Her boss lived at the hotel, making the alleged daily harassment hard to escape
A pregnant hotel worker in Oklahoma was allegedly harassed, demoted to harder duties, and fired - all in the space of about two months after her employer learned she was expecting.
The Equal Employment Opportunity Commission filed a federal lawsuit on September 28 against three related hotel companies operating under the Continental Inn name in Blackwell, Oklahoma, alleging they violated Title VII's pregnancy discrimination protections across four counts.
According to the complaint, the worker started at the hotel in October 2023 as housekeeping and laundry staff and was promoted to front desk within a week. She typically worked Monday through Friday, 8 a.m. to 3 p.m.
That changed in March 2024, the filing says, when she told a manager she was pregnant with a baby due at the end of September.
The complaint alleges the company's operations manager - who oversaw all of the chain's hotels across Oklahoma and Texas and reported directly to the owner - learned of the pregnancy during a management meeting in or around April 2024. According to the filing, the operations manager asked why the worker was working there while pregnant. The owner, the complaint says, commented that it was a liability for her to work while pregnant.
The operations manager also told the worker she would need to quit in July 2024, roughly two months before her due date, according to the filing. When management relayed this plan, the complaint says, the worker pushed back and said she intended to work until her baby arrived.
That did not go over well, according to the complaint.
The filing alleges the operations manager began harassing the worker nearly every day she worked after discovering her pregnancy. The complaint says he followed her around while she worked, questioned the food she ate, told her she needed to be at home instead of working because she was pregnant, and questioned whether her fiance - the baby's father - was properly providing for her since she was working while pregnant.
The operations manager had moved into the hotel in or around April 2024, the complaint says, which made it difficult for the worker to avoid him even when she tried.
In late May 2024, according to the filing, the worker was demoted from front desk back to housekeeping and laundry. The complaint alleges the operations manager also told her she would be moved from her daytime shift to a 3 p.m. to 11 p.m. slot - a change the filing says he knew would not work because she had childcare responsibilities for a young daughter.
While her pay rate stayed the same, the complaint says the housekeeping duties were significantly more strenuous and physically demanding than front desk work.
The filing alleges the operations manager continued to nitpick the worker's performance, was rude to her, criticized her pregnancy, and told her she needed to go home. The complaint says she kept working because she needed to earn money for her family and was physically able to do her job.
On or about June 7, 2024 - a Friday - the worker told the operations manager directly that she felt she was being discriminated against and harassed because of her pregnancy, according to the filing. The complaint says she told him he was trying to get rid of her because she was pregnant, that he was harassing her and trying to force her to quit, and that his plan for forced leave was against the law.
The operations manager's response, according to the complaint: her pregnancy was a liability for the hotel, he intended to force her to take leave about a month before her due date, and he planned to cut her hours further. The complaint also alleges he accused her of only doing half of her work because she was pregnant.
The worker was off on her regular days off - Saturday and Sunday. When she returned to work on Monday, June 10, the filing says, she was fired.
Friday to Monday. That was the gap between the worker raising discrimination and losing her job, according to the EEOC's timeline.
The complaint alleges the reasons the defendants gave for the discharge were pretextual. The filing further alleges, upon information and belief, that similarly situated employees were treated more favorably.
The EEOC brings four counts: hostile work environment based on pregnancy, demotion based on pregnancy, discharge based on pregnancy, and discharge in retaliation for opposing unlawful employment practices. The agency is seeking backpay, lost benefits, compensatory and punitive damages, reinstatement, and a permanent injunction. A jury trial has been demanded.
The hotel chain involves three LLCs that the complaint says operated as a single employer with common ownership, shared management, and centralized control of labor relations. According to the filing, the owner operates about half a dozen hotels across Oklahoma and Texas under the Continental Inn name, each structured as a single-member LLC.
For HR teams, the alleged timeline is the kind of fact pattern that draws federal enforcement attention - and juries: a worker raises a discrimination complaint on a Friday and comes back Monday to a termination.
The allegations in this complaint have not been tested, and no court has made any findings or rulings on the merits.
