank: 4

Heading: Pregnancy-discrimination claim based on Spees's termination

Text: In addition to alleging that JMI violated the antidiscrimination laws in transferring her to work in the tool room, Spees contends that JMI discriminated against her by terminating her employment after she was placed on bedrest. This claim is also a mixed-motive claim, so Spees must show that she was subject to an adverse employment action for which her pregnancy was a motivating factor. See White v. Baxter Healthcare Corp., 533 F.3d 381, 401 (6th Cir.2008). JMI concedes the obviousthat firing an employee constitutes an adverse employment action. See, e.g., id. at 402. And, to be sure, Spees's pregnancy played a role in her termination, with complications stemming from the pregnancy causing Spees to be placed on bedrest, which in turn led to her firing due to the fact that she had exhausted all of her available medical leave. But the White analysis does not hinge on whether Spees's pregnancy was a link in the chain of events that resulted in her firing. Rather, White directs us to examine whether there is evidence that JMI was motivated by Spees's pregnancy in making its decision to terminate her. JMI's justifies its termination decision by pointing to the fact that Spees presented it with Dr. Mueller's note placing Spees on bedrest. Unlike the note from Dr. Cardenas, which Spees claims was obtained at the direction of Milam in order to restrict her to light-duty work, there is no evidence that JMI influenced Dr. Mueller's writing Spees the bedrest note. This restriction instead stemmed from Dr. Mueller's diagnosis of Spees's incompetent-cervix medical condition. Dr. Mueller's assessment was also arrived at independently of any request by Spees, who testified that she neither asked to be placed on bedrest nor told Dr. Mueller that JMI had told her to seek medical leave. Pursuant to the bedrest note from Dr. Mueller, Spees was unable to work in any capacity at JMI, a point that Spees herself recognizes. Spees also acknowledges that although she would have been placed on medical leave under normal circumstances, she was not eligible for FMLA leave as a recently hired employee who had already exhausted all of the regular leave to which she was entitled. JMI's decision to terminate Spees was thus based on a combination of her being unable to work and her lack of any available medical leave, not upon her pregnancy per se. But Spees maintains that she would not have submitted the bedrest note from Dr. Mueller to JMI if she had known that she was ineligible for any additional medical leave. She adds that she would have preferred to continue working in defiance of Dr. Mueller's advice. But there is no evidence that Spees resisted being placed on bedrest. To the contrary, it was Spees who submitted the bedrest note to JMI. Spees argues that she did so only because she had been encouraged to go on some medical leave, but she also conceded in her deposition that no one at JMI guaranteed her that she was eligible for such leave. Her reliance on any expectation of medical leave was therefore unjustified. In short, absent any evidence that JMI played a role in having Spees placed on bedrestthe event that directly led to her terminationthere is no support for Spees's contention that her pregnancy in and of itself was a motivation behind JMI's decision to fire her. Without the bedrest note, the record supports the conclusion that JMI would have allowed Spees to continue working in the tool room despite being pregnant. Spees was terminated, in other words, not because she was pregnant, but because she voluntarily submitted to JMI the bedrest note advising her not to work for the duration of her pregnancy. We therefore conclude that summary judgment was proper on this claim.