Court Opinion

ID: 9365234
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-01-23 16:00:35.631003+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T17:15:43.936591
License: Public Domain

22-1251
Syeed v. Bloomberg L.P.

                          United States Court of Appeals
                             For the Second Circuit

                                        August Term 2022

                                    Argued: January 9, 2023
                                   Decided: January 23, 2023

                                            No. 22-1251

                                          NAFEESA SYEED,

                                         Plaintiff-Appellant,

                                                  v.

                                         BLOOMBERG L.P.,

                                        Defendant-Appellee. *

                          Appeal from the United States District Court
                            for the Southern District of New York
                           No. 20-cv-7464, Gregory H. Woods, Judge.

          Before:         JACOBS, SULLIVAN, and PÉREZ, Circuit Judges.

       This case presents an unresolved question of New York law: whether a
nonresident plaintiff not yet employed in New York City or State satisfies the
impact requirement of the New York City Human Rights Law (the “NYCHRL”)
or the New York State Human Rights Law (the “NYSHRL”) if the plaintiff pleads
and later proves that an employer deprived the plaintiff of a New York City- or

*   The Clerk of Court is respectfully directed to amend the caption as set forth above.
State-based job opportunity on discriminatory grounds. Because we conclude that
this issue implicates a host of important state interests, we reserve decision and
certify the question to the New York Court of Appeals.

      DECISION RESERVED AND QUESTION CERTIFIED.

                                  NIALL MACGIOLLABHUI, Law Office of Niall
                                  MacGiollabhui, New York, NY, for Plaintiff-
                                  Appellant Nafeesa Syeed.

                                  ELISE M. BLOOM, Proskauer Rose LLP, New
                                  York, NY (Allison L. Martin, Proskauer Rose
                                  LLP, New York, NY, Mark W. Batten,
                                  Proskauer Rose LLP, Boston, MA, on the brief),
                                  for Defendant-Appellee Bloomberg L.P.

RICHARD J. SULLIVAN, Circuit Judge:

      This case presents an unresolved question of New York law: Whether a

nonresident plaintiff not yet employed in New York City or State satisfies the

impact requirement of the New York City Human Rights Law (the “NYCHRL”)

or the New York State Human Rights Law (the “NYSHRL”) if the plaintiff pleads

and later proves that an employer deprived the plaintiff of a New York City- or

State-based job opportunity on discriminatory grounds. Because we conclude that

this issue implicates a host of important state interests, we reserve decision and

certify the question to the New York Court of Appeals.

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                                        I.    Background

       Bloomberg L.P. (“Bloomberg”) is a privately held company that operates

Bloomberg       Media,      a   news      organization       that    employs      approximately

2,700 reporters, producers, and editors across over 120 news bureaus worldwide. 1

Bloomberg Media’s employment decisions are controlled by its Editorial

Management Committee, which operates from Bloomberg’s New York City

headquarters.

       In October 2014, Nafeesa Syeed, a South Asian-American woman, began

working for Bloomberg’s Dubai news bureau as a Persian Gulf economy and

government reporter. A year later, Syeed informed Bloomberg that she wished to

transfer to its New York or Washington, D.C. bureaus because of her husband’s

job location. After applying for multiple positions, Syeed ultimately obtained a

position in the Washington, D.C. bureau reporting on cybersecurity. By mid-2018,

Syeed realized that there was no career path for her at that bureau, and she applied

for several reporting jobs with Bloomberg in New York City. In particular, Syeed

repeatedly told her team leader that she was interested in filling a U.N.-reporter

position. That vacancy, however, was ultimately filled by a man.

1The facts are drawn from the second amended complaint and are accepted as true for the
purposes of this opinion. See, e.g., Chambers v. Time Warner, Inc., 282 F.3d 147, 152 (2d Cir. 2002).

                                                 3
      When Syeed subsequently asked why she had not been considered for the

U.N. position, her team leader responded that Syeed had never said that she

wanted to cover foreign policy; he also advised her that she had to advocate for

herself if she wanted to advance at Bloomberg. Another editor told Syeed that one

of the reasons she was not considered for the U.N. position was that the position

had not been designated as a “diversity slot.” J. App’x at 48. In June 2018, Syeed

met with the Head of Human Resources for the Washington, D.C. bureau and

complained that Bloomberg had a racist and sexist culture. The Head of Human

Resources instructed Syeed to report her concerns to a senior executive editor for

diversity, talent, standards, and training at Bloomberg Media. Two days later,

Syeed informed her team leader and managing editor that she could not continue

to work at Bloomberg because of the discrimination that she faced.

      On behalf of herself and other similarly situated individuals, Syeed – now a

resident of California – filed a class-action lawsuit in New York state court against

Bloomberg and several of its employees on August 9, 2020; shortly thereafter, she

amended her complaint. Prior to any further proceedings in state court, the

Defendants removed the case to federal court pursuant to the Class Action

Fairness Act and moved to dismiss the amended complaint under Federal Rule of

                                         4
Civil Procedure 12(b)(6). Rather than oppose the motion, Syeed again amended

her complaint, dropping all of the individual employee defendants. In her second

amended complaint, Syeed alleged class claims under NYSHRL for disparate

treatment and disparate impact on the basis of sex, as well as individual claims for

constructive discharge and, under NYSHRL and NYCHRL, for discrimination on

the basis of race and sex in denying her promotions, setting her compensation, and

creating a hostile work environment.

          Thereafter, Bloomberg again moved to dismiss under Rule 12(b)(6). Upon

that motion, the district court (Woods, J.) dismissed all of Syeed’s claims against

Bloomberg, including her NYCHRL and NYSHRL claims based on Bloomberg’s

failure to promote her to positions in New York. See Syeed v. Bloomberg L.P., 568 F.

Supp. 3d 314, 321, 329–34 (S.D.N.Y. 2021).2 More specifically, the district court

concluded that Syeed’s failure-to-promote claims must be dismissed because, at

all relevant times, Syeed was a nonresident of New York City and State who

worked in Washington, D.C., and thus did not and could not adequately plead

that she had felt the impact of Bloomberg’s discrimination in New York City or

2   On appeal, Syeed only contests the district court’s dismissal of her failure-to-promote claims.

                                                   5
State. Id. The district court entered a final judgment pursuant to Federal Rule of

Civil Procedure 54(b) on Syeed’s claims, and Syeed timely appealed.

                             II.     Standard of Review

      We review de novo a district court’s grant of a motion to dismiss for failure

to state a claim under Rule 12(b)(6). See Harris v. Mills, 572 F.3d 66, 71 (2d Cir.

2009). Accordingly, we consider the legal sufficiency of the complaint, taking its

factual allegations to be true and drawing all reasonable inferences in Syeed’s

favor. See id.

                                   III.   Discussion

      Syeed’s appeal raises a single legal question:       Whether a nonresident

plaintiff not yet employed in New York City or State satisfies the NYCHRL or

NYSHRL impact requirement if the plaintiff pleads and later proves that an

employer deprived the plaintiff of a New York City- or State-based job

opportunity on discriminatory grounds. We find that this core question is an

unsettled issue of New York law that merits certification to the New York Court

of Appeals.

      “Although the parties did not request certification, we are empowered to

seek certification nostra sponte.” Kuhne v. Cohen & Slamowitz, LLP, 579 F.3d 189, 198

                                           6
(2d Cir. 2009). “We may certify a question to the New York Court of Appeals

where that court has not spoken clearly on an issue and we are unable to predict,

based on other decisions by New York courts, how the Court of Appeals would

answer a certain question.” Ortiz v. Ciox Health LLC, 961 F.3d 155, 158 (2d Cir.

2020) (internal quotation marks omitted); see also 2d Cir. R. 27.2(a); 22 N.Y.C.R.R.

§ 500.27(a). Our discretion to certify is principally guided by three factors: “(1) the

absence of authoritative state court decisions; (2) the importance of the issue to the

state; and (3) the capacity of certification to resolve the litigation.” O’Mara v. Town

of Wappinger, 485 F.3d 693, 698 (2d Cir. 2007). Each of these factors weighs in favor

of certification here.

      As to the first certification factor, the New York Court of Appeals has not

decided the specific question raised in this case. The closest case is Hoffman v.

Parade Publications, where the New York Court of Appeals held that, because

NYCHRL and NYSHRL were intended to protect persons who inhabit or are

persons within New York City and State, respectively, “nonresidents of the city

and state must plead and prove that the alleged discriminatory conduct had an

                                          7
impact within those respective boundaries.” 15 N.Y.3d 285, 289, 291 (2010). 3

Applying that test, the Hoffman court found that the plaintiff – who resided and

worked in Georgia, but who attended quarterly meetings in, and was managed

and fired from, New York City – was not himself sufficiently impacted within

New York City or State to be able to bring a claim for discriminatory termination.

Id. at 288, 292. Hoffman, however, was silent as to whether, in discriminatory

failure-to-hire or failure-to-promote cases, a nonresident plaintiff – who did not

work in New York City or State, but who alleged that but for an employer’s

unlawful conduct, he or she would have worked in New York City or

State – would also be unable to assert sufficient personal impact in New York City

or State.

3Hoffman based its intent conclusions on certain statutory provisions. See, e.g., id. at 289 (noting
that NYCHRL “declares, among other things, that ‘prejudice, intolerance, bigotry, and
discrimination . . . threaten the rights and proper privileges of [the city’s] inhabitants’”; also noting
that the NYCHRL “created the City Commission on Human Rights to, among other things, ‘foster
mutual understanding and respect among all persons in the city of New York’” (quoting N.Y.C.
Admin. Code §§ 8-101, 8-104) (alterations and emphasis added by Hoffman)); id. at 291 (noting
that NYSHRL “declares that the State of New York ‘has the responsibility to act to assure that
every individual within [New York State] is afforded an equal opportunity to enjoy a full and
productive life,’ and that failure to afford equal opportunity ‘threatens the peace, order, health,
safety and general welfare of the state and its inhabitants’” (quoting N.Y. Exec. Law § 290)
(alterations and emphasis added by Hoffman)). We recognize, though, that N.Y.C. Admin. Code
§ 8-104 has been repealed.

                                                   8
      Nor does Hoffman provide clear guidance from which we can predict how

the New York Court of Appeals would answer our question. Certain portions of

Hoffman seem to imply that nonresidents can satisfy the NYCHRL or NYSHRL

impact requirement only if they currently work in New York City or State. See,

e.g., id. at 291 (“[T]he impact requirement [for nonresidents] . . . confines the

protections of the NYCHRL to those who are meant to be protected – those who

work in the city.” (emphasis added)); id. (“Application of the ‘impact’ requirement

to [NYSHRL] claims achieves the same ends as is the case with its City counterpart,

because it permits those who work in the state to invoke its protections.” (emphasis

added)). But given that the Hoffman court was only asked to address a claim

related to a discriminatory termination, we do not think it is our place to read

Hoffman’s references to “those who work in” New York City or State to necessarily

preclude those who would work in New York City or State absent discrimination.

Id. Furthermore, we note that another portion of Hoffman seems to allow for the

possibility that a plaintiff could satisfy the impact requirement without living or

working in New York City or State at the time of the discriminatory acts. See id. at

292 (finding that dismissal was proper because “Hoffman was neither a resident

of, nor employed in, the City or State of New York. Nor does Hoffman state a claim

                                         9
that the alleged discriminatory conduct had any impact in either of those

locations.” (emphasis added)). 4

       Other decisions by New York courts are equally ambiguous on this issue.

For starters, the parties have not cited, and we are not aware of, any lower

state-court case where a nonresident plaintiff who was not yet employed in New

York City or State raised a failure-to-hire or failure-to-promote claim. And to the

extent that lower state-court cases applying the impact requirement to the more

typical hostile-work-environment or termination fact patterns are relevant, the

cases cut both ways.         For example, some cases have interpreted the impact

requirement to “turn[] primarily on [the plaintiff’s] physical location at the time of

the alleged discriminatory acts,” Benham v. eCommission Sols., LLC, 989 N.Y.S.2d

20, 21 (1st Dep’t 2014); see also Wolf v. Imus, 96 N.Y.S.3d 54, 55 (1st Dep’t 2019)

(same), while others seem to have more broadly posited that a plaintiff can allege

impact if he or she can show that the discriminatory acts affected “the terms,

conditions[,] or extent of [his or her] employment . . . within the boundaries of

4See also Pakniat v. Moor, 145 N.Y.S.3d 30, 30–31 (1st Dep’t 2021) (like Hoffman, emphasizing that
NYSHRL is “intended to protect the residents of this State or nonresidents who work in this
State,” but also concluding that the plaintiff could not make out her NYCHRL or NYSHRL claims
“because plaintiff was living and working in Montreal, Canada at the time of the alleged
discriminatory conduct and she failed to allege that the conduct had any impact in either New
York State or New York City” (emphasis added)).

                                               10
New York,” Hardwick v. Auriemma, 983 N.Y.S.2d 509, 512 (1st Dep’t 2014); see also

Jarusauskaite v. Almod Diamonds, Ltd., 152 N.Y.S.3d 579, 580 (1st Dep’t 2021) (same).

       Federal courts have been no more conclusive. Although this is a matter of

first impression in this Circuit,5 district courts within this Circuit have reached

different conclusions.        As already described, the district court in this case

concluded that the NYCHRL and NYSHRL impact requirement could not be met

by a nonresident plaintiff whose only asserted geographical connection was that

she was denied a promotion to a position in New York City and State. See Syeed,

568 F. Supp. 3d at 330–34. In reaching this conclusion, the district court relied

heavily on the statements in Hoffman seeming to imply that a nonresident plaintiff

must work in the City or State at the time of the discriminatory act to be impacted

5 There are no Second Circuit decisions, precedential or non-precedential, on point. See, e.g.,
Vangas v. Montefiore Med. Ctr., 823 F.3d 174, 182–83 (2d Cir. 2016) (in a discriminatory-termination
case, holding that a plaintiff who “worked in Yonkers, was supervised in Yonkers, and was
terminated in Yonkers,” but spoke on the phone to patients in New York City, did not satisfy the
NYCHRL impact requirement, because she was not personally impacted in the City); Ware v. L-3
Vertex Aerospace, LLC, 833 F. App’x 357, 358–59 (2d Cir. 2020) (in a hostile-work-environment and
retaliatory-termination case, holding that a plaintiff who was a Florida resident, worked as a
supply technician in Afghanistan, and signed an employment agreement with a Mississippi
choice-of-law provision, did not satisfy the NYCHRL or NYSHRL impact requirement by virtue
of his employer’s parent company being headquartered in New York); Fried v. LVI Servs., Inc., 500
F. App’x 39, 42 (2d Cir. 2012) (in a discriminatory- and retaliatory-termination case, holding that
a plaintiff who “at all times relevant to his complaint lived and worked in Connecticut,” but
frequently communicated with his former employer’s New York headquarters and attended
meetings there, did not satisfy the NYCHRL impact requirement through those tangential
connections).

                                                11
in either location. See, e.g., id. at 331; see also id. at 331–32 (also citing favorable

language from Pakniat, Hardiwick, Benham, and Wolf).

      But the three other district courts that have considered the pertinent

question have reached the opposite conclusion. For example, in Anderson v.

HotelsAB, LLC, the plaintiff alleged that, due to her relationship with her disabled

son, she was not hired for a position that would have required her to work about

half the year in New York City. No. 15-cv-712 (LTS), 2015 WL 5008771, at *1–2

(S.D.N.Y. Aug. 24, 2015). Invoking language similar to Hardwick and Jarusauskaite,

the district court noted that “the [NYCHRL] impact requirement is satisfied if the

plaintiff alleges that the conduct has affected the terms and conditions of plaintiff’s

employment within the city,” and thus refused to dismiss the case because the

allegedly discriminatory refusal to hire “had an impact with respect to [the

plaintiff’s] prospective employment responsibilities in New York City.” Id. at *2–

4; see also Chau v. Donovan, 357 F. Supp. 3d 276, 283–84 (S.D.N.Y. 2019) (finding that

a California plaintiff alleging that she was not hired for a New York City position

due to her refusal to submit to sexual demands had adequately pleaded the

NYCHRL and NYSHRL impact requirement); Scalercio-Isenberg v. Morgan Stanley

Servs. Grp. Inc., No. 19-cv-6034 (JPO), 2019 WL 6916099, at *1, *4 (S.D.N.Y. Dec. 19,

                                          12
2019) (finding that a New Jersey plaintiff alleging that she was not hired for a New

York City position due to her age, gender, and disability had adequately pleaded

the NYCHRL and NYSHRL impact requirement).

      In sum, given the absence of any state-court decisions directly on point, as

well as the absence of clear guidance from any state-court decisions from which

we can predict how the New York Court of Appeals would answer our question,

we conclude that certification of the question is preferable to resolving it ourselves.

See CFTC v. Walsh, 618 F.3d 218, 231 (2d Cir. 2010) (observing that certification is

appropriate where an issue has not been litigated often enough in New York

courts to give rise to “sufficient precedents . . . to make a determination concerning

[its] proper outcome” (internal quotation marks omitted)).

      As to the second certification factor, resolving this issue involves making

value judgments and weighing competing policy interests, which the New York

Court of Appeals is better positioned to do. See Ortiz, 961 F.3d at 159. On the one

hand, a ruling for Syeed would allow NYCHRL and NYSHRL suits against

prospective employers who hire for jobs in New York City or State by plaintiffs

who have no past or present geographical connections. See Syeed, 568 F. Supp. 3d

at 333 (“Anderson’s misapplication of the impact test . . . expands the class of

                                          13
nonresident plaintiffs protected by the NYCHRL [and NYSHRL] to include

individuals who do not work in the city or state, but who merely speculate that

they might have done so someday in the future.”). 6 On the other hand, a ruling

for Bloomberg would serve to immunize employers from liability under NYCHRL

or NYSHRL for discriminatory conduct pertaining to New York City- or State-

based jobs – conduct which does arguably have an impact within New York City

or State. See Pakniat, 145 N.Y.S.3d at 31 (“[NYCHRL and NYSHRL] are meant to

deter discriminatory behavior by New York employers, as well as to compensate

the employees impacted by that behavior.”). 7                 Given these competing state

interests, we find that this issue is best answered by the New York Court of

6 Cf. Shiber v. Centerview Partners LLC, No. 21-cv-3649 (ER), 2022 WL 1173433, at *4 (S.D.N.Y. Apr.
20, 2022) (“[I]f ‘impact can be shown by a mere hope to work in New York down the line, the
flood gates would be open.’” (quoting Kraiem v. JonesTrading Inst. Servs. LLC., 492 F. Supp. 3d 184,
199 (S.D.N.Y. 2020)).
7 We also note that the New York City Council amended NYCHRL post-Hoffman “to clarify its
intent to foster jurisprudence maximally protective of civil rights in all circumstances.” Makinen
v. City of New York, 857 F.3d 491, 495 (2d Cir. 2017) (internal quotation marks omitted); see also
N.Y.C. Admin. Code § 8-130 (identifying three cases “that have correctly understood and
analyzed the liberal construction requirement”). Of course, “it is well settled that the Legislature
is presumed to be aware of the decisional and statute law in existence at the time of an
enactment.” Odunbaku v. Odunbaku, 28 N.Y.3d 223, 229 (2016) (internal quotation marks and
alterations omitted). But where, as here, no decisional law appears to have definitively answered
our question, the post-Hoffman (and other previous) amendments may have some bearing on how
broadly to interpret the NYCHRL impact requirement.

                                                14
Appeals. See Brooklyn Ctr. for Psychotherapy, Inc. v. Phila. Indemnity Ins. Co., 955

F.3d 305, 314 (2d Cir. 2020).

      As to the third and final certification factor, the answer to the certified issue

will no doubt control the outcome of the case before us. If the New York Court of

Appeals determines that a nonresident plaintiff not yet employed in New York

City or State may nevertheless satisfy the NYCHRL or NYSHRL impact

requirement by pleading and later proving that an employer deprived the plaintiff

of a New York City- or State-based job opportunity on discriminatory grounds,

the district court’s Rule 12(b)(6) dismissal of Syeed’s failure-to-promote claims

would have to be reversed and the case remanded for further proceedings. But if

the New York Court of Appeals decides that only nonresident plaintiffs who are

already employed in New York City or State can meet the NYCHRL or NYSHRL

impact requirement, the district court’s decision would have to be affirmed.

                                 IV.    Conclusion

      For the reasons stated above, we RESERVE decision and CERTIFY the

following question to the New York Court of Appeals:

      Whether a nonresident plaintiff not yet employed in New York City
      or State satisfies the impact requirement of the New York City Human
      Rights Law or the New York State Human Rights Law if the plaintiff
      pleads and later proves that an employer deprived the plaintiff of a

                                         15
      New York City- or State-based job opportunity on discriminatory
      grounds.

Of course, the New York Court of Appeals is not limited to the question stated.

Rather, the New York Court of Appeals may modify the certified question as it

sees fit and may direct the parties to address other issues that it deems relevant to

the circumstances presented in this appeal.

      It is hereby ORDERED that the Clerk of this Court transmit to the Clerk of

the New York Court of Appeals a certificate, as set forth below, together with a

copy of this opinion and a complete set of briefs, appendices, and the record filed

by the parties in this Court. This panel will retain jurisdiction to decide the case

once we have had the benefit of the views of the New York Court of Appeals or

once that court declines to accept certification.

                                     Certificate

      The foregoing is hereby certified to the New York Court of Appeals

pursuant to Second Circuit Local Rule 27.2 and New York Codes, Rules, and

Regulations Title 22, § 500.27(a), as ordered by the United States Court of Appeals

for the Second Circuit.

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