In Burgess v. Alamo Drafthouse et al, No. CV 25-02640 (AHA), 2026 WL 1070905 (D.D.C. Apr. 20, 2026), the court held that plaintiff failed to state a claim for age or race discrimination respectively under the Age Discrimination in Employment Act (ADEA) and Title VII of the Civil Rights Act of 1964.
From the decision:
To survive dismissal for failure to state a claim, a complaint must “state a claim to relief that is plausible on its face.” Ashcroft v. Iqbal, 556 U.S. 662, 678 (2009) (quoting Bell Atl. Corp. v. Twombly, 550 U.S. 544, 570 (2007)). A claim is facially plausible “when the plaintiff pleads factual content that allows the court to draw the reasonable inference that the defendant is liable for the misconduct alleged.” Id. (citing Twombly, 550 U.S. at 556). The court “must take all the factual allegations in the complaint as true,” though it is “not bound to accept as true a legal conclusion couched as a factual allegation.” …
Although Burgess does not identify specific causes of action in her amended complaint, the court liberally construes her pleadings to assert age discrimination under the Age Discrimination in Employment Act (“ADEA”) and race discrimination under Title VII. To state a claim under those laws, she must plausibly allege that her employer undertook (i) an adverse employment action (ii) because of her age or race. Baloch v. Kempthorne, 550 F.3d 1191, 1196 (D.C. Cir. 2008).2
Burgess alleges no facts from which the court can conclude she was fired because of her age or race. In her amended complaint and response to the defendants’ motion to dismiss, Burgess states she was fired after she was accused of making a sexually explicit comment to customers, an accusation which she denies, and after requesting a meeting with a manager to discuss another manager’s conduct. See ECF No. 10 at 4; ECF No. 15.
She also references discrimination because of her age and race, but she provides no explanation of how her termination was connected to her age or race and does not identify her age or race, as required to state a discrimination claim. ECF No. 10 at 3; ECF No. 15; see, e.g., Pickett v. Brennan, No. 18-cv-1257, 2019 WL 13290799, at *2 (D.D.C. May 14, 2019) (dismissing age discrimination claim in part because plaintiff “never provides his age”); Slate v. Pub. Def. Serv. for the Dist. of Columbia, 31 F. Supp. 3d 277, 299 (D.D.C. 2014) (dismissing race discrimination claim in part because plaintiff “failed to allege the most basic fact necessary to plead a claim under Title VII—namely, that he is a member of a protected class”). Burgess has therefore failed to plausibly allege she was fired because of her age or race. See Iqbal, 556 U.S. at 678 (stating a complaint cannot merely provide “naked assertions devoid of further factual enhancement” (cleaned up))
Accordingly, the court granted defendants’ motion to dismiss and dismissed the action without prejudice.