Court Opinion

ID: 9363792
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-01-17 18:01:32.264642+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T17:15:34.239584
License: Public Domain

USCA11 Case: 21-13814    Document: 26-1      Date Filed: 01/17/2023    Page: 1 of 19

                                                    [DO NOT PUBLISH]
                                    In the
                 United States Court of Appeals
                         For the Eleventh Circuit

                           ____________________

                                 No. 21-13814
                           Non-Argument Calendar
                           ____________________

        QUANIAH R. STEVENSON,
                                                       Plaintiff-Appellant,
        versus
        DELTA AIR LINES, INC.,

                                                     Defendant-Appellee.

                           ____________________

                  Appeal from the United States District Court
                     for the Northern District of Georgia
                      D.C. Docket No. 1:16-cv-02571-AT
                           ____________________
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        2                         Opinion of the Court                     21-13814

        Before ROSENBAUM, JILL PRYOR, and GRANT, Circuit Judges.
        PER CURIAM:
               After appellant Quaniah Stevenson was terminated from
        her job with Delta Air Lines, Inc., she sued the airline, claiming
        that it had unlawfully discriminated and retaliated against her.
        The district court granted summary judgment to Delta on all
        claims, and Stevenson appealed. After careful review, we affirm.
                                              I.
                Stevenson, an African-American woman, worked for Del-
        ta. 1 As an employment benefit, Delta provided Stevenson and her
        designated travel companion, Jovan Dais, with “travel passes” for
        free or reduced-rate travel. In addition, Stevenson received “bud-
        dy passes” from Delta, which allowed her to provide reduced-rate
        travel to other friends and family members.
               Delta had written policies regarding the use of the travel
        passes and buddy passes. It prohibited, among other things, the
        use of travel passes and buddy passes for business travel. Delta re-
        quired its employees to keep control over their passes. An em-
        ployee was responsible for ensuring that any pass she provided
        was not being used for business travel or any other improper pur-

        1 Because we write only for the parties who are already familiar with the
        facts and proceedings in the case, we recite only what is necessary to explain
        our decision.
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        21-13814                   Opinion of the Court                        3

        pose. Delta’s written policies provided that if a pass was used for
        business travel, the responsible employee may be “subject . . . to
        disciplinary action, up to and including . . . termination of em-
        ployment.” Doc. 88-6 at 1. 2 Stevenson was “very familiar with”
        the policies related to travel passes and buddy passes. Doc. 88-4 at
        25.
               In 2014, Delta became concerned that some employees
        were allowing passes to be used for business purposes. It sent a
        memo to its employees reminding them not to “share [their]
        passes with anyone who intends to use pass travel for business
        purposes.” Doc. 88-11 at 1. Delta again warned employees that a
        violation of the policy could result in termination of the employee
        who provided the pass.
                At the same time, Delta announced it was starting a new
        initiative known as the “Fly Right” program to prevent abuse of
        the travel passes and buddy passes. As part of the initiative, Delta
        created a “Pass Protection Group,” which consisted of employees
        tasked with “proactively identify[ing] cases of possible abuse and
        investigat[ing] them thoroughly.” Doc. 88-10 at 2. The Pass Pro-
        tection Group focused on employees whose travel companions
        had high travel pass usage and employees who shared buddy
        passes with individuals who received buddy passes from at least
        five Delta employees. One of the individuals the Pass Protection

        2 “Doc.” numbers refer to the district court’s docket entries.
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        4                        Opinion of the Court                    21-13814

        Group identified was a passenger who received buddy passes
        from several Delta employees including Stevenson.
               As part of its review, the Pass Protection Group looked at
        Stevenson’s travel pass records and saw that Dais, Stevenson’s
        designated travel companion, frequently used a travel pass to fly
        to a number of different locations. The Pass Protection Group in-
        vestigated whether Dais was using his travel pass for business
        travel. During the investigation, the Pass Protection Group
        learned that Dais was a music producer.
               The Pass Protection Group focused on a June 6, 2015 trip
        for which Dais used a travel pass to fly from Atlanta to Los Ange-
        les, where he stayed for one night. Dais made the trip with Caleb
        Boyett, a music artist who used a buddy pass for the flight. On the
        day of the trip, Boyett posted to his social media accounts on mul-
        tiple platforms, including Twitter and Instagram, that he would
        be performing that night as an opening act for Tyga, a rapper, at a
        concert in Bakersfield, California. That day, Boyett also posted to
        his Instagram and Twitter accounts a photograph with the cap-
        tion, “ON SOME L.A. SHIT with @therealjovandais” and used
        the hashtag “#NODAISOFF.” 3 Doc. 88-3 at 21.

        3 On his social media accounts, Dais had several other posts about Boyette.
        For example, he posted a photograph from the set where Boyette was re-
        cording a music video and on another occasion he posted about Boyette’s
        upcoming performances in Austin, Texas. In both posts, Dais included the
        hashtag “#nodaisoff.”
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        21-13814               Opinion of the Court                        5

                In July 2015, Delta interviewed Stevenson about Dais’s
        travel. After the interview, the company concluded that Steven-
        son had not been “forthcoming” during the interview about Da-
        is’s travel. Id. at 31. It also determined that Dais had used the
        travel pass for “business purposes.” Id. Because Stevenson had vi-
        olated Delta’s policies regarding travel passes and had recently re-
        ceived two other warnings for unrelated violations of company
        policy, Delta says, it decided to terminate her employment. At the
        time of the termination, Stevenson was over 40 years old.
                Stevenson, initially proceeding pro se, sued Delta. She
        brought claims for race, sex, and age discrimination as well as re-
        taliation claims. In her complaint, Stevenson denied that she had
        violated any policies related to travel passes. She also alleged that
        when other employees outside of her protected classes were
        found to have engaged in “the same or similar infractions [as
        those] attributed to [] Stevenson,” they were not terminated. Doc.
        3 at ¶ 40.
                After the initial discovery period closed, Delta filed a mo-
        tion for summary judgment. At that point, Stevenson retained an
        attorney who entered an appearance in the case. The attorney
        filed a motion to reopen discovery, which was granted.
              After additional discovery, Delta filed a new motion for
        summary judgment. As required by the district court’s local rules,
        along with its motion Delta submitted a brief and a separate
        statement of undisputed facts. See N.D. Ga. R. 56.1.
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        6                      Opinion of the Court               21-13814

                Delta sought summary judgment on all of Stevenson’s
        claims. In its brief, Delta applied the burden shifting framework
        established by the Supreme Court in McDonnell-Douglas Corp. v.
        Green, 411 U.S. 792 (1973). It argued that Stevenson had failed to
        establish a prima facie case of discrimination or retaliation and
        had no evidence that Delta’s legitimate, nondiscriminatory reason
        for terminating Stevenson—that she had allowed Dais to use the
        travel pass for business purposes and was not forthcoming during
        the investigation—was pretextual.
               Stevenson filed an opposition to the motion for summary
        judgment. The district court’s local rules directed that when a
        party responds to a motion for summary judgment, it must file a
        “responsive brief” as well as a “response to the movant’s state-
        ment of undisputed facts” and a “statement of additional facts
        which the respondent contends are material and present a genu-
        ine issue for trial.” N.D. Ga. R. 56.1(B)(2). Rather than file three
        separate documents—a responsive brief, a response to Delta’s
        statement of undisputed facts, and a statement of additional facts
        that present a genuine issue for trial—Stevenson filed a single
        document. In her opposition, Stevenson purported to respond
        both to the substance of Delta’s motion and its statement of un-
        disputed facts. Nowhere did Stevenson include a statement of ad-
        ditional facts that she contended were material and presented a
        genuine issue for trial.
             The first few pages of Stevenson’s response set forth her
        argument about why Delta was not entitled to summary judg-
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        21-13814               Opinion of the Court                        7

        ment. She argued that the evidence showed that she was “treated
        less favorably and differently (i.e., terminated with no warning for
        an alleged single violation of travel benefits) than individuals out-
        side of her protected classification.” Doc. 98 at 5. She also argued
        that there was evidence that other individuals outside of her pro-
        tected class “committed more egregious acts [yet] were allowed
        to keep their job[s].” Id. And she contended that there was no ev-
        idence that Dais had engaged in business travel when he used the
        travel pass on June 6.
               The remainder of Stevenson’s response purported to re-
        spond to Delta’s statement of undisputed facts. In this section,
        among other things, Stevenson identified by name 14 other em-
        ployees who she said had allowed “their travel passes to be used
        for business travel” but had not been terminated. Id. at 9.
               After reviewing the parties’ submissions, the magistrate
        judge prepared a lengthy recommendation that the district court
        grant Delta’s summary judgment motion. As a preliminary mat-
        ter, the magistrate judge found that Stevenson had failed to com-
        ply with the district court’s local rules governing responses to mo-
        tions for summary judgment. The magistrate judge pointed out
        that Stevenson had not filed any statement identifying the issues
        as to which there was a material dispute and had failed to set forth
        her response to Delta’s statement of undisputed facts in a separate
        document.
              The magistrate judge also identified other ways that Ste-
        venson’s response was inadequate. For example, to support her
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        8                      Opinion of the Court                21-13814

        position that similarly situated employees were treated different-
        ly, she provided a record citation to “40 pages from a deposition
        and an exhibit containing information regarding 190 Delta em-
        ployees.” Doc. 102 at 3–4 (emphasis omitted). The magistrate
        judge concluded that this response was insufficient because a
        judge is “not required to dig through volumes of documents and
        transcripts to try to figure out what facts [a party] might think
        support her position.” Id. at 4 (internal quotation marks omitted).
               Given these deficiencies, the magistrate judge concluded
        that the court could strike Stevenson’s response entirely. But “in
        the interest of fairness and expediency,” the magistrate judge said
        she would consider Stevenson’s “noncompliant brief.” Id. at 7 (in-
        ternal quotation marks omitted).
               The magistrate judge then addressed the merits of Steven-
        son’s race, sex, and age discrimination claims as well as her retali-
        ation claim. For each claim, the magistrate judge applied the
        McDonnell Douglas burden-shifting framework.
               For the race and sex discrimination claims, the magistrate
        judge determined that Stevenson had failed to establish a prima
        facie case and also that she had failed to demonstrate pretext. To
        establish a prima face case, the magistrate judge explained, Ste-
        venson had to show that “her employer treated similarly situated
        employees more favorably.” Id. at 26. The magistrate judge con-
        cluded that Stevenson had failed to come forward with such evi-
        dence. Although Stevenson had identified 14 individuals as poten-
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        21-13814               Opinion of the Court                        9

        tial comparators, the magistrate judge explained why each of
        these individuals was not similarly situated to Stevenson.
               The first group of potential comparators the magistrate
        judge discussed was five employees Delta had cleared of any mis-
        conduct. Because Delta had not found that these employees en-
        gaged in misconduct, the magistrate judge concluded they were
        not similarly situated.
               The second group of potential comparators were five em-
        ployees Delta found had engaged in misconduct and disciplined.
        But because none of these employees’ misconduct had involved
        “allow[ing] their travel passes to be used for business purposes,”
        the magistrate judge concluded that they had not “engaged in the
        same basic misconduct as” Stevenson and thus were not similarly
        situated. Id. at 31–32.
               The final group of potential comparators were four em-
        ployees Delta found had engaged in misconduct by allowing their
        travel passes to be used for business purposes. But the magistrate
        judge concluded that these individuals were not similarly situated
        because there was no evidence that these individuals “were dis-
        honest or evasive during their respective investigations.” Id. at 36.
        In addition, these individuals were not similarly situated because
        there was “no evidence” that they “shared [Stevenson’s] discipli-
        nary history.” Id.
               But even assuming that Stevenson had established a prima
        facie case of race or sex discrimination, the magistrate judge con-
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        10                     Opinion of the Court               21-13814

        cluded, Delta still would be entitled to summary judgment. The
        magistrate judge explained that Delta had “articulated legitimate,
        non-discriminatory reasons” for Stevenson’s termination: she was
        not “forthcoming” during her interview and Dais had used the
        travel pass for business purposes. Id. at 37 (internal quotation
        marks omitted). Because Stevenson had not demonstrated that
        each of these legitimate, non-discriminatory reasons was pre-
        textual, the magistrate judge determined that Delta was entitled
        to summary judgment.
                For Stevenson’s age discrimination claim, the magistrate
        judge found that she had failed to establish a prima facie case or
        demonstrate pretext. The magistrate judge explained that to es-
        tablish a prima facie case of age discrimination, Stevenson had to
        show, among other things, that “a substantially younger person
        filled the position from which [she] was discharged.” Id. at 22 (in-
        ternal quotation marks omitted). The magistrate judge concluded
        there was no evidence that a substantially younger person filled
        Stevenson’s position after she was discharged or that “a substan-
        tially younger Delta employee was treated differently” from Ste-
        venson. Id. at 23. Alternatively, even if Stevenson could establish
        a prima facie case, the magistrate judge concluded that Delta
        would still be entitled to summary judgment because Stevenson
        had failed to establish that Delta’s legitimate, non-discriminatory
        reason for her termination was pretextual.
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        21-13814                  Opinion of the Court                              11

               After recommending that the district court grant summary
        judgment to Delta on all the discrimination claims, 4 the magis-
        trate judge considered Stevenson’s retaliation claims. The magis-
        trate judge concluded that Stevenson failed to establish a prima
        facie case of retaliation because there was no evidence that she
        ever had engaged in any protected conduct. The magistrate judge
        noted that Stevenson “freely admitted during her deposition[ that]
        she never made any complaints about any of the alleged harass-
        ment or ‘discrimination’ discussed in her [c]omplaint.” Id. at 46–
        47. In any event, even if Stevenson had established a prima facie
        case, the magistrate judge concluded, Delta still would be entitled

        4 Stevenson also brought disability discrimination claims under the Ameri-
        cans with Disabilities Act (“ADA”), 42 U.S.C. § 12112(a). The district court
        granted summary judgment on the disability discrimination claims on sever-
        al grounds, including because Stevenson failed to come forward with evi-
        dence showing that she was disabled under the ADA.
        “To obtain reversal of a district court judgment that is based on multiple,
        independent grounds, an appellant must convince us that every stated
        ground for the judgment against [her] is incorrect.” Sapuppo v. Allstate Flo-
        ridian Ins. Co., 739 F.3d 678, 680 (11th Cir. 2014). When an appellant fails to
        challenge one of the grounds on which the district court based its judgment,
        she is deemed to have forfeited any challenge to the ground, “and it follows
        that the judgment is due to be affirmed.” Id. Because Stevenson does not
        raise any argument on appeal addressing the district court’s conclusion that
        there was no evidence that she was disabled under the ADA, we conclude
        that the district court’s grant of summary judgment on the disability discrim-
        ination claims is due to be affirmed. We thus address the ADA claims no fur-
        ther.
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        12                     Opinion of the Court                 21-13814

        to summary judgment because Stevenson had failed to come
        forward with evidence of pretext.
               Stevenson objected to the report and recommendation.
        The district court overruled Stevenson’s objection, adopted the
        magistrate judge’s recommendation, and granted Delta’s sum-
        mary judgment motion. The court stated that it reached this con-
        clusion after “conduct[ing] a full de novo review of the record.”
        Doc. 106 at 2. The court agreed with the magistrate judge that
        Stevenson failed to establish “a prima facie case as to any of her
        claims.” Id. at 3. In addition, the court found that she had failed to
        “rebut[] the legitimate[,] nondiscriminatory reasons” put forth by
        Delta for her termination. Id.
               This is Stevenson’s appeal.
                                         II.
                We review de novo a district court’s grant of summary
        judgment, viewing all evidence and drawing all reasonable infer-
        ences in favor of the nonmoving party. Hurlbert v. St. Mary’s
        Health Care Sys., Inc., 439 F.3d 1286, 1293 (11th Cir. 2006). Sum-
        mary judgment is appropriate only “if the movant shows that
        there is no genuine dispute as to any material fact and the movant
        is entitled to judgment as a matter of law.” Fed. R. Civ. P. 56(a).
               We review for abuse of discretion a district court’s decision
        to rule on a summary judgment motion before all discovery dis-
        putes have been resolved. Urquilla-Diaz v. Kaplan Univ., 780 F.3d
        1039, 1050 (11th Cir. 2015).
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        21-13814                  Opinion of the Court                             13

                                             III.
                Stevenson argues on appeal that the district court erred in
        granting summary judgment to Delta on her discrimination and
        retaliation claims. She says that because this case was at the sum-
        mary judgment stage, she did not have to satisfy the prima facie
        case requirement under the McDonnell Douglas framework. We
        reject Stevenson’s argument that when a plaintiff travels under
        the McDonnell Douglas framework, she does not need to estab-
        lish a prima facie case to survive summary judgment.
               In this case, Stevenson brought race, sex, and age discrimi-
        nation claims as well as retaliation claims. Because Stevenson at-
        tempted to prove that Delta acted with a discriminatory (or retal-
        iatory) intent by circumstantial evidence, we look to the McDon-
        nell Douglas burden-shifting framework.5 See 411 U.S. 792. Un-

        5 A plaintiff also may defeat summary judgment by presenting a “convincing
        mosaic of circumstantial evidence that would allow a jury to infer intentional
        discrimination.” Smith v. Lockheed-Martin Corp., 644 F.3d 1321, 328 (11th
        Cir. 2011) (footnote omitted) (internal quotation marks omitted). But Ste-
        venson raised no argument about the convincing mosaic framework in her
        opposition to the motion for summary judgment filed in the district court
        and raises no argument about it on appeal. We thus do not address the con-
        vincing-mosaic framework. See Owens v. Governor’s Off. of Student
        Achievement, 52 F.4th 1327, 1337 n.2 (11th Cir. 2022) (declining to consider
        convincing-mosaic framework when employee did not raise argument about
        the framework on appeal); Bailey v. Metro Ambulance Servs., Inc., 992 F.3d
        1265, 1273 (11th Cir. 2021) (declining to consider convincing-mosaic frame-
        work when plaintiff did not adequately raise it in the district court).
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        14                     Opinion of the Court                21-13814

        der this framework, a plaintiff must first establish a prima facie
        case. See id. at 802.
               We briefly review the elements of a prima facie case for
        each of Stevenson’s claims. To state a prima facie case for race,
        sex, or age discrimination, a plaintiff must show that (1) she “be-
        long[ed] to a protected class,” (2) “she was subjected to an adverse
        employment action,” (3) “she was qualified to perform the job in
        question,” and (4) the “employer treated similarly situated em-
        ployees outside her class more favorably.” Lewis v. City of Union
        City, 918 F.3d 1213, 1220–21 (11th Cir. 2019) (en banc) (internal
        quotation marks omitted); see Morris v. Emory Clinic, Inc.,
        402 F.3d 1076, 1082–83 (11th Cir. 2005). With regard to the re-
        quirement that an employee must show that “similarly situated”
        employees outside her protected class were treated more favora-
        bly, we have explained that the plaintiff and any comparator must
        be similarly situated “in all material respects.” Lewis, 918 F.3d at
        1227 (internal quotation marks omitted). “Ordinarily,” a similarly
        situated comparator “will have engaged in the same basic conduct
        (or misconduct) as the plaintiff” and “will share the plaintiff’s em-
        ployment or disciplinary history.” Id. at 1227–28.
               The elements of a prima facie case for a retaliation claim
        are different. A plaintiff must show: (1) she “engaged in statutorily
        protected activity,” (2) “she suffered an adverse [employment] ac-
        tion,” and (3) “the adverse action was causally related to the pro-
        tected activity.” Patterson v. Ga. Pac., LLC, 38 F.4th 1336, 1345
        (11th Cir. 2022) (internal quotation marks omitted).
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        21-13814               Opinion of the Court                      15

               For both discrimination and retaliation claims under the
        McDonnell-Douglas framework, once an employee sets forth a
        prima facie case, the burden shifts to the employer to articulate a
        non-discriminatory basis for its employment action. See Tex.
        Dep’t of Cmty. Affs. v. Burdine, 450 U.S. 248, 253 (1981). If the
        employer meets this burden, the inference of discrimination drops
        out of the case entirely, and the plaintiff has the opportunity to
        show by a preponderance of the evidence that the employer’s
        proffered reasons “were not its true reasons, but were a pretext
        for discrimination.” Id.
                Stevenson’s primary argument on appeal is that the district
        court erred in applying the McDonnell-Douglas burden-shifting
        framework at the summary judgment stage. By requiring her to
        come forward with evidence of a prima facie case, she says, the
        district court improperly placed the burden on the nonmovant for
        summary judgment.
                The district court did not err. When a plaintiff travels un-
        der the McDonnell-Douglas framework “[t]o avoid summary
        judgment, [she] must establish a prima facie case” of discrimina-
        tion or retaliation. Farley v. Nationwide Mut. Ins. Co., 197 F.3d
        1322, 1336 (11th Cir. 1999). Indeed, we have routinely applied the
        McDonnell-Douglas framework at the summary judge stage and
        affirmed the grant of summary judgment when the plaintiff failed
        to establish a prima facie case. See, e.g., Morris, 402 F.3d at 1082
        (affirming grant of summary judgment to employer when plaintiff
        failed to establish prima facie case).
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        16                     Opinion of the Court                21-13814

                To support her position that as the non-movant for sum-
        mary judgment she did not need to satisfy McDonnell-Douglas’s
        prima facie case requirement, Stevenson cites to our decision in
        Clark v. Coats & Clark, Inc., 990 F.2d 1217 (11th Cir. 1993). We
        fail to see how Clark supports Stevenson’s argument. In that case,
        we affirmed the grant of summary judgment to the employer on
        several claims because the plaintiffs had “failed to establish a pri-
        ma facie case” under McDonnell-Douglas. Id. at 1223–26. We
        simply cannot say that the district court erred when it considered
        at the summary judgment stage whether Stevenson established a
        prima facie case.
                We also see no error in the district court’s conclusion that
        Stevenson failed to establish a prima facie case. For the discrimi-
        nation claims, the district court concluded that Stevenson failed to
        establish a prima facie case because she had not identified a simi-
        larly situated comparator. In response to Delta’s summary judg-
        ment motion, Stevenson identified 14 potential comparators. But
        the district court adopted the magistrate judge’s detailed explana-
        tion for why each potential comparator was not similarly situated.
               On appeal, Stevenson barely addresses the district court’s
        conclusion that the individuals she identified were not sufficiently
        similarly situated to qualify as comparators. At most, her brief in-
        corporates by reference the argument she made in the district
        court. But “we will not consider any arguments a party attempts
        to incorporate by reference to filings in the district court.” Haynes
        v. McCalla Raymer, LLC, 793 F.3d 1246, 1250 (11th Cir. 2015).
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        21-13814               Opinion of the Court                      17

        Because Stevenson failed to make any substantive argument in
        her opening brief on appeal about why the district court erred in
        concluding that she failed to identify a sufficiently similar com-
        parator, we conclude that she has abandoned this issue on appeal.
        See id. at 1250–51. Accordingly, we cannot say that the district
        court erred in granting summary judgment to Stevenson on her
        claims for race, sex, and age discrimination.
                Turning to Stevenson’s retaliation claim, the district court
        determined that Stevenson failed to state a prima facie case for an
        entirely different reason: there was no evidence that she had en-
        gaged in any protected conduct. The magistrate judge’s recom-
        mendation, which the district court adopted, stated that there was
        no evidence that Stevenson had “exercised any statutorily pro-
        tected rights.” Doc. 102 at 46. On appeal, Stevenson raises no ar-
        gument that the district court erred in determining that she had
        not engaged in protected conduct. We thus conclude that she for-
        feited any challenge to the grant of summary judgment on her re-
        taliation claim. See United States v. Campbell, 26 F.4th 860, 874
        (11th Cir. 2022) (en banc).
                Stevenson offers one other reason to reverse the district
        court’s grant of summary judgment to Delta. She says that the
        district court’s ruling was premature given that she had previous-
        ly filed a motion to compel and the magistrate judge had deferred
        ruling on the motion to compel until after a deposition of an addi-
        tional Delta employee was completed. According to Stevenson,
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        18                     Opinion of the Court                 21-13814

        the district court should not have ruled on the motion for sum-
        mary judgment until after the motion to compel was resolved.
                Even assuming a discovery dispute remained pending at
        the time that the district court granted summary judgment, we
        cannot say that the district court abused its discretion. “Although
        summary judgment should not be granted until the party oppos-
        ing the motion has had an adequate opportunity for discovery, we
        have made clear that the party opposing the motion for summary
        judgment bears the burden of calling to the district court’s atten-
        tion any outstanding discovery.” City of Miami Gardens v. Wells
        Fargo & Co., 931 F.3d 1274, 1286 (11th Cir. 2019) (internal quota-
        tion marks omitted). “Failure to satisfy this burden is fatal to an
        argument that the district court granted summary judgment
        prematurely by failing to order or await the results of further dis-
        covery.” Id.; see Urquilla-Diaz, 780 F.3d at 1063–64 (holding that
        district court did not abuse its discretion in granting summary
        judgment motion when nonmovant failed to alert district court to
        outstanding discovery issue).
               Stevenson argues on appeal that the district court should
        have deferred its ruling on summary judgment because there was
        an outstanding discovery issue. But when Delta moved for sum-
        mary judgment in this case, Stevenson did not alert the district
        court that a discovery dispute remained pending. She did not file a
        declaration, affidavit, or other notice alerting the district court to
        the pending dispute. And she did not reference the allegedly out-
        standing discovery dispute in her opposition to summary judg-
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        21-13814               Opinion of the Court                       19

        ment or in her objections to the magistrate judge’s recommenda-
        tion. Because Stevenson failed to satisfy her burden of calling the
        district court’s attention to the outstanding discovery issue, we
        cannot say that the district court abused its discretion in ruling on
        the summary judgment motion. See Urquilla-Diaz, 780 F.3d at
        1063–64.
                                         IV.
               For the reasons set forth above, we affirm the district
        court’s grant of summary judgment.
              AFFIRMED.