Last month, we reported on a Georgia federal district court decision concluding that an employer failed to reasonably accommodate remote workers who objected to a mandatory COVID-19 vaccination requirement. A new decision from the Fourth Circuit Court of Appeals (which includes North Carolina, South Carolina, and Virginia) supported similar claims by remote working employees seeking vaccine exemptions, but on slightly different legal grounds.

In Finn v. Humane Society of the United States, the plaintiffs alleged that they requested exemptions to the mandatory COVID-19 vaccine requirement based on their religious beliefs. The district court dismissed the claim, stating that the plaintiffs had failed to articulate in their pleadings how their objections to the vaccine related to their religious beliefs. On appeal, the Fourth Circuit concluded that employees have a low burden when suing to show specific religious basis for their accommodation requests. While the employer can introduce evidence disputing the sincerity of or necessity for the accommodation, courts will not dismiss the claims due to lack of specific pleadings on this issue.

The Fourth Circuit affirmed dismissal of the plaintiffs' disability discrimination claims, ruling that the employer’s request for confirmation of vaccinated status is not a prohibited medical inquiry, and that unvaccinated status is not a protected disability.

This decision is yet another illustration of the shifting legal climate for reviewing religious discrimination and accommodation claims. Employers that may not have thought twice about rejecting accommodation requests in the past should understand that they are expected to grant such accommodations absent a demonstration of undue hardship.

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