Expressing Milk Under Title VII and the PPACA

Marcia McCormick posted on Workplace Prof Blog today about a Texas sex discrimination case  EEOC v. Houston Funding that lost on summary judgement where the EEOC alleged that a discriminatee had been fired for asking to be able to pump breast-milk at work.  McCormick summarized the holding as follows:

   The district court judge held that even though discrimination on the basis of pregnancy, childbirth, or related medical conditions is a violation of Title VII, that once the employee gave birth, she had no more pregnancy-related conditions and that therefore firing someone on the basis of lactation or pumping breastmilk could not be sex discrimination, citing these other district court decisions in support: Puente v. Ridge, No. M-04.267, 2005 U.S. Dist. LEXIS 46624, at *1I-12 (S.D. Tex. July 6, 2005); Martinez v. NBC Inc., 49 F. Supp. 2d 305, 311 (S.D.N.Y. 1999); Jacobson v. Regent Assisted Living, Inc., No. CV-98-564-ST, 1999 U.S. Dist. LEXIS 7680, at *30 (D. Or. Apr. 9, 1999; Wallace v. Pyro Mining Co., 789 F . Supp. 867, 869 (W.D. Ky. 1990).

Whether or not this summary judgement withstands an appeal, it probably won't have much of an effect on the workplace.  Little over a month after the alleged  discriminatee was fired, the Patient Protection and Affordable Care Act was signed into law.  One of the buried provisions of the PPACA establishes the right of women to be given a space (other than a bathroom) to nurse or express milk.