Labor & Employment Law Daily Wrap Up, DISCRIMINATION—RELIGIOUS—11th Cir.: Dismissal of employees' challenge to Atlas Air's COVID-19 vaccination policies affirmed on appeal, (Jul 13, 2026)

By Mandavi Singh, LL.M.

The employees failed to state plausible Title VII and related claims challenging the impugned policies; claims against a staffing company failed for lack of personal jurisdiction.

Employees in the commercial aviation industry failed to state viable federal or state-law claims arising from Atlas Air's COVID-19 vaccination, masking, and testing policies, and a federal district court in Florida correctly dismissed the action, the Eleventh Circuit has found. The appellate court also affirmed dismissal of all claims against Flight Services International for lack of personal jurisdiction, concluding that the staffing company's limited contacts with Florida bore no relationship to the challenged employment practices. The ruling left intact dismissal of every claim asserted in the employees' third amended complaint and reinforced long-standing principles governing personal jurisdiction, Title VII pleading standards, statutory enforcement, and Florida tort law (Akerlund v. Atlas Air, Inc., No. 24-11033 (11th Cir. July 10, 2026)).

Dispute. During the COVID-19 pandemic, Atlas Air required employees to receive COVID-19 vaccinations unless they qualified for a religious or medical exemption. Employees who received exemptions instead were required to wear masks while working and undergo periodic COVID-19 testing. Flight Services International supplied contractors to staff Atlas Air flights. A group of employees objected to the policies, asserting religious opposition to vaccination and contending that the accommodation measures themselves were objectionable.

Some alleged they accepted vaccination or worked under masking and testing requirements due to economic pressure, while others claimed they received less desirable, lower-paying assignments. The complaint, however, did not allege that any employee lost employment because of the policies. The employees sued under Title VII, the Federal Food, Drug, and Cosmetic Act (FDCA), constitutional theories, and several Florida tort theories. The district court dismissed the third amended complaint, prompting the appeal.

Personal jurisdiction. The appellate court first addressed whether Florida courts could exercise personal jurisdiction over Flight Services International. Applying the familiar distinction between general and specific jurisdiction, the court noted that the company was incorporated and headquartered in Texas. Under Goodyear Dunlop Tires Operations, S.A. v. Brown, 564 U.S. 915 (2011), and Daimler AG v. Bauman, 571 U.S. 117 (2014), those facts ordinarily foreclose general jurisdiction absent exceptional circumstances.

The employees argued that the company's periodic training sessions in Miami rendered it “at home” in Florida. The court disagreed, explaining that occasional employee training did not amount to the continuous and systematic contacts required for general jurisdiction. Nor did the employees establish specific jurisdiction because none alleged that their injuries arose from or related to those training sessions. Citing Ford Motor Co. v. Montana Eighth Judicial District Court, 592 U.S. 351 (2021), the court held that the required nexus between the forum and the underlying controversy was missing.

Title VII. Turning to Atlas Air, the court concluded that the Title VII hostile work environment claim failed because the complaint did not plausibly allege religious discrimination. Atlas Air did not deny religious accommodations; instead, it exempted employees with sincere religious objections from vaccination and required them to mask and undergo periodic testing. Although the employees characterized those measures as coercive and hostile, the complaint alleged political and practical objections to masks and testing rather than religious objections. It also failed to identify facts supporting an inference that Atlas Air acted because of hostility toward religion. Relying on Watson v. Fort Worth Bank & Trust, 487 U.S. 977 (1988), the court reiterated that discriminatory intent is an essential element of a Title VII claim. The allegations of discriminatory motive were, therefore, merely conclusory and insufficient to survive dismissal.

Federal statutory and constitutional claims. The court next rejected claims under the FDCA. Congress expressly vested enforcement authority in the federal government, not private litigants, through 21 U.S.C. § 337(a). Accordingly, the employees could not privately enforce provisions governing emergency-use authorization for medical products. The court relied on Buckman Co. v. Plaintiffs' Legal Committee, 531 U.S. 341 (2001), which confirmed that private enforcement is unavailable.

The constitutional claims fared no better because 42 U.S.C. § 1983 applies to state actors, while actions under Bivens v. Six Unknown Named Agents of Federal Bureau of Narcotics, 403 U.S. 388 (1971), are available only against federal officers in limited circumstances. Because Atlas Air was a private company, the court declined to recognize the requested extension of Bivens, describing such expansion as strongly disfavored under modern Supreme Court precedent, including Ziglar v. Abbasi, 582 U.S. 120 (2017).

Florida tort claims. The employees also asserted invasion of privacy, negligent disclosure of medical information, and intentional and negligent infliction of emotional distress. The Eleventh Circuit concluded that the privacy-based claims failed because the complaint alleged only internal dissemination of vaccination information among company personnel responsible for administering workplace policies. Florida law requires publicity to the public at large or to so many persons that the information effectively becomes public knowledge. Citing Steele v. Offshore Shipbuilding, Inc., 867 F.2d 1311 (11th Cir. 1989), and Hunstein v. Preferred Collection & Management Services, Inc., 48 F.4th 1236 (11th Cir. 2022) (en banc), the court explained that internal workplace communications do not satisfy that requirement. Likewise, the challenged pandemic protocols were not so outrageous as to sustain an intentional infliction of emotional distress claim under Eastern Airlines, Inc. v. King, 557 So. 2d 574 (Fla. 1990).

AI-generated citations. In an unusual concluding discussion, the Eleventh Circuit sharply criticized the employees' attorney for filing briefs containing numerous fictitious authorities apparently generated by artificial intelligence. The court observed that counsel continued to submit hallucinated citations even after problems had been identified and stated that lawyers cannot delegate professional judgment to AI systems without independently verifying legal authorities. Stressing that competent representation requires accuracy and diligence, the court announced that, in a separate order, the matter would be referred to the Eleventh Circuit's Committee on Lawyer Qualifications and Conduct. Although unrelated to the merits of the employment claims, the court's discussion serves as another appellate warning that attorneys remain fully responsible for every citation appearing in their filings.

Conclusion. Finally, the Eleventh Circuit affirmed dismissal of the third amended complaint in its entirety, leaving Atlas Air and Flight Services International free from liability on all pleaded federal and state claims.

The case is No. 24-11033.

Judge: Grant, B.

Attorneys: Anthony Frank Sabatini (Sabatini Law Firm) for Patrick Akerlund, Michael Alzati, Eric W. Anderson, Michael G. Ballard, Jr., Cindy Barrionuevo, Estate of Lane Caviness, and Larry James Bearce, Jr. Michelle Hogan (Jones Day) for Atlas Air, Inc. Scott Allan Cole (Cole Scott & Kissane) for Flight Services International, LLC.

Companies: Atlas Air, Inc.; Flight Services International, LLC

Cases: ReligiousDiscrimination Discrimination Covid19 StateLawClaims Privacy TortClaims Procedure AINews AlabamaNews FloridaNews GeorgiaNews