It started with a complaint about his Microsoft Teams status showing "Away"
A Wells Fargo audit manager alleges the bank fired him for serving in the National Guard.
The worker, a Pennsylvania National Guard member who held the title of Audit Manager - Vice President in Wells Fargo's Enterprise Technology Audit Group, filed a federal lawsuit on November 2, 2026 in the US District Court for the Eastern District of Pennsylvania. The suit brings two claims under USERRA, the federal law that shields service members from workplace discrimination tied to their military obligations. He alleges both discrimination and retaliation.
According to the complaint, Wells Fargo hired the worker in January 2024 knowing full well about his Guard commitments. He held a Certified Information Systems Auditor (CISA) credential, earned approximately $132,900 a year, and was a member of Wells Fargo's own veteran and service member employee legacy group.
The trouble, the filing alleges, started with a Teams status.
In September 2025, the worker was scheduled for military duty on September 3 and 4. He worked a modified schedule on September 2 to accommodate travel, sent an Outlook calendar invitation to his project colleagues flagging that he would be out for military duty, submitted the matching leave request in Workday, and sat through at least three meetings with audit leads that morning before heading to his duty station.
Days after he returned, the complaint alleges, his performance manager contacted him to complain that his Microsoft Teams status had displayed as "Away" for several hours on September 2. The worker explained he had given his team advance notice and had worked that morning. The manager said he understood, according to the filing.
Then he raised the same absence as a performance issue in a later check-in.
That manager, who the complaint says took over the worker's performance evaluations around May or June 2025, allegedly had no real contact with the worker until roughly August 2025. Under the setup described in the filing, the manager did not directly observe the worker's day-to-day output - that fell to whichever audit lead was running each project. Yet the complaint alleges this manager wrote the worker's performance reviews and had a hand in decisions about his continued employment.
On October 6, 2025, the complaint states, the worker emailed his manager his military schedule and supporting documents. He told him, in writing, that his military time was protected by law and that Wells Fargo had known about his service since day one. The manager again said he understood, according to the filing.
What followed, the complaint alleges, was a pattern of escalation - a word the filing itself uses.
The manager allegedly sat on military leave requests submitted through Workday, in several cases not approving them until the leave dates had already come and gone. He allegedly brought up the worker's military service repeatedly in performance conversations that had nothing to do with it, recasting properly noticed military leave as a failure to "communicate effectively."
In December 2025 - roughly two months after the worker put his statutory rights in writing - Wells Fargo handed him an informal warning about the quality of his work, the complaint states. The filing alleges he had not received consistent negative feedback before that point, was not the lead audit manager on the projects cited in the warning, and that in at least one case the expectations for his work were changed after he had already finished it, without anyone telling him.
Then - nothing. The complaint alleges Wells Fargo gave the worker no further meaningful feedback between December 2025 and March 2026. No performance improvement plan. No progressive discipline of any kind.
On March 14, 2026, the complaint states, Wells Fargo terminated the worker during a meeting his manager scheduled that morning - the day after he had taken approved paid time off. The bank said the termination was performance-related but gave no real explanation, according to the filing. He was told he would get termination paperwork by email. All he received was information about continuing his health insurance under COBRA.
Wells Fargo cut off his laptop access immediately, the complaint states, blocking him from the records that documented his work, his performance, his leave requests, and his exchanges with his manager.
The complaint argues the performance rationale was a pretext - a cover story for the real reason. It points to several threads: the worker performed his duties as directed by audit leads; he was not the lead on the projects held against him; the firing came roughly three months after a single informal warning with no follow-up discipline; and Wells Fargo did not contest his unemployment benefits claim, which the filing calls inconsistent with a genuine for-cause termination.
Both claims allege the violations were willful, noting that the worker disclosed his military service at hire and expressly told his manager in writing on October 6, 2025 that his military time was protected by law.
The complaint names both Wells Fargo and the manager individually. Under USERRA, anyone to whom an employer delegates employment-related responsibilities - things like approving leave, writing performance reviews, participating in firing decisions - can be held personally liable. The filing alleges the manager held exactly that kind of authority over the worker.
The worker is seeking lost wages and benefits, an equal amount in additional damages for willful violations, reinstatement to his old role or pay in lieu of it, and attorneys' fees. He has demanded a jury trial.
According to the complaint, the worker has been unemployed since March 14, 2026 and has been driving rideshare to make ends meet.
For HR teams, the case puts a sharp focus on how managers handle military leave in practice - not just whether leave is granted, but whether it quietly shows up in performance reviews, check-ins, and informal warnings. When those conversations are logged in systems like Workday and Outlook, they can become the evidence trail in a federal lawsuit.
The allegations in the complaint have not been tested, and no court has made any findings or rulings on the merits.
