In Panchumarthi v. Tech Mahindra, No. 4:24-CV-01017-SDJ-BD, 2025 WL 3687142 (E.D. Tex. Dec. 15, 2025), the court held that the Ending Forced Arbitration of Sexual Assault and Sexual Harassment Act (EFAA) did not apply to plaintiff’s claims of discrimination (as opposed to sexual harassment).
From the decision:
Although the EFAA carves out some sex-discrimination claims, it does not apply to the sex-discrimination claims Panchumarthi brought.
EFAA makes arbitration agreements unenforceable “with respect to a case which … relates to [a] sexual assault dispute or [a] sexual harassment dispute.” 9 U.S.C. § 402(a). A “sexual assault dispute” is “a dispute involving a nonconsensual sexual act or sexual contact,” and a “sexual harassment dispute” is “a dispute relating to conduct that is alleged to constitute sexual harassment under applicable Federal, Tribal, or State law.” Id. § 401(3)–(4). Because EFAA refers to “a case which … relates to” a sexual-harassment dispute, it applies to “the entirety of the case relating to the sexual harassment dispute, not merely the discrete claims in that case that themselves either allege such harassment or relate to a sexual harassment dispute.”
But EFAA does not apply to all sex-discrimination claims. It applies only to sexual-assault and sexual-harassment claims. Sexual harassment’ is conceptually distinct from sex discrimination. Disparate treatment sex discrimination occurs when an employer subjects an employee to an adverse employment action motivated by his or her sex…. By contrast, an employee is subject to sexual harassment in a hostile work environment when the employee’s coworkers are so severely or pervasively hostile to the employee, on account of the employee’s sex, that it alters the conditions of employment.
(Cleaned up.)
Applying these principles, the court held that plaintiff’s allegation “that she was fired because of her sex and age so that she could be replaced with a younger man,” if true, “would constitute sex and age discrimination,” and that since she did not allege that anyone at defendant subjected her to a hostile work environment and only alleged sex discrimination, not sexual harassment, the EFAA did not apply.
The court therefore recommended that the defendant’s motion to compel arbitration be granted and the case stayed pending arbitration.