The U.S. Court of Appeals for the Second Circuit has ruled that employees must show an adverse employment decision was motivated by their need for religious accommodation to establish a prima facie discrimination case.
The precedential opinion, issued on July 15, 2026, reshapes how religious discrimination claims are evaluated across Connecticut, New York, and Vermont.
The case, Bergin v. New York State Unified Court System, centred on a court officer who sought a religious exemption from a COVID-19 vaccination requirement in September 2021.
Jessica Bergin, a court officer for the New York Unified Court System, submitted a written request citing religious objections to the vaccination mandate, which required compliance by October 18, 2021.
After UCS denied her exemption request, her employment was terminated in April 2022 for failure to comply with the vaccination requirement, following a period of administrative leave.
UCS ended its vaccination requirement in February 2023 and reinstated Bergin’s employment in June 2023, though she had already filed a religious discrimination lawsuit under Title VII.
A federal district court had previously granted partial summary judgment in Bergin’s favour in November 2024, finding she had established a prima facie case under an older Second Circuit test for failure to accommodate religion.
The Second Circuit vacated that ruling, finding the district court had applied the wrong legal standard, and remanded the case for further proceedings consistent with the updated framework.
The appellate court adopted the test set forth in the Supreme Court’s 2015 decision in EEOC v. Abercrombie and Fitch Stores, Inc., which requires plaintiffs to show the employer’s desire to avoid a religious accommodation was a motivating factor in any adverse employment action.
The Second Circuit stated that “[t]he Supreme Court explained that failure-to-accommodate-religion claims fall within Title VII’s disparate treatment provision, which ‘prohibits certain motives, regardless of the state of the actor’s knowledge.'”
Bergin had argued that Abercrombie did not apply to her case because it involved failure to hire rather than wrongful termination, but the court rejected this, noting such an argument “runs headlong into the statutory text [of Title VII], which treats hiring and firing alike.”
The ruling clarifies that an employee is not required to formally inform an employer of the need for a religious accommodation to trigger the employer’s legal obligation to provide one.
The court acknowledged that an employer’s knowledge of a needed accommodation may serve as evidence of motive, but held that the absence of such knowledge is not a dispositive factor in these claims.
Under Title VII, employers must provide a reasonable religious accommodation unless doing so would impose an undue hardship, defined as a substantial cost or difficulty to the organisation.
Employment lawyers advise that employers in the Second Circuit should now assess failure-to-accommodate religion claims under the Abercrombie standard, and consider training managers on their obligations under both state and federal religious discrimination laws.