Florida Attorney General Calls for Racial Discrimination Investigation Over Starbucks Inclusion and Diversity Policies

Florida Attorney General Ashley Moody filed a complaint this past week calling for an investigation into Starbucks’ hiring process. Moody has accused the coffee giant of racial discrimination and illegal hiring practices. Moody has called for the Florida Commission on Human Relations to investigate the company over their inclusion and diversity policies. She claims that the company’s hiring practices are meant to reach unlawful quotas.

According to Starbucks’ website, the company discloses that its executives “have compensation tied to our inclusion and diversity objectives.” In a 2022 press release, the company vowed to “achieve BIPOC representation of at least 30 percent at all corporate levels and at least 40 percent of all retail and manufacturing roles by 2025 in the U.S.

The complaint cites a recent SCOTUS decision involving Students for Fair Admissions, Inc. v President and Fellows of Harvard College. In the decision, the court ruled that racial discrimination “demeans the dignity and worth of a person to be judged by ancestry instead of by his or her own merit and essential qualities.” Moody believes that Starbucks’ inclusion and diversity quotas are a violation of civil rights laws and that authorities should evaluate whether or not the company could be considered an “abusive work environment.”

Moody said that Starbucks’ anti-bias training “tries to convince white employees that they are ‘the problem.’” The complaint cited a statement from 2018 in which a Starbucks executive said, “I was bearing witness to my own white privilege. I had to realize that I’m the problem.”

Moody contends that hiring practices that utilize race-based quotas are illegal. She says that Starbucks has published publicly available policies that raise sufficient concerns that they are using a quota system and that the compensation of key executives is tied to that system. She called on the Florida Commission on Human Relationships to investigate these concerns to ensure that Florida civil rights are not violated.

Can white employees file anti-discrimination lawsuits? 

The EEOC recently greenlit a lawsuit filed by a white, heterosexual woman, who was dissuaded from applying for a job based on the fact that she was not a minority candidate. The recent lawsuit will make it more difficult for companies to place diversity-facing language in their employment postings. In this case, the company was hoping to hire someone from the LGBTQ+ community. However, the language of the job posting violates anti-discrimination language according to the EEOC.

What makes this case unique is that the applicant never applied for the position. Instead, they were simply dissuaded from taking the position based on language that the EEOC considers discriminatory. This will make it more difficult for companies to include such language in their job postings. It may also impact Starbucks’ company-wide quota policy.

Talk to a Tampa, FL Employment Discrimination Lawyer Today 

Have you been passed up for a job based on your race, ethnicity, age, disability, gender, or sexual orientation? If so, you may be able to file a lawsuit against the company that failed to hire you. Call the Tampa employment lawyers at Florin Gray Bouzas Owens, LLC today to schedule an appointment, and we can begin investigating your concerns right away.

Source:

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