Federal Employee Discrimination: What is It?

Federal employees, like virtually all workers throughout the United States, are protected from discrimination in the workplace. Federal employees are protected from many different kinds of discrimination and are protected from discrimination on the basis of many different characteristics and attributes.

If you are a federal employee, there is a special federal sector complaint process that provides you with remedies.  Baltimore employment lawyers can help you to determine your best course of action for making a discrimination claim if you have been victimized. You should call an attorney whenever you suspect you have been treated unfairly in connection with your job in the federal workforce or in connection with any terms or conditions of hiring, firing, or promotions in the federal workforce.

What is Federal Employee Discrimination?

Federal employees are protected by the same laws that apply to the workforce as a whole, including Title VII of the Civil Rights Act, the Rehabilitation Act of 1973 which adopts the same standards for determining disability discrimination as those outlined in the Americans with Disabilities Act, and the Age Discrimination in Employment Act. Collectively, these laws protect against discrimination on the basis of race, religion, color, sex, national origin, advanced age, pregnancy, and disability.

The U.S. Equal Employment Opportunity Commission also explains that there are other protections for federal workers – in addition to laws the EEOC enforces — that prohibit discrimination against federal workers on the basis of sexual orientation, marital status, status as a parent, political affiliation, and other conduct that does not have an adverse impact on an employee’s performance. Federal workers, in other words, receive more protection from a broader array of different kinds of discriminatory behavior than workers in the private sector.

The types of discrimination that federal employees are protected against are extensive. Workers aren’t just protected from discrimination when it comes to obvious types of discriminatory behavior such as an employer refusing to hire or promote someone because of his race or gender. There are other types of discriminatory conduct as well, including:

• Refusal to make reasonable accommodations to allow a person with a disability to work or to allow reasonable accommodations for an employee’s religious beliefs and practices.
• Employers allowing a hostile work environment to be created on the basis of someone’s protected status. If employers allow discriminatory or sexist jokes to be made, this would be an example of hostile work environment discrimination.
• Disparate impact discrimination: When job requirements have the effect of disqualifying more members of a protected class, such as requirements that disqualify more women or more people of a particular race, those requirements may be considered a form of discrimination unless there is a bona fide job-related reason for the discriminatory conduct.

Baltimore employment lawyers can provide assistance with understanding all of the different types of discriminatory behavior that federal workers are protected from and can provide assistance taking action if you are in the federal government workforce and you believe you have been treated unfairly in violation of the law. Call The Law Firm of J.W. Stafford, L.L.C. at 410-514-6099 or contact us online today.