Search
The Employer Handbook Blog
Not Every Discrimination Complaint Gets Legal Protection
A discrimination complaint can be genuine without being legally protected.
An employee learned that the hard way when her retaliation claim flatlined before it even got to trial.
A magistrate judge in a federal court recently reminded employers that even a sincere complaint has to be objectively reasonable before it triggers retaliation protection under Title VII.
TL;DR: A court recommended summary judgment for an employer after finding that a nurse’s belief she had faced race discrimination wasn’t objectively reasonable. The record showed differences between travel nurses and staff nurses, not between Black and White nurses. Without an objectively reasonable belief in discrimination, her retaliation claims under Title VII and Section 1981 failed.
How the retaliation claim unfolded and unraveled
The employee was a travel nurse who took short-term hospital assignments through a staffing agency. She had worked at this hospital before, but when she accepted a new placement on a nephrology unit, she learned the job had changed. Nurses on that unit, both staff and travelers, were now expected to perform peritoneal dialysis, a delicate procedure she had never done.
She told her manager she did not feel comfortable performing dialysis without more training. During that conversation, she also said she thought she was being asked to do it because she is Black. The manager disagreed, explaining that White nurses had to perform the same procedure and that everyone was being held to the same expectations.
They talked about orientation. The plan was for her to work a 12-hour training shift with about four hours devoted to dialysis and the rest to general onboarding. She did not think that was enough and asked for more instruction, pointing out that staff nurses typically received several weeks of training. The manager said that the four-hour dialysis training was the same for everyone, whether staff or travel.
A few days later, before orientation started, the hospital canceled the assignment. The manager told the staffing agency it was not safe to place a nurse who did not have dialysis experience and seemed uneasy about performing the procedure. The agency passed that message along.
The nurse thought her race was the real reason for the cancellation and filed a retaliation claim, arguing the hospital ended her assignment because she complained about discrimination.
The magistrate judge zeroed in on a key point: the distinction the nurse described was not about race at all. It was about job classification. In her own testimony, she compared the training she received as a travel nurse to the training offered to staff nurses, not to the training given to White nurses. She said she was offered about four hours of dialysis training, while staff nurses got four to six weeks of onboarding. That might seem unequal, but the court explained it was not race-based; it reflected the difference between permanent employees and short-term contract workers. And while she said most of the travel nurses working nights were Black, she admitted she was not sure how her coworkers identified themselves and did not offer any evidence about the racial makeup of the staff nurses. In the end, the court said the difference she pointed to was staffing, not race, and her belief in discrimination was not objectively reasonable.
What employers can learn from this
Take every complaint seriously.
Even if the allegations seem weak or unlikely to amount to a legal claim, take time to listen, ask questions, and understand what the employee is describing. Respectful attention shows good faith and helps surface facts early.
Apply standards consistently.
Uneven enforcement of policies is where most retaliation and discrimination cases gain traction. Make sure training, scheduling, and expectations are applied the same way for everyone in the same role.
Document decisions and communications.
Write down why a decision was made, who made it, and when. A brief, factual note or email often proves decisive if the complaint later turns into a lawsuit.
Stay coordinated.
When working with staffing agencies or contractors, share information and messaging so the explanation for an action is consistent across organizations.
The bottom line
A good faith complaint is not automatically protected. What matters is whether a reasonable person, looking at the facts, could believe discrimination really occurred.
This kind of case is an outlier. Most retaliation claims turn on timing, credibility, and documentation, not on whether the employee’s belief was objectively reasonable. Employers should still handle every complaint carefully, investigate as needed, and show through their conduct and records that concerns are taken seriously and addressed fairly.