March 19, 2025 • 36 mins
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The Equal Employment Opportunity Commission has just declared war on corporate DEI programs, and every employee needs to understand what this means for their workplace rights. In this explosive episode of the Employee Survival Guide, employment attorney Mark delves into the EEOC's dramatic new stance that Diversity, Equity, and Inclusion initiatives are fundamentally illegal under Title VII of the 1964 Civil Rights Act.
The federal government, through Acting EEOC Chair Andrea Lucas, has taken the position that DEI programs create unlawful quotas and preferences based on protected characteristics like race and sex. Despite their widespread adoption across major corporations in recent years, these initiatives now face extinction as the EEOC begins targeting employers - starting with warning letters to twenty major law firms threatening enforcement action.
Mark provides crucial context about what makes DEI programs potentially discriminatory, explaining how the Supreme Court's decision abolishing affirmative action set the stage for this dramatic policy shift. You'll learn what constitutes illegal preferential treatment, why "reverse discrimination" isn't a separate legal category, and what employees should do if they believe they're experiencing discrimination related to DEI work.
EEOC and Justice Department Warn Against Unlawful DEI-Related Discrimination
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Disclaimer: For educational use only, not intended to be legal advice.
Mark as Played
Transcript
Episode Transcript
Available transcripts are automatically generated. Complete accuracy is not guaranteed.
Speaker 1 (00:02):
Hey, it's Mark, and welcome back to another edition
of the Employee Survival Guide,where, as you know, I always try
to find stuff that'sinteresting and controversial,
and today's another example ofthat.
Today's episode we're going totalk about the Equal Employment
Opportunity Commission, that'sthe US federal agency charged
(00:26):
with protecting you as employees.
I don't know if you know thatit's a federal agency that has
been around for 60 years.
Apparently, this year was theanniversary the 60th anniversary
of the founding of the EEOC andalso of the passage of the 1964
(00:47):
Civil Rights Act, a veryimportant statute that gives you
rights against your privateemployers, and so the EEOC has
decided to take a stand.
If you've been following thepress about this issue, you
should understand that there isa new sheriff in town, and the
(01:12):
old chair of the EOC obviouslywas left.
She was a Biden appointee.
The former chair is CharlotteBurroughs, I'm sorry, and the
new acting chair is a young ladywho's also a young woman, who's
an employment lawyer by trade,and since I could find the name,
I apologize.
(01:33):
It's very new to me, so theonce I do that, I apologize.
So the EOC has taken a stanceunder the new chair, and the new
chair is Andrea Lucas Iapologize, andrea, there's
(01:54):
actually only two people on thecommission today.
One's a Democrat and one isAndrea Lucas, a Republican.
And the today's episode is aboutDEI diversity, equity,
inclusion as it's interpreted bythe EOC or enforced by the EOC.
(02:15):
Or, more specifically, as tothe rooting out or a complete
utter elimination of anythingrelated to DEI anywhere and any
private sector employmentpossible.
The federal sector employment.
You already hear about that.
There's zero tolerance for that, as the executive orders from
(02:35):
Trump.
Let me start out by saying thisis a.
When I approach this DEIsubject matter, people could
have opinions about my approachto it or how I'm viewing it.
So I'm going to say politicallyneutral, down the center aisle,
please, and don't find out ortry to accuse me of being one
(02:55):
way or the other.
Discrimination in America isanti-democratic in terms of the
institution of the United Statesbeing a democracy, and when you
have discrimination it violatesfederal law, 1964 Civil Rights
Act.
It also violates 42 USC 1981, areconstruction statute from the
(03:24):
Civil War era designed to andintended to enforce or to
encourage African-Americanslaves in that time, post-civil
War, to earn, to contract andown land essentially.
But today we use it fordiscrimination cases based upon
race.
We also use it for reversediscrimination it doesn't matter
your race.
So back to DEI.
(03:44):
The EOC has taken a position andon a press release in fact
today here's the title of it theEOC and Justice Department warn
against unlawful DEI-relateddiscrimination.
And this went out to everyonetoday and basically says that
(04:04):
DEI is a broad term that is notdefined in Title VII of the
Civil Rights Act of 1964.
Title VII prohibits employmentdiscrimination based on
protected characteristics suchas race and sex.
We know that says DEIinitiatives, policies and
(04:27):
programs or practices may beunlawful if they involve an
employer or other covered entitytaking the employment action
motivated in part or in whole byemployees or applicants race,
sex or another protectedcharacteristic.
And the EEOC goes on to say I'mreading here it says In the
past five years the DEI policies, programs and practices have
(04:49):
become increasingly prevalent inmany of our nation's largest
and most prominent businesses,universities and cultural
institutions.
The widespread adoption of DEI,however, does not change
longstanding legal prohibitionsagainst the use of race, sex and
other protected characteristicsin employment.
I need you to really understandthat the widespread adoption of
(05:11):
DEI in the general public byemployers doesn't change what it
is it's illegal.
Now here's where it getscontroversial because it's
political.
We all know how DEI came aboutand if you didn't know, here's a
short scoop there was a murderin some location of a police
officer, of a black man named MrFloyd, and then there was a
(05:33):
public outcry of that, and socorporations didn't want to be
on the losing side of thatsituation.
So they glommed on and startedcreating this DEI initiative,
started creating this DEIinitiative and it went on for
some time and people werechallenged with their own
internal and implicit biases andthe like.
And so you know this and you'vebeen around, you've read
through it, you've experiencedit in your workplaces, I'm sure.
(05:55):
But that didn't make it legal.
Fast forward two years ago orless, the Supreme Court in the
United States abolishedaffirmative action and it said
in that decision that there waszero percentage tolerance for
any quota.
What is DEI?
Well, dei basically createsquotas.
(06:18):
It creates an attempt to bringup the playing field, so to
speak.
This is where it getscontroversial politically
speaking.
Well, if you now know thatTitle VII of the 64th Civil
Rights Act says zero toleranceas to any race specification,
dei is implicitly doing whatit's creating quotas, and it's
(06:42):
illegal in the affirmativeaction setting.
It will soon be legal in theprivate employment sector.
Now you have the federal agencysaying it's illegal because it
creates quotas, and you can'thave any percentages of
favoritism, one classificationover another.
So white versus black, or Asianversus white, or in sex versus
(07:03):
male, female or anything, orsexual orientation Across the
board.
You can't have favorites.
You can't bolster one becauseyou believe, by systemic
discrimination of some sort,that you're trying to bolster
the, you know, maybe bringingmore women up to the C-suite
because you feel that there's alesser percentage in the C-suite
(07:26):
.
So by doing that, any type ofinitiative, in whole or in part,
could be seen as discriminationagainst who?
Well, the opposite particularcategory.
So this would be men.
So you would have basically areversed sex discrimination case
.
In that respect, I'm currentlyactually dealing with a case
(07:46):
about the file it has.
70% of the employees are female.
It's a public company and can'tname names yet, but it says 70%
and this is on informationbelief.
So the issue is you know, weknow by fact, that the workplace
(08:07):
in America is, I think it'slike 57%, 58% female to men.
I think men are maybe thedifference, maybe 53%, but you
can hear the statistics there.
So 70%, wow, how did you getthat level of representation of
women in the workplace in thatparticular company?
That may be a case of DEItreatment.
(08:28):
You know where you're favoringone class over another.
We shall see.
I'm actually drafting acomplaint.
But so DEI from the federalperspective, by the EEOC that
regulates private employersprivate meaning non-governmental
and EEOC it says it's illegal.
(08:49):
So what are you going to doabout it if you find that you
have a DEI program at work?
Let's listen to what the EEOCsays further about this issue.
And this is now quoting thechairwoman, andrea Lucas, quote
(09:09):
far too many employers defendcertain types of race or sex
preferences as good, providedthey are motivated by business
interests in diversity, equityor inclusion.
But no matter an employer'smotive, there is no good or even
acceptable race or sexdiscrimination.
End quote.
And then the I believe she saidquote in the words of Justice
(09:34):
Clarence Thomas in hisconcurrence in Students for Fair
Admissions.
That's the affirmative actiondecision.
Ending affirmative action quote.
This is now quoting JusticeThomas.
Two discriminatory wrongs can'tmake a right which is actually
logically true.
Can't make a right which isactually logically true.
(09:55):
Lucas then went on to say whilethe public may be confused
about what rules apply to DEI.
The law itself is clear and Iagree with her, and this is not
a political statement, it's justclear.
You just can't have apreference.
And she goes on to say andthere are some serious
implications for some verypopular types of DEI programs,
(10:28):
policies and programs, and thatwas the Deputy Attorney General,
todd Blanch.
He goes on to say that thetechnical assistance document
provides clear information foremployees on how to act should
they experience unlawfuldiscrimination based upon DEI
practices.
End quote.
So now you know that the federalgovernment agency, the EEOC, is
(10:48):
targeting the private workplaceregarding DEI practices.
You probably are not smelling awhiff of anything from your
employer about DEI these daysbecause they all retreated.
Some companies are holding outI think Walmart is one of them,
but most companies have justcanceled.
If you had read the Wall StreetJournal this morning, you would
(11:11):
have read a very nice story byLauren Weber, a reporter for the
journal, and she basicallydiscussed the activities at the
company Morgan Stanley.
It goes into very disturbingfacts about how the company
(11:35):
approached DEI and then how,what really happened in terms of
, in particular, if you wereAfrican-American, and what
happened to you if you went tothe organization, and obviously,
lawsuits arose after that.
Now let's turn to the twodocuments I mentioned.
These are one was what to do ifyou experience discrimination
(11:58):
related to DEI work, and theother one was what should you
know about DEI-relateddiscrimination?
My focus is going to be on thelatter document.
I'm going to pull it up infront of me, and the EOC
produced this.
I'll put this in the show notesso you can grab the links to
them, and I wanted to go througha couple of the FAQ type of
(12:21):
questions so we address it andmake me clear about what's at
stake here and what's not.
You should understand by thisjuncture in the episode that DEI
is illegal.
Now you got to get your headaround that first, because we
were just told for like threeyears that DEI is like the way
to go and it was just banteredabout and it was just sung from
(12:45):
high everywhere.
But today it's actually now theEOC is taking position.
It's illegal to do any relatedDEI practices.
We all hope that they come upwith something better.
Diversity you can't use the wordequity.
Inclusion might be problematictoo, but they've now turned to a
(13:09):
meritocracy type of argument.
So decisions based upon merit,which arguably it should.
Merit has no color, gender, age, et cetera.
We all know that.
I mean good old work ethic.
You should be rewarded that way.
The problem is in our country isthat we have employers who and
(13:29):
this is my opinion because itmatters I'm an employment lawyer
and this is what I see we havestatutes that protect people
1964 Civil Rights Act but whathappens?
Employers still continue toviolate it.
Why does that happen?
Because we have organizationsof people who work that are very
large and sometimes small, thatemployers just allow and don't
(13:54):
follow the rules and allowenvironments to be fostered,
festering, that promotediscrimination.
It's not going away becausepeople have implicit bias
related to one another for avariety of scales, just not
because of race.
It's just because the wayhumans are, they basically want
to.
If you are a threat to someone,you're going to find any way
(14:16):
that you can dehumanize thatperson based upon
characteristics, and that's whatleads to discrimination.
I mean, this is all I do for myentire career going on, I don't
know, 28 years, I forget, butyou know the 64 Civil Rights Act
is 60 years old.
It's still going on, ok, soit's not something easy to root
(14:39):
from our society.
And so it's here andunfortunately it can get really
disgusting and I'm justover-coding this.
I mean it can get reallydisturbing what these cases are
about and I do my best to bringyou these stories.
You'll see them in individualpodcasts where I have an AI
(15:03):
discussion about a particularcase in question.
The result, and try to exposeyou to these fact patterns
because I need you to see thelevel of behavior people go to
against one another at work.
It's really disturbing.
But back to the issue here.
The EEOC wants you to know whatDEI and related discrimination
looks like, and so here's justseveral questions.
(15:24):
They are, you know, they've puttogether and I'll put it in the
show notes, as I told you.
First one let's just try theseout.
If I believe I've beendiscriminated against related to
a DEI at work, can I file alawsuit in federal court
alleging a violation of TitleVII without taking any other
further steps?
Well, the answer is no, and youhave to file your
(15:45):
administrative exhaustion.
That's through the EEOC andthat's a requirement.
I myself have to do it forevery single case, for each
client that I have, and thestate has the same requirement
for that.
The second question if youbelieve you'd experienced
discrimination related to DEIwork, what federal government
entity can help you?
Well duh, the EEOC.
You know that's the agency.
(16:06):
And can I just start fromsomething here the EEOC in my
experience?
Now I had 28 years of doingthis.
I had more experience beforethat, before I became a lawyer.
So I've actually been reviewingthe EOC's activities for, let's
call it, 45 years.
Okay, because in college I usedto research the EOC and whatnot
(16:28):
.
I actually went down there onetime in DC and met a chairperson
because I was curious.
So, in reality, the EEOC I justneed to know some specifics.
They claim and this was onJanuary 17, 2025, this is their
annual performance in generalcounsel's reports for fiscal
(16:49):
year 2024, they claim that theyreceived roughly 88,000 new
charges of discrimination in 24,reflecting a 9% increase over
the prior year.
But the reason why I'm gettingto this fact for a second is
because the EEOC tends to.
Well, each time I have asettlement that doesn't go to
(17:12):
suit, the EOC wants to know thesettlement of each client, and
so I say, well, ask thedefendant.
But what they're trying to do,and they come up with this very
large, grandiose number.
I'm trying to locate it for asecond.
They said in fiscal 2024, theyhad $700 million recovered for
victims of discrimination.
$700 million recovered forvictims of discrimination.
(17:37):
That encompasses all the casesthat I and other employment
lawyers are engaging in inaddition to the EOC doing their
own cases.
They do their own cases.
But let me tell you somethingI've never had an EOC agency
interact in any of my cases.
Period end of story.
I had one for-cost grant fromthe EOC must have been about
(17:57):
more than 25 years ago.
I remember the case, I rememberthe investigator and that was
the only one I ever received.
Why is that?
Because the EOC doesn't getinvolved with practitioners in
their cases, but they want toknow who.
You know what your settlementvalue was and it's like they did
something, like they want tobounce off your.
(18:19):
You know the work that I did,but they didn't do squat.
So my complaint about the EOC isdon't report these settlements
about employees, because privatepractitioners like myself
created the result.
Don't claim that, and they doit all the time and I can't
stand it.
So I'm going to call you outEOC.
(18:39):
Stop doing that, because you'renot helping us by any resource
you provide.
Period end of story.
And you know me, I don't filemy EOC cases and then pursue it
in the agencies.
I've stopped doing that becauseI don't believe the agency is
worth a darn penny of myclient's time and money in there
at all and anything that'sresulting is because I'm
(19:02):
creating that.
Now that's my spiel.
On the issue about the EOC, youknow I think that they should
spend more money in the EOC,give it a larger budget and to
police it.
But you know setting forthguidelines.
You know, give me a yawn like ameh.
You know, it's just.
I've read these guidelines.
(19:23):
I'm like the courts don'tfollow them.
And we now know the SupremeCourt in the United States says
we're not going to giveadministrative deference and no
more Chevron deference to theseagencies.
So what good use is the EOCguidance?
It's not.
If they were to do something and, chairman Lucas, if you are
listening to this, god, Iactually, if I had, maybe I'll
(19:45):
send her an email.
I could do that send her theshow note link and she can read
or listen to herself.
But for once, if Trump in hisrhetoric wants to help employees
who voted for him becausethat's what happened why don't
you give employees somethingthey can dig into instead of
(20:05):
politic or whatever?
Choose to get rid of so-calledwoke DEI practices, which I'm
talking about today.
That's how they label it.
But the EEOC has been meh theirentire time.
They really don't help stop theproblem of discrimination.
And then they write about it,but it's a lot of bureaucracy.
(20:28):
It's like give me a break.
They don't do enough to helpthe everyday employee who
doesn't have any.
You know contact with thisagency.
I mean you got to hire anattorney or you can file your
charge.
But you know the EOC is not theadvocate of employees the way
that they think that they are.
Okay.
I know that they file theirindividual lawsuits and they get
(20:50):
companies to roll over, but Ido that too, so I keep track of
my settlements.
I mean, what's the difference?
So they got to come up with adifferent game plan of how they
administer their services andour tax dollars I mean our tax
dollars.
I don't even know the budgetoffhand.
It's got to be insane theamount of millions of dollars
they have.
But you don't know this.
(21:11):
But they don't have any moneyto spend on mediators to hire
them.
They don't have money to havelarge law firm internally within
the agency to prosecute thesecases.
It's kind of a joke, I'm sorry,and so I'm lashing out at the
EOC, because I've watched it fortoo long and under both
(21:32):
administrations.
Do something with it.
Do something novel, out of thebox thinking to be effective, to
stop the problems, to preventemployers.
If you really want to carry alarge gun on the EOC level, this
is an analogy show it.
Take a stance instead ofguidance which has no
(21:54):
deferential treatment in thecourts, and I've never actually
heard a case that I've had wherethe EOC guidance was actually
dispositive in the court casesquoted by the judge.
I mean.
So all right, I digress, butyou heard it.
It's just I'm exhausted andfrustrated with it.
I have been for a long time.
So, moving on to the questionsregarding what you can do as an
(22:18):
employee, if you see DEI work inyour workplace to individuals
who are part of a quote-unquoteminority group, such as a racial
or ethnic minority, or workerswith non-American national
origins, or diverse employees orhistorically underrepresented
(22:39):
groups, women or some othersubset of individuals, and the
answer that the EEOC provides isno.
Title VII's protections applyequally to all workers.
Doesn't that feel good?
I mean, it's like that'sdemocratic, because that's what
Title VII does.
It didn't say anything aboutquotas and it pissed me off.
When the DEI initiative cameinto being.
(22:59):
I'm like that's discriminatory,but God forbid, I'd be canceled
if I said that.
Okay, well, now we understandit's illegal, not just because
the federal agency said it, itwas always illegal, it's just.
I wish people would get moreinformation about this instead
of latching on some type ofsoundbite and saying DEI this
and that it was inherentlydiscriminatory.
(23:20):
And I took efforts to bringindividual settlement cases
against private employers thatnever reached the light of day,
alleging discrimination basedupon DEI, and did so in some
cases where it was filedpublicly in a federal court.
So it was always illegal.
(23:41):
Let's see.
The next thing is in that samecategory.
The EEOC does not require highershowing of proof for so-called
quote reverse discriminationclaims.
The EEOC's position is thatthere is no such thing as a
reverse discrimination claim,which is true, only
discrimination.
So we just label it reversebecause white, black.
(24:03):
So you know, typically in ourcountry historically it was race
discrimination was related tobeing African-American.
Well, there are cases involvingpeople who are non-African
American who bring claims.
We have a multi-diversepopulation.
There are Indians, there areIndians of American heritage,
there are, I mean, slaviccountries represented here,
(24:26):
there are Germans, irish, etcetera, and there are also
Caucasian individuals, and soyou can have a claim of
discrimination according to anyrace.
So reverse discrimination isjust what we use to signify
there is no meaning to it andthere is no higher standard for
(24:49):
that as well.
And there's a court casepending in the Supreme Court of
the United States and that casebasically says you know, should
a reverse claim ofdiscrimination have a higher
burden than one of a minoritytreatment?
And the answer is kind ofsimple and the Supreme Court
itself, during oral argument,was like the question presented.
(25:12):
They were wondering you know itwas kind of a silly question
and the question presented no,there's no different standard
for it, it's the same standardfor everyone in terms of who
brings a claim of racediscrimination.
So that's the issue in terms ofthe Supreme Court.
(25:33):
It will come out in, I believeI think they said June.
Let's see Any other additionalquestions that I can see that
are kind of popping up.
This is the last one I'll dealwith.
When is DEI initiative, policy,program or practice unlawful
under Title VII?
And this goes to the issue of,you know, the issue of hiring,
(25:59):
firing, promotions, demotions,compensation, fringe benefits,
access to trainings, mentoring,sponsorships and workplace
networking, all this good stuffthat happens in its factual
minutiae.
In your workplace, if anythingis preferential in any way, you
have discrimination.
Just call it out, and so theEEOC is taking a strong position
(26:24):
on that and they're going tolabel it as unlawful
discrimination, segregation, andthey're going to say that
you're not entitled to do thatand they're going to, you know,
maybe the EEOC is going toactually bring cases against you
know, I don't think they havethe resources.
I think this is just a lot ofshouting happening by the EEOC
but with zero follow through.
(26:45):
I mean zero because they didn'thave the resources once.
And now we have this, you know,draining of the swamp approach
happening now with Trump.
Where are the resources goingto come?
You've fired everybody.
So you know there's no.
I get it.
I don't even know if there's aquorum at the EOC commission
level basis.
There's only two left.
They need to appoint more.
(27:05):
So there's no resources here todo what's to be done here.
I think this is more of justgrabbing some headlines, maybe
at this stage by the EEOC,nothing more.
But let's see.
Is there anything else here wecan add?
Here, to give you an idea, ifyou're seeing Title VII
discrimination claims based uponDEI.
You've got to confront it.
(27:30):
You might say to yourselfyou're going to risk your job,
but I want to say that you'regoing to be well-supported if
you confront it these days.
And here's why Somethinghappened.
I believe a day ago the EEOCsent a letter out and you can
actually read it in the paper.
I don't know if the Times iscovering this.
(27:51):
The Wall Street Journaldefinitely did cover it.
The EEOC commissioner Lucassent out a letter to something
like 20 large law firms in thecountry and it said and these
are now law firms that areprivate places of employment.
People work there lawyers andtheir administrative staff and
the pronouncement by the EEOCsaid if you engage in anything
(28:14):
DEI-related, we're coming afteryou, and they mean it.
There's another law firm, dla Ican't remember the name of it.
I'm going to think of it DLAPiper, but I don't think that's
the name of it where the Trumpadministration specifically
attacked the law firm andthey're just cratering.
(28:36):
This is a very large law firm.
They're losing business andclients because they will.
The federal government refusesto do any work-related
activities with this law firmand their clients, or refuses to
do any work-related activitieswith this law firm and their
clients.
So the letter came out to avarious group of large
workplaces Paul Hastings was oneof them a very large, prominent
defense employment law firm andthe federal government, in
(29:02):
essence through the EEOC, saidif you have any DEI practices,
they're illegal and we're comingafter you.
If you have any DEI practices,they're illegal and we're coming
after you, and it's just.
Obviously it's a politicalagenda, but it's also part of
the initiative to stop DEI andeventually they'll start to send
letters to organizations beyondlaw firms.
There is a DEI front that'sbeing managed by the federal
(29:27):
government and through the EEOCto eradicate DEI and anything
related to it.
Obviously it's an anti-wokeismtype of behavior but in all
sincerity, this is a federalgovernment agency designed to
protect both political partiesand their employees.
It doesn't not.
(29:49):
So this is a specifically downthe middle of the aisle issue
that cannot be politicized.
And I want to make one importantpoint before I close.
No one has a right to captureas a group subset for support
employees.
You can see that parties, bothleft and right, try to
politicize employees.
Now, if you are Democrat, yougenerally will see union
(30:11):
activity.
So they you know Democratsthink they have a hold on unions
and you know that's just partof their support group.
And then Republicans, they willsay, well, we're pro-business
and so we have them.
And so you know there'saccusations of.
You know all the people who areat the inauguration in 2025 for
Trump.
You know that's big corporategovernment influence, et cetera.
(30:34):
You have to ignore that stuff,the EEOC or the federal
government itself related toemployees?
It's neither party, and it'sbecause of one very simple thing
.
If a little civics lesson forthe day I'm a political science
major by background, but here itis.
I mean, don't get swayed by anyother type of influence.
(30:57):
1964, civil Rights Act 60 yearsto the date of this passage,
passed in the wake of politicalturmoil back in 1964.
Congress your electedrepresentatives back then passed
this statute.
It said zero information aboutquotas.
Zero, it just simply said shallnot discriminate based upon any
(31:20):
particular category, period,end of story.
It didn't say anything more.
And it founded the EEOC as afederal agency designed to
enforce that statute.
It said nothing about quotas.
So if we're to have a takeawayfrom this, it's not political,
it can't be politicized.
If we would hope that the agencythat was charged here to
(31:44):
protect us as employees, the EOC, would finally stand up and do
the right goddamn thing andprotect employees instead of
pass the buck, because that'sall I've seen them do.
As a practitioner, I'm going totell you the EOC is just
worthless.
I check a box, I move on.
That's ridiculous.
So if they come up withsomething of a novel approach to
(32:08):
this, hats off to them.
Make sure it's not the austereelitism from major universities.
Just keep it simple.
Make sure people understand it,enforce it with vigor and
create deterrence.
Enforce it with vigor andcreate deterrence.
(32:30):
Wow, I just think I justwhiffed that off the top of my
head because maybe that's it.
Well, they're going to say, well, that's what we're already
doing.
Well, it's not working.
So they need to do somethingmore.
Have more resources, morelawyers hired by the federal
government to go after badoffenders.
Okay, on both sides of theaisle at these companies who
allow this to happen, maybe helpout and give resources to join
(32:53):
cases with employee advocateslike the National Employment
Lawyers Association, which I'm apart of, and maybe they sign on
to cases with us.
That'd be a wonderful approachto really piss off employers
that we're going after.
Maybe they'll get the message,mr Employer, that you shouldn't
do these things, or maybe bettermanage your employees instead
(33:16):
of pipping them out, becausethat's what you all know how to
do.
I mean, it's just ridiculous.
So maybe EEOC signing on tocases and filing appearances in
federal court along with me,that would really help.
It would send a message toemployers, it would help settle
cases and then you can come tothe settlement conference with
me and we can participate infront of a magistrate, judge and
(33:37):
try to settle a case.
That would help More moneyresource in the right direction
instead of creating guidance.
I don't need guidance, I needaction.
I need action, you need action.
It's stopped this insanity thatthe EOC has been perpetuating
for 60 years.
All right, I'm exhausted.
This is exhausting shit that Ican't stand.
(33:59):
But if you're here for me, it'sbecause this is really
happening out there.
Granted, the EOC is trying totake a new position Great, love
it.
But the follow through I wantto see it.
Show me Actions, not yourstupid words.
Actions, okay, so there youhave it.
Dei is illegal, always was,always will be.
(34:21):
They'll come up with somethingnew in the future, according to
the statute, but there you haveit.
So, yeah, it's tiring, but thisis what I find interesting and
fascinating to bring to yourattention, and now you're
educated and it's straight downthe middle.
Not political, just the facts,ma'am.
(34:41):
That's what it is and that'sall I ever promised I would do
for you.
Have a great day.
Hey, it's Mark, and welcome back to another edition
of the Employee Survival Guide,where, as you know, I always try
to find stuff that'sinteresting and controversial,
and today's another example ofthat.
Today's episode we're going totalk about the Equal Employment
Opportunity Commission, that'sthe US federal agency charged
(00:26):
with protecting you as employees.
I don't know if you know thatit's a federal agency that has
been around for 60 years.
Apparently, this year was theanniversary the 60th anniversary
of the founding of the EEOC andalso of the passage of the 1964
(00:47):
Civil Rights Act, a veryimportant statute that gives you
rights against your privateemployers, and so the EEOC has
decided to take a stand.
If you've been following thepress about this issue, you
should understand that there isa new sheriff in town, and the
(01:12):
old chair of the EOC obviouslywas left.
She was a Biden appointee.
The former chair is CharlotteBurroughs, I'm sorry, and the
new acting chair is a young ladywho's also a young woman, who's
an employment lawyer by trade,and since I could find the name,
I apologize.
(01:33):
It's very new to me, so theonce I do that, I apologize.
So the EOC has taken a stanceunder the new chair, and the new
chair is Andrea Lucas Iapologize, andrea, there's
(01:54):
actually only two people on thecommission today.
One's a Democrat and one isAndrea Lucas, a Republican.
And the today's episode is aboutDEI diversity, equity,
inclusion as it's interpreted bythe EOC or enforced by the EOC.
(02:15):
Or, more specifically, as tothe rooting out or a complete
utter elimination of anythingrelated to DEI anywhere and any
private sector employmentpossible.
The federal sector employment.
You already hear about that.
There's zero tolerance for that, as the executive orders from
(02:35):
Trump.
Let me start out by saying thisis a.
When I approach this DEIsubject matter, people could
have opinions about my approachto it or how I'm viewing it.
So I'm going to say politicallyneutral, down the center aisle,
please, and don't find out ortry to accuse me of being one
(02:55):
way or the other.
Discrimination in America isanti-democratic in terms of the
institution of the United Statesbeing a democracy, and when you
have discrimination it violatesfederal law, 1964 Civil Rights
Act.
It also violates 42 USC 1981, areconstruction statute from the
(03:24):
Civil War era designed to andintended to enforce or to
encourage African-Americanslaves in that time, post-civil
War, to earn, to contract andown land essentially.
But today we use it fordiscrimination cases based upon
race.
We also use it for reversediscrimination it doesn't matter
your race.
So back to DEI.
(03:44):
The EOC has taken a position andon a press release in fact
today here's the title of it theEOC and Justice Department warn
against unlawful DEI-relateddiscrimination.
And this went out to everyonetoday and basically says that
(04:04):
DEI is a broad term that is notdefined in Title VII of the
Civil Rights Act of 1964.
Title VII prohibits employmentdiscrimination based on
protected characteristics suchas race and sex.
We know that says DEIinitiatives, policies and
(04:27):
programs or practices may beunlawful if they involve an
employer or other covered entitytaking the employment action
motivated in part or in whole byemployees or applicants race,
sex or another protectedcharacteristic.
And the EEOC goes on to say I'mreading here it says In the
past five years the DEI policies, programs and practices have
(04:49):
become increasingly prevalent inmany of our nation's largest
and most prominent businesses,universities and cultural
institutions.
The widespread adoption of DEI,however, does not change
longstanding legal prohibitionsagainst the use of race, sex and
other protected characteristicsin employment.
I need you to really understandthat the widespread adoption of
(05:11):
DEI in the general public byemployers doesn't change what it
is it's illegal.
Now here's where it getscontroversial because it's
political.
We all know how DEI came aboutand if you didn't know, here's a
short scoop there was a murderin some location of a police
officer, of a black man named MrFloyd, and then there was a
(05:33):
public outcry of that, and socorporations didn't want to be
on the losing side of thatsituation.
So they glommed on and startedcreating this DEI initiative,
started creating this DEIinitiative and it went on for
some time and people werechallenged with their own
internal and implicit biases andthe like.
And so you know this and you'vebeen around, you've read
through it, you've experiencedit in your workplaces, I'm sure.
(05:55):
But that didn't make it legal.
Fast forward two years ago orless, the Supreme Court in the
United States abolishedaffirmative action and it said
in that decision that there waszero percentage tolerance for
any quota.
What is DEI?
Well, dei basically createsquotas.
(06:18):
It creates an attempt to bringup the playing field, so to
speak.
This is where it getscontroversial politically
speaking.
Well, if you now know thatTitle VII of the 64th Civil
Rights Act says zero toleranceas to any race specification,
dei is implicitly doing whatit's creating quotas, and it's
(06:42):
illegal in the affirmativeaction setting.
It will soon be legal in theprivate employment sector.
Now you have the federal agencysaying it's illegal because it
creates quotas, and you can'thave any percentages of
favoritism, one classificationover another.
So white versus black, or Asianversus white, or in sex versus
(07:03):
male, female or anything, orsexual orientation Across the
board.
You can't have favorites.
You can't bolster one becauseyou believe, by systemic
discrimination of some sort,that you're trying to bolster
the, you know, maybe bringingmore women up to the C-suite
because you feel that there's alesser percentage in the C-suite
(07:26):
.
So by doing that, any type ofinitiative, in whole or in part,
could be seen as discriminationagainst who?
Well, the opposite particularcategory.
So this would be men.
So you would have basically areversed sex discrimination case
.
In that respect, I'm currentlyactually dealing with a case
(07:46):
about the file it has.
70% of the employees are female.
It's a public company and can'tname names yet, but it says 70%
and this is on informationbelief.
So the issue is you know, weknow by fact, that the workplace
(08:07):
in America is, I think it'slike 57%, 58% female to men.
I think men are maybe thedifference, maybe 53%, but you
can hear the statistics there.
So 70%, wow, how did you getthat level of representation of
women in the workplace in thatparticular company?
That may be a case of DEItreatment.
(08:28):
You know where you're favoringone class over another.
We shall see.
I'm actually drafting acomplaint.
But so DEI from the federalperspective, by the EEOC that
regulates private employersprivate meaning non-governmental
and EEOC it says it's illegal.
(08:49):
So what are you going to doabout it if you find that you
have a DEI program at work?
Let's listen to what the EEOCsays further about this issue.
And this is now quoting thechairwoman, andrea Lucas, quote
(09:09):
far too many employers defendcertain types of race or sex
preferences as good, providedthey are motivated by business
interests in diversity, equityor inclusion.
But no matter an employer'smotive, there is no good or even
acceptable race or sexdiscrimination.
End quote.
And then the I believe she saidquote in the words of Justice
(09:34):
Clarence Thomas in hisconcurrence in Students for Fair
Admissions.
That's the affirmative actiondecision.
Ending affirmative action quote.
This is now quoting JusticeThomas.
Two discriminatory wrongs can'tmake a right which is actually
logically true.
Can't make a right which isactually logically true.
(09:55):
Lucas then went on to say whilethe public may be confused
about what rules apply to DEI.
The law itself is clear and Iagree with her, and this is not
a political statement, it's justclear.
You just can't have apreference.
And she goes on to say andthere are some serious
implications for some verypopular types of DEI programs,
(10:28):
policies and programs, and thatwas the Deputy Attorney General,
todd Blanch.
He goes on to say that thetechnical assistance document
provides clear information foremployees on how to act should
they experience unlawfuldiscrimination based upon DEI
practices.
End quote.
So now you know that the federalgovernment agency, the EEOC, is
(10:48):
targeting the private workplaceregarding DEI practices.
You probably are not smelling awhiff of anything from your
employer about DEI these daysbecause they all retreated.
Some companies are holding outI think Walmart is one of them,
but most companies have justcanceled.
If you had read the Wall StreetJournal this morning, you would
(11:11):
have read a very nice story byLauren Weber, a reporter for the
journal, and she basicallydiscussed the activities at the
company Morgan Stanley.
It goes into very disturbingfacts about how the company
(11:35):
approached DEI and then how,what really happened in terms of
, in particular, if you wereAfrican-American, and what
happened to you if you went tothe organization, and obviously,
lawsuits arose after that.
Now let's turn to the twodocuments I mentioned.
These are one was what to do ifyou experience discrimination
(11:58):
related to DEI work, and theother one was what should you
know about DEI-relateddiscrimination?
My focus is going to be on thelatter document.
I'm going to pull it up infront of me, and the EOC
produced this.
I'll put this in the show notesso you can grab the links to
them, and I wanted to go througha couple of the FAQ type of
(12:21):
questions so we address it andmake me clear about what's at
stake here and what's not.
You should understand by thisjuncture in the episode that DEI
is illegal.
Now you got to get your headaround that first, because we
were just told for like threeyears that DEI is like the way
to go and it was just banteredabout and it was just sung from
(12:45):
high everywhere.
But today it's actually now theEOC is taking position.
It's illegal to do any relatedDEI practices.
We all hope that they come upwith something better.
Diversity you can't use the wordequity.
Inclusion might be problematictoo, but they've now turned to a
(13:09):
meritocracy type of argument.
So decisions based upon merit,which arguably it should.
Merit has no color, gender, age, et cetera.
We all know that.
I mean good old work ethic.
You should be rewarded that way.
The problem is in our country isthat we have employers who and
(13:29):
this is my opinion because itmatters I'm an employment lawyer
and this is what I see we havestatutes that protect people
1964 Civil Rights Act but whathappens?
Employers still continue toviolate it.
Why does that happen?
Because we have organizationsof people who work that are very
large and sometimes small, thatemployers just allow and don't
(13:54):
follow the rules and allowenvironments to be fostered,
festering, that promotediscrimination.
It's not going away becausepeople have implicit bias
related to one another for avariety of scales, just not
because of race.
It's just because the wayhumans are, they basically want
to.
If you are a threat to someone,you're going to find any way
(14:16):
that you can dehumanize thatperson based upon
characteristics, and that's whatleads to discrimination.
I mean, this is all I do for myentire career going on, I don't
know, 28 years, I forget, butyou know the 64 Civil Rights Act
is 60 years old.
It's still going on, ok, soit's not something easy to root
(14:39):
from our society.
And so it's here andunfortunately it can get really
disgusting and I'm justover-coding this.
I mean it can get reallydisturbing what these cases are
about and I do my best to bringyou these stories.
You'll see them in individualpodcasts where I have an AI
(15:03):
discussion about a particularcase in question.
The result, and try to exposeyou to these fact patterns
because I need you to see thelevel of behavior people go to
against one another at work.
It's really disturbing.
But back to the issue here.
The EEOC wants you to know whatDEI and related discrimination
looks like, and so here's justseveral questions.
(15:24):
They are, you know, they've puttogether and I'll put it in the
show notes, as I told you.
First one let's just try theseout.
If I believe I've beendiscriminated against related to
a DEI at work, can I file alawsuit in federal court
alleging a violation of TitleVII without taking any other
further steps?
Well, the answer is no, and youhave to file your
(15:45):
administrative exhaustion.
That's through the EEOC andthat's a requirement.
I myself have to do it forevery single case, for each
client that I have, and thestate has the same requirement
for that.
The second question if youbelieve you'd experienced
discrimination related to DEIwork, what federal government
entity can help you?
Well duh, the EEOC.
You know that's the agency.
(16:06):
And can I just start fromsomething here the EEOC in my
experience?
Now I had 28 years of doingthis.
I had more experience beforethat, before I became a lawyer.
So I've actually been reviewingthe EOC's activities for, let's
call it, 45 years.
Okay, because in college I usedto research the EOC and whatnot
(16:28):
.
I actually went down there onetime in DC and met a chairperson
because I was curious.
So, in reality, the EEOC I justneed to know some specifics.
They claim and this was onJanuary 17, 2025, this is their
annual performance in generalcounsel's reports for fiscal
(16:49):
year 2024, they claim that theyreceived roughly 88,000 new
charges of discrimination in 24,reflecting a 9% increase over
the prior year.
But the reason why I'm gettingto this fact for a second is
because the EEOC tends to.
Well, each time I have asettlement that doesn't go to
(17:12):
suit, the EOC wants to know thesettlement of each client, and
so I say, well, ask thedefendant.
But what they're trying to do,and they come up with this very
large, grandiose number.
I'm trying to locate it for asecond.
They said in fiscal 2024, theyhad $700 million recovered for
victims of discrimination.
$700 million recovered forvictims of discrimination.
(17:37):
That encompasses all the casesthat I and other employment
lawyers are engaging in inaddition to the EOC doing their
own cases.
They do their own cases.
But let me tell you somethingI've never had an EOC agency
interact in any of my cases.
Period end of story.
I had one for-cost grant fromthe EOC must have been about
(17:57):
more than 25 years ago.
I remember the case, I rememberthe investigator and that was
the only one I ever received.
Why is that?
Because the EOC doesn't getinvolved with practitioners in
their cases, but they want toknow who.
You know what your settlementvalue was and it's like they did
something, like they want tobounce off your.
(18:19):
You know the work that I did,but they didn't do squat.
So my complaint about the EOC isdon't report these settlements
about employees, because privatepractitioners like myself
created the result.
Don't claim that, and they doit all the time and I can't
stand it.
So I'm going to call you outEOC.
(18:39):
Stop doing that, because you'renot helping us by any resource
you provide.
Period end of story.
And you know me, I don't filemy EOC cases and then pursue it
in the agencies.
I've stopped doing that becauseI don't believe the agency is
worth a darn penny of myclient's time and money in there
at all and anything that'sresulting is because I'm
(19:02):
creating that.
Now that's my spiel.
On the issue about the EOC, youknow I think that they should
spend more money in the EOC,give it a larger budget and to
police it.
But you know setting forthguidelines.
You know, give me a yawn like ameh.
You know, it's just.
I've read these guidelines.
(19:23):
I'm like the courts don'tfollow them.
And we now know the SupremeCourt in the United States says
we're not going to giveadministrative deference and no
more Chevron deference to theseagencies.
So what good use is the EOCguidance?
It's not.
If they were to do something and, chairman Lucas, if you are
listening to this, god, Iactually, if I had, maybe I'll
(19:45):
send her an email.
I could do that send her theshow note link and she can read
or listen to herself.
But for once, if Trump in hisrhetoric wants to help employees
who voted for him becausethat's what happened why don't
you give employees somethingthey can dig into instead of
(20:05):
politic or whatever?
Choose to get rid of so-calledwoke DEI practices, which I'm
talking about today.
That's how they label it.
But the EEOC has been meh theirentire time.
They really don't help stop theproblem of discrimination.
And then they write about it,but it's a lot of bureaucracy.
(20:28):
It's like give me a break.
They don't do enough to helpthe everyday employee who
doesn't have any.
You know contact with thisagency.
I mean you got to hire anattorney or you can file your
charge.
But you know the EOC is not theadvocate of employees the way
that they think that they are.
Okay.
I know that they file theirindividual lawsuits and they get
(20:50):
companies to roll over, but Ido that too, so I keep track of
my settlements.
I mean, what's the difference?
So they got to come up with adifferent game plan of how they
administer their services andour tax dollars I mean our tax
dollars.
I don't even know the budgetoffhand.
It's got to be insane theamount of millions of dollars
they have.
But you don't know this.
(21:11):
But they don't have any moneyto spend on mediators to hire
them.
They don't have money to havelarge law firm internally within
the agency to prosecute thesecases.
It's kind of a joke, I'm sorry,and so I'm lashing out at the
EOC, because I've watched it fortoo long and under both
(21:32):
administrations.
Do something with it.
Do something novel, out of thebox thinking to be effective, to
stop the problems, to preventemployers.
If you really want to carry alarge gun on the EOC level, this
is an analogy show it.
Take a stance instead ofguidance which has no
(21:54):
deferential treatment in thecourts, and I've never actually
heard a case that I've had wherethe EOC guidance was actually
dispositive in the court casesquoted by the judge.
I mean.
So all right, I digress, butyou heard it.
It's just I'm exhausted andfrustrated with it.
I have been for a long time.
So, moving on to the questionsregarding what you can do as an
(22:18):
employee, if you see DEI work inyour workplace to individuals
who are part of a quote-unquoteminority group, such as a racial
or ethnic minority, or workerswith non-American national
origins, or diverse employees orhistorically underrepresented
(22:39):
groups, women or some othersubset of individuals, and the
answer that the EEOC provides isno.
Title VII's protections applyequally to all workers.
Doesn't that feel good?
I mean, it's like that'sdemocratic, because that's what
Title VII does.
It didn't say anything aboutquotas and it pissed me off.
When the DEI initiative cameinto being.
(22:59):
I'm like that's discriminatory,but God forbid, I'd be canceled
if I said that.
Okay, well, now we understandit's illegal, not just because
the federal agency said it, itwas always illegal, it's just.
I wish people would get moreinformation about this instead
of latching on some type ofsoundbite and saying DEI this
and that it was inherentlydiscriminatory.
(23:20):
And I took efforts to bringindividual settlement cases
against private employers thatnever reached the light of day,
alleging discrimination basedupon DEI, and did so in some
cases where it was filedpublicly in a federal court.
So it was always illegal.
(23:41):
Let's see.
The next thing is in that samecategory.
The EEOC does not require highershowing of proof for so-called
quote reverse discriminationclaims.
The EEOC's position is thatthere is no such thing as a
reverse discrimination claim,which is true, only
discrimination.
So we just label it reversebecause white, black.
(24:03):
So you know, typically in ourcountry historically it was race
discrimination was related tobeing African-American.
Well, there are cases involvingpeople who are non-African
American who bring claims.
We have a multi-diversepopulation.
There are Indians, there areIndians of American heritage,
there are, I mean, slaviccountries represented here,
(24:26):
there are Germans, irish, etcetera, and there are also
Caucasian individuals, and soyou can have a claim of
discrimination according to anyrace.
So reverse discrimination isjust what we use to signify
there is no meaning to it andthere is no higher standard for
(24:49):
that as well.
And there's a court casepending in the Supreme Court of
the United States and that casebasically says you know, should
a reverse claim ofdiscrimination have a higher
burden than one of a minoritytreatment?
And the answer is kind ofsimple and the Supreme Court
itself, during oral argument,was like the question presented.
(25:12):
They were wondering you know itwas kind of a silly question
and the question presented no,there's no different standard
for it, it's the same standardfor everyone in terms of who
brings a claim of racediscrimination.
So that's the issue in terms ofthe Supreme Court.
(25:33):
It will come out in, I believeI think they said June.
Let's see Any other additionalquestions that I can see that
are kind of popping up.
This is the last one I'll dealwith.
When is DEI initiative, policy,program or practice unlawful
under Title VII?
And this goes to the issue of,you know, the issue of hiring,
(25:59):
firing, promotions, demotions,compensation, fringe benefits,
access to trainings, mentoring,sponsorships and workplace
networking, all this good stuffthat happens in its factual
minutiae.
In your workplace, if anythingis preferential in any way, you
have discrimination.
Just call it out, and so theEEOC is taking a strong position
(26:24):
on that and they're going tolabel it as unlawful
discrimination, segregation, andthey're going to say that
you're not entitled to do thatand they're going to, you know,
maybe the EEOC is going toactually bring cases against you
know, I don't think they havethe resources.
I think this is just a lot ofshouting happening by the EEOC
but with zero follow through.
(26:45):
I mean zero because they didn'thave the resources once.
And now we have this, you know,draining of the swamp approach
happening now with Trump.
Where are the resources goingto come?
You've fired everybody.
So you know there's no.
I get it.
I don't even know if there's aquorum at the EOC commission
level basis.
There's only two left.
They need to appoint more.
(27:05):
So there's no resources here todo what's to be done here.
I think this is more of justgrabbing some headlines, maybe
at this stage by the EEOC,nothing more.
But let's see.
Is there anything else here wecan add?
Here, to give you an idea, ifyou're seeing Title VII
discrimination claims based uponDEI.
You've got to confront it.
(27:30):
You might say to yourselfyou're going to risk your job,
but I want to say that you'regoing to be well-supported if
you confront it these days.
And here's why Somethinghappened.
I believe a day ago the EEOCsent a letter out and you can
actually read it in the paper.
I don't know if the Times iscovering this.
(27:51):
The Wall Street Journaldefinitely did cover it.
The EEOC commissioner Lucassent out a letter to something
like 20 large law firms in thecountry and it said and these
are now law firms that areprivate places of employment.
People work there lawyers andtheir administrative staff and
the pronouncement by the EEOCsaid if you engage in anything
(28:14):
DEI-related, we're coming afteryou, and they mean it.
There's another law firm, dla Ican't remember the name of it.
I'm going to think of it DLAPiper, but I don't think that's
the name of it where the Trumpadministration specifically
attacked the law firm andthey're just cratering.
(28:36):
This is a very large law firm.
They're losing business andclients because they will.
The federal government refusesto do any work-related
activities with this law firmand their clients, or refuses to
do any work-related activitieswith this law firm and their
clients.
So the letter came out to avarious group of large
workplaces Paul Hastings was oneof them a very large, prominent
defense employment law firm andthe federal government, in
(29:02):
essence through the EEOC, saidif you have any DEI practices,
they're illegal and we're comingafter you.
If you have any DEI practices,they're illegal and we're coming
after you, and it's just.
Obviously it's a politicalagenda, but it's also part of
the initiative to stop DEI andeventually they'll start to send
letters to organizations beyondlaw firms.
There is a DEI front that'sbeing managed by the federal
(29:27):
government and through the EEOCto eradicate DEI and anything
related to it.
Obviously it's an anti-wokeismtype of behavior but in all
sincerity, this is a federalgovernment agency designed to
protect both political partiesand their employees.
It doesn't not.
(29:49):
So this is a specifically downthe middle of the aisle issue
that cannot be politicized.
And I want to make one importantpoint before I close.
No one has a right to captureas a group subset for support
employees.
You can see that parties, bothleft and right, try to
politicize employees.
Now, if you are Democrat, yougenerally will see union
(30:11):
activity.
So they you know Democratsthink they have a hold on unions
and you know that's just partof their support group.
And then Republicans, they willsay, well, we're pro-business
and so we have them.
And so you know there'saccusations of.
You know all the people who areat the inauguration in 2025 for
Trump.
You know that's big corporategovernment influence, et cetera.
(30:34):
You have to ignore that stuff,the EEOC or the federal
government itself related toemployees?
It's neither party, and it'sbecause of one very simple thing
.
If a little civics lesson forthe day I'm a political science
major by background, but here itis.
I mean, don't get swayed by anyother type of influence.
(30:57):
1964, civil Rights Act 60 yearsto the date of this passage,
passed in the wake of politicalturmoil back in 1964.
Congress your electedrepresentatives back then passed
this statute.
It said zero information aboutquotas.
Zero, it just simply said shallnot discriminate based upon any
(31:20):
particular category, period,end of story.
It didn't say anything more.
And it founded the EEOC as afederal agency designed to
enforce that statute.
It said nothing about quotas.
So if we're to have a takeawayfrom this, it's not political,
it can't be politicized.
If we would hope that the agencythat was charged here to
(31:44):
protect us as employees, the EOC, would finally stand up and do
the right goddamn thing andprotect employees instead of
pass the buck, because that'sall I've seen them do.
As a practitioner, I'm going totell you the EOC is just
worthless.
I check a box, I move on.
That's ridiculous.
So if they come up withsomething of a novel approach to
(32:08):
this, hats off to them.
Make sure it's not the austereelitism from major universities.
Just keep it simple.
Make sure people understand it,enforce it with vigor and
create deterrence.
Enforce it with vigor andcreate deterrence.
(32:30):
Wow, I just think I justwhiffed that off the top of my
head because maybe that's it.
Well, they're going to say, well, that's what we're already
doing.
Well, it's not working.
So they need to do somethingmore.
Have more resources, morelawyers hired by the federal
government to go after badoffenders.
Okay, on both sides of theaisle at these companies who
allow this to happen, maybe helpout and give resources to join
(32:53):
cases with employee advocateslike the National Employment
Lawyers Association, which I'm apart of, and maybe they sign on
to cases with us.
That'd be a wonderful approachto really piss off employers
that we're going after.
Maybe they'll get the message,mr Employer, that you shouldn't
do these things, or maybe bettermanage your employees instead
(33:16):
of pipping them out, becausethat's what you all know how to
do.
I mean, it's just ridiculous.
So maybe EEOC signing on tocases and filing appearances in
federal court along with me,that would really help.
It would send a message toemployers, it would help settle
cases and then you can come tothe settlement conference with
me and we can participate infront of a magistrate, judge and
(33:37):
try to settle a case.
That would help More moneyresource in the right direction
instead of creating guidance.
I don't need guidance, I needaction.
I need action, you need action.
It's stopped this insanity thatthe EOC has been perpetuating
for 60 years.
All right, I'm exhausted.
This is exhausting shit that Ican't stand.
(33:59):
But if you're here for me, it'sbecause this is really
happening out there.
Granted, the EOC is trying totake a new position Great, love
it.
But the follow through I wantto see it.
Show me Actions, not yourstupid words.
Actions, okay, so there youhave it.
Dei is illegal, always was,always will be.
(34:21):
They'll come up with somethingnew in the future, according to
the statute, but there you haveit.
So, yeah, it's tiring, but thisis what I find interesting and
fascinating to bring to yourattention, and now you're
educated and it's straight downthe middle.
Not political, just the facts,ma'am.
(34:41):
That's what it is and that'sall I ever promised I would do
for you.
Have a great day.
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