Two employees at McDonald’s are filing a federal lawsuit in Florida over allegations of racial discrimination. According to the suit, a manager displayed racist behavior towards African American employees. 

Discrimination graphic; image courtesy of
arnoldus via Pixabay, www. pixabay.com

The suit was filed in Tampa and argues the general manager of the “corporate-owned Lakeland locations cut the hours of Black workers while maintaining those of other workers, assigned Black workers menial cleaning tasks, not within their job descriptions, ignored Black workers requests for time off in favor of others and made racist comments about Black customers and employees.” The two workers who filed the lawsuit ended up being exposed to COVID-19 and, upon returning to work from quarantine, there were fired. Though the suit was originally filed back in July, the attorneys representing the plaintiffs filed an amendment earlier this month. However, representatives for McDonald's said the “decision to fire the employees was made separate from the pending lawsuit.” The company added:“McDonald’s is committed to leading with values and does not tolerate retaliation. The allegations that employees were terminated for any reason related to ongoing litigation is categorically false.”According to the amended suit, McDonald's terminated the employees “as another example of unfair treatment and a direct response to the lawsuit.” One of the plaintiffs is Monica Scott, 34. According to the lawsuit, she was “fired the day she returned to work from a COVID-19 leave last month.” According to Eve Cervantez, one of the attorneys representing the plaintiffs said Scott “was unable to get into work one day because of car trouble…As you can imagine, McDonald’s doesn’t normally fire employees for car trouble.”The other plaintiff, Augustus 'Gus' Moody, was terminated September 17 for alleged insubordination, according to the suit. Additionally, the suit argues that Moody was “not insubordinate, but set up for failure and written up for things like having a missing name tag while other employees weren’t given infractions for the same things.” On top of that, “Moody also had to take two separate mandated leaves in recent months because of coronavirus exposure,” the suit states. Cervantez added:“They are seeking reinstatement. They would like to go back and work at McDonald’s if McDonald’s would treat them properly.”This isn’t the first racial discrimination filed against McDonald's lately. Earlier this week, a handful of workers in Rock Island, Illinois, filed a similar lawsuit against the company. The attorneys assigned to the two cases are working together. The Florida suit states:“Florida is thus not an isolated incident, but is instead symptomatic of a pattern or practice of McDonald’s corporate leadership’s failure to address pervasive racism and anti-Black sentiment throughout the organization.”

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Two Black McDonald’s workers fired after filing discrimination case in Tampa courtTwo Black McDonalds employees sacked after filing discrimination claim in Tampa court