In Jackson, Robert v. American Civil Liberties Union, Inc. et al, 21-CV-5037 (JPO), 2024 WL 4766983 (S.D.N.Y. Nov. 13, 2024), the court, inter alia, denied defendant’s motion for summary judgment on plaintiff’s claims of race discrimination under Title VII of the Civil Rights Act of 1964 and 42 U.S.C. § 1981.
After summarizing the McDonnell Douglas burden-shifting framework, the court applied it to the facts.
As to the “pretext” element, the court explained:
Defendants are correct that it is not enough for Jackson to undermine their stated reasons for their actions, as “a reason cannot be proved to be a pretext for discrimination unless it is shown both that the reason was false, and that discrimination was the real reason.” St. Mary’s Honor Ctr., 509 U.S. at 515 (quotation marks and emphasis omitted).6 However, Jackson also presents evidence that he was treated differently (and worse) than other employees and that Tian at least once acknowledged that she engaged in racially motivated conduct, see infra Section III.A.1. Taken together, Jackson’s attack on the justifications for his negative performance reviews and his (admittedly circumstantial) evidence of racial bias sum up to a “mosaic” from which a rational fact-finder could conclude that Defendants’ proffered reasons are pretext for discrimination. Banks, 81 F.4th at 259; see also Byrnie, 243 F.3d at 102 (“At summary judgment in an employment discrimination case, a court should examine the record as a whole, just as a jury would ….”); Walsh v. N.Y.C. Hous. Auth., 828 F.3d 70, 76 (2d Cir. 2016) (“[A] plaintiff may satisfy her burden by building a wall out of individual evidentiary bricks ….”).
Accordingly, the court held that because plaintiff “has successfully raised a dispute of fact as to whether Defendants’ justifications were pretextual, the Court declines Defendants’ request for summary judgment on his discrimination claims.”