US Supreme Court Clarifies Standard in Reverse-Discrimination Cases

Decision Alert: Ames v. Ohio Dep’t of Youth Svcs.

Introduction:

On June 5, 2025, the United States Supreme Court issued a unanimous decision holding that so-called “reverse discrimination” claims—discrimination claims brought by a member of the majority race, gender, or other protected characteristic—are not subject to heightened standards of proof. As reverse-discrimination claims continue to become more common, the decision clarifies the legal standards that will apply to those claims and serves as an important reminder for employers of the considerations to take into account when making employment decisions.

Issue:

Whether, in addition to pleading the other elements of an employment discrimination claim under Title VII of the Civil Rights Act of 1964, a majority-group plaintiff must show additional “background circumstances” to bolster the claim that the defendant discriminates against the majority.

Background:

Petitioner Marlean Ames is a heterosexual woman who was hired by the Ohio Department of Youth Services in 2004. In 2019, Ames was assigned a new supervisor, a homosexual woman. Ames received positive performance reviews, but when she applied for a promotion to the Department’s Bureau Chief of Quality, a homosexual woman was hired instead of Ames. Just four days later, Ames was demoted to a secretarial role and a gay man was hired to fill Ames’s prior role.

Ames sued her employer, the Ohio Department of Youth Services, pursuant to Title VII of the Civil Rights Act of 1964, asserting claims of discrimination based on her sex and sexual orientation. The United States District Court for the District of Ohio granted summary judgment in favor of the Ohio Department of Youth Services. The Sixth Circuit affirmed, holding that because Ames is heterosexual in addition to the prima facie case that all discrimination plaintiffs must establish—Ames must make an additional showing of “background circumstances to support the suspicion that the defendant is that unusual employer who discriminated against the majority.” The Sixth Circuit noted that Ames’s prima facie case was easy to make, but that her claim for sexual-orientation discrimination should nevertheless be dismissed because she failed to satisfy the so-called “background circumstances” requirement by pointing to evidence that a member of the relevant minority group made the employment decision at issue or statistical evidence showing a pattern of discrimination by the employer against members of the majority group. In Ames’s case, she was terminated by the Director and Assistant Director—who were both heterosexuals—and there was no evidence of a pattern of discrimination besides her own experience.

Prior to the Supreme Court’s decision, four circuits had adopted the “background circumstances” requirement in discrimination cases brought by majority-group plaintiffs. See Hammer v. Ashcroft, 383 F.3d 722 (8th Cir. 2004); Mills v. Health Care Services Corp., 171 F.3d 450 (7th Cir. 1999); Harding v. Gray, 9 F.3d 150 (D.C. Cir. 1993); Notari v. Denver Water Dep’t, 971 F.2d 585 (10th Cir. 1992). Two circuits had explicitly rejected the requirement. See Iadimarco v. Runyon, 190 F.3d 151 (3d. Cir. 1999); Smith v. Lockheed-Martin Corp., 644 F.3d 1321 (11th Cir. 2011).

Court’s Holding:

In a unanimous opinion authored by Justice Ketanji Brown Jackson, the US Supreme Court held that majority-group plaintiffs bringing “reverse discrimination” claims under Title VII of the Civil Rights Act of 1964 are not required to show “background circumstances to support the suspicion that the defendant is that unusual employer who discriminates against the majority.”

The Court explained that the “background circumstances” requirement is not consistent with Title VII’s text or the Supreme Court’s case law construing the statute. Starting with the statutory text, the Court noted that Title VII’s disparate-treatment provision “draws no distinctions between majority-group plaintiffs and minority-group plaintiffs.” Indeed, the statute focuses on “individuals” rather than groups. “By establishing the same protections for every ‘individual’—without regard to that individual’s membership in a minority or majority group—Congress left no room for courts to impose special requirements on majority-group plaintiffs alone,” the Court found.

The Supreme Court thus rejected the heightened standard imposed by some lower courts on majority-group plaintiffs, affirming that all Title VII discrimination claims must be evaluated under the same burden-shifting framework established by the Court in McDonnell Douglas Corp. v. Green, 411 U.S. 792 (1973). The Court further explained that the “background circumstances” rule ignores the Court’s instruction to avoid inflexible applications of McDonnell Douglas’s first prong. In fact, the Court noted that it has “repeatedly” explained that “precise requirements of a prima facie case can vary depending on the context and were ‘never intended to be rigid, mechanized, or ritualistic.’” Swierkiewicz v. Sorema N.A., 534 U.S. 506, 512 (2002). The “background circumstances” rule “disregards this admonition by uniformly subjecting all majority-group plaintiffs to the same, highly specific evidentiary standard in every case,” according to the Supreme Court.

Additionally, the Court explicitly rejected the Ohio Department of Youth Services’ argument that the background circumstances was “just another way of asking whether the circumstances surrounding an employment decision, if otherwise unexplained, suggest that the decision was because of a protected characteristic.” The Supreme Court found this contention to be “directly at odds” with the Sixth Circuit’s description of the “background circumstances” rule and its application of that requirement in this case. Rather, the Sixth Circuit “expressly based” its holding affirming summary judgment “on Ames’s failure to satisfy a heightened evidentiary standard.” Because Title VII does not impose a heightened standard on majority group plaintiffs, the Supreme Court vacated the judgment below and remanded to the Sixth Circuit for application of the proper prima facie standard.

Justice Clarence Thomas, joined by Justice Neil Gorsuch, concurred. Justice Thomas joined the majority’s opinion in full, but wrote to emphasize the issues that arise when judges create “atexual legal rules and frameworks” such as the background-circumstances requirement. Justice Thomas cited the example of “the difficult—if not impossible—task of deciding whether a particular plaintiff qualifies as a member of the so-called ‘majority.’” Women, for example, make up the majority in the United States as a whole, but not in some states and counties. Women similarly make up the majority of employees in certain industries but not others. Defining the “majority” is even more difficult in the context of race, as racial categories tend to be “overbroad” and “imprecise in many ways.” Notably, Justice Thomas also invited a challenge to the McDonnell Douglas burden-shifting framework, noting that he “would be willing to consider whether the McDonnell Douglas framework is a workable and useful evidentiary tool.”

Takeaways for Employers:

• Reverse-discrimination claims have been on the rise in recent years. By removing obstacles that certain majority plaintiffs faced in pleading and proving their claims, this decision will likely lead to a further increase in the filing of discrimination claims by majority groups.
• Employers should continue to carefully review all employment decisions—such as hirings, promotions, and terminations—regardless of whether the employee falls into a majority or minority-protected class. All employment decisions should be supported by legitimate business reasons and contemporaneously documented. Employers should likewise ensure that supervisors and Human Resources personnel are adequately trained to recognize and prevent all forms of workplace discrimination.
• When litigating Title VII discrimination claims, employers can still point to certain facts—like the characteristics of the decisionmakers and the experiences of others—to undermine an inference of discrimination or argue a lack of pretext. But the Supreme Court has confirmed that reverse-discrimination claims are not subject to a higher or different burden of proof than other discrimination claims.
• This decision signals a recognition by the Supreme Court of the continuing validity of discrimination claims brought by majority-group plaintiffs, and that such claims will receive consideration by the Court. This is important to keep in mind as possible challenges to diversity, equity, and inclusion (“DEI”) programs and policies are litigated and will possibly reach the Supreme Court in the coming years. Indeed, Justice Thomas specifically refers to DEI initiatives in footnote 3 of his concurrence, stating that DEI initiatives “have often led to overt discrimination against those perceived to be in the majority.” This footnote will surely be cited in the future as legal challenges to DEI programs are expected to increase.

Read the court’s full opinion.