Although Leah Snyder is reportedly not among the 150 people charged criminally for storming the U.S. Capitol on Jan. 6, she was terminated for attending the pro-Trump rally by her employer. In response, Snyder sued the company in federal court for $10 million, according to media reports.
"This case is interesting because it pushes us to think about protected activities in a new light, particularly the kinds of activities that remain protected and unprotected by federal and state laws,” said Nicole Clark, a California attorney and founder of judicial analytics platform Trellis Law Intelligence.
Snyder’s complaint, filed in the Central District of California, states she worked for outsourcing company Alight Solutions for more than 20 years as a computer programmer and coder before deciding to take paid time off to attend the Washington D.C. protest, which some have dubbed an insurrection.
“Many state laws protect political activities, so long as the protest is lawful,” Clark told the Southern California Record. “However, many protests emerge as a result of social actors questioning how the status quo has defined lawful behavior. As we have learned from the Black Lives Matter movement, these definitions are context-specific and are often inflected by racial and class dynamics.”
Causes of action in the lawsuit include wrongful termination of employment in violation of public policy as well as breach of the covenant of good faith and fair dealing.
“The primary legal obstacle for this case relates to the challenges of any wrongful termination action, which can be difficult cases to win because the employee must prove that the employer acted with a specific illegal motivation,” Clark said in an interview. “That is that the termination was directly related to a protected activity but motives can be difficult to prove in law.”
An Alight Solutions spokesperson told the Mercury News that the employer condemns Capitol protestors for actions taken at the “insurrection in Washington, D.C.” and that “lawlessness and violence” are firmly against their company policies.
While an employer may terminate at-will employees for any reason, employers are still obligated to abide by the California Labor Code, such as Section 1101.
“It states that employers may not adopt or enforce policies that prevent employees from engaging or participating in political activities,” Clark said. “California courts have generally interpreted political activity broadly to include running for office or supporting causes."
Similarly, Section 98.6 of the same code prohibits employers from taking adverse action against an employee for lawful conduct occurring during non-working hours away from the employer’s premises.
“In California, state laws protecting employees from political retaliation have existed since the 1930s,” Clark said. “Since that time, these laws have protected employees engaging in divisive political matters, whether they be labor-related political activities or LGBTQ-related political activities.”
Snyder’s attorney David Flyer did not immediately respond to requests for comment.
“Often, employees work at-will, meaning that the employee or the company can terminate the relationship at any time, for any reason,” Clark added. “Federal law does provide some protections for at-will employees, which protect at-will employees from being terminated for reasons that have been deemed illegal, such as discrimination, whistleblowing, refusing to participate in illegal activities.”