562 U.S. 411, 417 (2011)
Vincent Staub worked as an angiography technician for Proctor Hospital until his termination in 2004.1 Staub was a member of the United States Army Reserve and was required to attend one weekend of drill per month plus two to three weeks of full-time training each year.2 His immediate supervisor Janice Mulally and her supervisor Michael Korenchuk were both hostile to Staub's military obligations.3
Mulally scheduled Staub for additional shifts without notice so that he would pay back the department for coverage of his reserve schedule.4 She told a coworker that Staub's military duty strained the department and asked for help getting rid of him.5 Korenchuk referred to Staub's military obligations as a bunch of smoking and joking and a waste of taxpayers' money.6 He knew that Mulally was out to get Staub.7
In January 2004 Mulally issued Staub a Corrective Action for purportedly violating a company rule requiring him to stay in his work area when not with a patient.8 The Corrective Action directed Staub to report to Mulally or Korenchuk when he had no patients and the angio cases were completed.9 Staub maintained that the rule did not exist.10 He had not violated it.11
On April 2, 2004 a coworker complained to Proctor's vice president of human resources Linda Buck and chief operating officer Garrett McGowan about Staub's unavailability.12 Three weeks later Korenchuk told Buck that Staub had left his desk without informing a supervisor in violation of the Corrective Action.13 Although Staub had left Korenchuk a voicemail notification Buck relied on the report reviewed Staub's personnel file and fired him citing the ignored directive.14
Staub challenged the termination through Proctor's grievance process claiming Mulally had fabricated the Corrective Action out of hostility to his military service but Buck did not follow up with Mulally and upheld the decision.15 Staub sued Proctor under the Uniformed Services Employment and Reemployment Rights Act alleging that the supervisors' animus had influenced Buck's decision.16 A jury found that Staub's military status was a motivating factor in the discharge and awarded him $57,640 in damages.17 The Seventh Circuit reversed.18 The Supreme Court granted certiorari.19
Whether an employer may be held liable under the Uniformed Services Employment and Reemployment Rights Act for an adverse employment action when a supervisor motivated by antimilitary animus influences the ultimate decisionmaker who lacks such animus?20
Yes. Mulally and Korenchuk performed acts motivated by antimilitary animus with the intent to cause Staub's termination.23 Their statements and reports demonstrated this intent.24 Those acts were a proximate cause of Buck's decision to fire Staub.25 She relied on the Corrective Action they had prompted.26 Buck did not conduct independent verification that would have severed the causal chain.27
The judgment of the Seventh Circuit is reversed and the case is remanded for further proceedings.28
Related opinions on this issue
Justice Alito concurred in the judgment.29 He agreed that the decision of the Court of Appeals must be reversed.30 He would have done so based on the statutory text rather than principles of agency and tort law.31
Discrimination must be present within the mind of the person who makes the decision to take the adverse action.32 He concluded that Korenchuk had been delegated part of the decisionmaking authority in this case.33 Buck accepted the accusation at face value without undertaking an independent investigation.34
Therefore the employer could be held liable on that narrower textual basis.35