On June 24, the United States Supreme Court held that a Title VII plaintiff must prove that retaliation was not just a motivating factor in an adverse employment action but instead was the determinative factor.

The case involved a medical doctor of Middle Eastern descent who was hired to work as a member of a University's faculty and as a staff physician in an affiliated hospital under the terms of an established affiliation agreement. The employee alleged that his ultimate (but not direct) superior was biased against him on the basis of his religion and ethnic heritage, which manifested itself in close scrutiny of his productivity and billing practices. The employee also claimed that the superior told him that "Middle Easterners are lazy", and that he complained to the superior's boss, the Chair of Internal Medicine, about the harassment on multiple occasions. The employee ultimately decided to resign his teaching position due to the harassment, but sought to remain employed on the hospital staff. In his letter of resignation from the faculty, the employee told the Chair of Internal Medicine that he was resigning due to his superior's harassment, which stemmed from religious, racial and cultural bias against Arabs and Muslims. The Chair of Internal Medicine was upset by the superior's public humiliation and through it was important to publicly exonerate her. The employee subsequently received a job offer as a staff physician at the hospital, an offer which was subsequently withdrawn after the Chair of Internal Medicine asserted that allowing the employee to work at the hospital was inconsistent with the affiliation agreement's requirement that all staff physicians also work as members of the University's faculty. The employee filed suit alleging that his superior discriminated against him on the basis of race and religion, and that the Chair of Internal Medicine's effort to prevent the hospital from hiring him after he complained about his superior constituted impermissible retaliation. At trial, the jury found for the employee on both claims. On appeal, the Fifth Circuit vacated the jury's discrimination finding but affirmed the retaliation finding on the theory that the employee presented sufficient evidence showing that retaliation was a motivating factor for the adverse employment action, rather than a "but-for" cause. The case was appealed to the Supreme Court.

In a lengthy analysis of the text of Title VII, the Supreme Court reasoned that there are legal and factual distinctions between Title VII discrimination claims, which can result in employer liability if wrongful discrimination is a motivating factor according to clear statutory language, and retaliation claims, which contain no statutory indication that the "motivating factor" standard should apply. Furthermore, retaliation claims continue to be on the rise across the country, impacting the allocation of resources in the judicial system and creating the opportunity for filing frivolous claims. To proceed with a Title VII retaliation claim, the court concluded, an employee must show that the unlawful retaliation "would not have occurred in the absence of the alleged wrongful action or actions of the employer". Read more.