Labor & Employment Law Daily Wrap Up, DISCRIMINATION—PREGNANCY—W.D. Tex.: DOD contract worker advances PWFA claim over breastfeeding accommodation, (Jul 30, 2025)

By Kathleen Kapusta, J.D.

“Despite the DoD’s arguments that the PWFA does not apply to breastfeeding, the unambiguous statutory text supports applying it to conditions such as lactation and the accompanying pumping and breastfeeding that naturally accompany lactation.”

Declining to dismiss the Pregnant Workers Fairness Act claim of a Department of Defense contract employee who alleged that the room provided for breastfeeding was on another floor in a different building than her office, a federal court in Texas found that the PWFA’s text supports applying it to conditions such as lactation and she alleged a plausible failure to accommodate claim based on the distance of the provided room from her usual work area. The court, however, dismissed without prejudice her Rehab Act Section 504 claim (Bellotte v. Austin, No. 5:24-CV-0876-JKP (W.D. Tex. July 28, 2025)).

The employee was hired in July 2021 by Bestica, Inc., to work as a contract preventionist/exercise physiologist for the Department of Defense, Defense Health Agency (DHA). To accommodate her allergy to artificial scents, including aerosols, chemicals, colognes, perfumes, scented lotions, and diffusers, she asked DHA to enforce its already existing Scent-Free Workplace Policy.

Breastfeeding pod. In December 2022, she had a baby and took maternity leave through early March 2023. In July, she was transferred to a different location and, because she did not have a private office, she had to use a breastfeeding pod in a different building. Her complaint resulted only in a suggestion that she change her breastfeeding schedule. As a result, she stopped breastfeeding in August.

Resignation. She learned in February 2024 that she was pregnant again. Because she could not obtain an accommodation, she claimed she was forced to resign.

Lawsuit. She then sued, asserting among other things claims against the defense department for failure to accommodate, retaliatory hostile work environment, hostile work environment based on her disability, and constructive discharge based on reprisal and disability under Sections 501 and 504 of the Rehab Act as well as a claim under the PWFA for failure to provide her with a space for breastfeeding.

Sovereign immunity. Moving to dismiss the employee’s Rehab Act Section 504 claim, the defense department first argued that sovereign immunity protected it against monetary damages under that Section and that she lacked standing for her Section 504 claim. Agreeing, the court found that sovereign immunity precluded her Section 504 claim for monetary damages and because she failed to identify any equitable remedy she was pursuing, she lacked standing to pursue her Section 504 claims.

PWFA claim. Turning to the employee’s PWFA claim, the court assumed without deciding that she was an employee within the meaning of the PWFA. It also noted that the PWFA took effect on June 27, 2023, and because she provided no support for retroactive application of the statute, only conduct occurring after that date could provide a basis for her claim.

Here, observed the court, the employee gave birth in December 2022, took maternity leave through early March 2023, requested in May to telework as an accommodation for her allergen disability, and when there was no response, followed up on that request on June 27, 2023, and was told that it was being determined whether an accommodation was available. Because the PWFA had yet to be enacted, said the court, these events only concerned her allergen disability and thus her claims under the Rehab Act.

Transfer. In July 2023, the employee, while still breastfeeding, transferred to a different location where, she alleged, she had “to use the breastfeeding pod on the second floor in a different building” from her non-private office. To access the pod, she asserted, she had to traverse numerous hospital hallways, which exposed her to allergens that triggered or exacerbated her symptoms. When she complained that the breastfeeding accommodation was ineffective and unreasonable due the exposure to allergens, a nurse suggested that she “change her breast-feeding schedule to best serve the clinic.” Due to a lack of a proper accommodation, she stopped breastfeeding.

PWFA. As relevant here, said the court, the PWFA makes it “an unlawful employment practice for a covered entity” to fail to make “reasonable accommodations to the known limitations related to the pregnancy, childbirth, or related medical conditions of a qualified employee.” Arguing that the PWFA applies to pregnant workers and does not make any mention of lactation or breastfeeding and thus does not extend to the employee’s allegations, the defense department relied on Spagnolia v. Charter Commc’ns, LLC, a 2023 case from the federal district court in Colorado.

But that case, said the court here, addressed a 2016 Colorado statute and has no persuasive value when considering the federally enacted PWFA. Moreover, the court observed, “Spagnolia even recognizes that other legislative enacted statutes expressly include breastfeeding.”

Guidance and regulations. As to the employee’s contention that lactation is a condition arising out of childbirth, the court found this supported by interpretive guidance and regulations issued by the EEOC, including a regulation that lists “lactation and conditions related to lactation” as part of the “non-exhaustive” list of “Pregnancy, childbirth, or related medical conditions.” Further, said the court, the unambiguous text of the PWFA supports applying it to conditions such as lactation and the accompanying pumping and breastfeeding. And to the extent the statute itself leaves any ambiguity, the court found “the implemented regulations and EEOC guidance crystal clear. Unless binding authority dictates otherwise, this Court declines to simply find the PWFA inapplicable to breastfeeding.”

Conflation. The defense department, however, argued that the employee conflated her PWFA claim with her Rehab Act claims because her failure to accommodate her breastfeeding allegation related to the need to walk to the breastfeeding pod with its resulting exposure to allergens. While the court agreed that she did conflate her claims to some extent, it found she alleged a distinct claim under the PWFA related to her breastfeeding.

She complained about the space provided for breastfeeding. And while she complained about the exposure to allergens, which was specific to her Rehab Act claim, she also alleged that the provided room was “on the second floor in a different building from where her office was located.” In addition, she alleged that to reach the room, she was required to traverse “through many hallways throughout the hospital” and that she complained about the “breastfeeding accommodation” requiring a walk that exposed her to allergens. This was enough, said the court, to allege a plausible failure to accommodate based on the distance of the provided room from her usual work area.

Notice. Addressing, finally, the defense department’s assertion the employee did not sufficiently allege that she complied with her responsibility of informing it of her need for accommodation, the court pointed out that it could reasonably infer the employee’s need for a breastfeeding area that was close to her normal work area would have been open, obvious, and apparent to the department and thus, she did not need not plead more than she already pled.

Accordingly, the court denied the defense department’s motion to dismiss the employee’s PWFA claim.

The case is No. 5:24-CV-0876-JKP.

Judge: Pulliam, J.

Attorneys: Erica Bilkis (Alan Lescht & Associates) for Ashley Bellotte. Huiju Jeon, U.S. Department of Justice, for Lloyd J. Austin, III. Kelli Cubeta (Cubeta Law Group) for Bestica, Inc.

Companies: Bestica, Inc.

Cases: PregnancyDiscrimination Discrimination DisabilityDiscrimination TexasNews