EEOC Investigation Into the Biden VA’s Targeting of Pro-Life Employee Continues

The Biden Administration is using every bureaucratic agency it can to expand abortion and stymie life. We are taking legal action to fight back in each and every instance.

The ACLJ just submitted our client’s rebuttal statement in the formal EEOC (Equal Employment Opportunity Commission) complaint process with the Department of Veteran Affairs (VA) for discrimination based on religion and a hostile work environment. Our client is a longtime employee at a VA medical center in Colorado who was singled out and targeted by his supervisors simply because of his religious, pro-life beliefs.

As we previously explained, our client was instructed by his supervisors to remove pro-life photos from his Microsoft TEAMS account because his fellow colleagues found them “offensive and triggering.” Not only was he instructed by his supervisors to remove his pro-life photos (one with a red heart and a cross in the middle with the words “pro-life”; the other depicting an unborn baby inside a heart shape with a cross), but he was also accused of being unprofessional. Faced with the threat of discipline, our client removed his photos. Meanwhile, all other employees were permitted to continue to display their chosen photos, including personal logos, LGBTQ rainbows and/or flags, and personal pictures of family members and dogs. 

Upon further inquiry by our client after he was unable to locate any policy justifying the removal of his pro-life photos, the VA finally produced one. Of course, our client’s supervisors asserted that they were simply enforcing the policy, but evidence demonstrated that the VA was not enforcing this policy in any neutral or generally applicable manner. Indeed, even after this policy was emailed to our client, VA employees have continued to display a host of Microsoft TEAMS photos and logos that violate the policy. As far as we know, none of them have been asked to remove their photos, nor have any of them been accused of being unprofessional and/or informed that their photos are offensive or triggering to others.

The facts of this matter provide yet another example of the Biden Administration’s unapologetic pursuit of a radical abortion agenda and its disregard for the law. As we reported late last year, following the Supreme Court’s decision in Dobbs v. Jackson Women’s Health Organization restoring state legislatures’ constitutional authority to restrict or prohibit abortion, President Biden took steps to circumvent the law and announced that the VA would begin providing abortions through VA hospitals, clinics, and other facilities. We immediately went to work to submit public comment and legal analysis demonstrating that the VA would be violating federal law if it moved forward with performing abortions.

The Biden Administration’s continued claim that it represents women on the issue of abortion via its radical abortion agenda is a farce. It has continued to ignore the views held by a majority of women in this country. Biden’s claim that abortion protects a vulnerable population of women is also a farce. An estimated 930,160 babies were aborted in 2020 – many of those were female.

Nonetheless, federal agencies under Biden’s Administration march on – demonstrating ignorance of the law and intolerance for opposing views. Unfortunately, our client is just one example of the Administration’s disregard for the law.

Now that our rebuttal has been submitted, we await the EEOC’s final review and decision. (Review by the EEOC is a necessary step before filing a lawsuit involving federal employment-related discrimination claims.) We maintain hope that we will be able to reach an amenable resolution through this process that acknowledges the unjust treatment suffered by our client and ensures he will never again be the target of discrimination.