Amicus Brief: Young v. Colorado Dept. of Corrections

Joshua Young, a white corrections officer formerly employed by the Colorado Department of Corrections, challenged the legality of the DEI training imposed by his employer. The district court dismissed his suit for failure to state a legally cognizable claim. The U.S. Court of Appeals for the Tenth Circuit affirmed the dismissal but provided guidance on how to properly plead his claims. In this second attempt, Young addressed the Tenth Circuit’s concerns, but the district court again dismissed with prejudice (without possibility of refiling), rejecting Young’s renewed claims under federal civil rights laws and stating that Young failed to sufficiently allege that the DEI training constituted severe or pervasive harassment capable of altering employment conditions. Again on appeal to the Tenth Circuit, MI joined the Southeastern Legal Foundation and American Civil Rights Project on a brief arguing that (1) Young reasonably construed the training as a demand to implement a race-based ideology on the job, and (2) courts have an important role in protecting the rights of employees from workplace training that constitutes a hostile work environment.

Ilya Shapiro is a senior fellow and director of Constitutional Studies at the Manhattan Institute. Follow him on Twitter here.

Dan Morenoff is an adjunct fellow at the Manhattan Institute and the executive director at the American Civil Rights Project.

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