Labor & Employment Law Daily Wrap Up, EMPLOYEE LEAVE—E.D. Wis.: Harley-Davidson worker's FMLA claims proceed to trial, PUMP Act count tossed, (Jul 15, 2026)

By Wendy Biddle, J.D.

The court rejected the motorcycle maker's theory that accepting extra parental leave forfeits FMLA protections.

A federal court in Wisconsin largely denied Harley-Davidson Motor Company's motion for summary judgment in an employment discrimination suit brought by a former merchandising manager, allowing her FMLA interference and retaliation claims to proceed to a jury while dismissing a related claim under the Providing Urgent Maternal Protections for Nursing Mothers Act (PUMP Act). The employee alleged that the motorcycle company failed to return her to an equivalent job following her 16 weeks of combined disability, parental, and FMLA leave. She was terminated as part of a department-wide restructuring within three months of her return. The court found the employee provided sufficient evidence of her FMLA claims; however she failed to comply with the notice requirements of the PUMP Act so the court granted summary judgment to Harley-Davidson for the PUMP Act claim (Do v. Harley-Davidson Motor Company Inc., No. 2:24-cv-01091-BHL (E.D. Wis. July 14, 2026)).

The employee worked for Harley-Davidson Motor Company as a merchandising manager from September 2021 until her termination in June 2024, spending most of that time managing the company's "Collections" product line, an umbrella encompassing four clothing lines, with two employees reporting to her. In the fall of 2023, while the employee was pregnant, Harley-Davidson restructured the Collections line, eliminating one of its sub-lines and closing its New York office.

Leave. The employee went on leave after giving birth on November 20, 2023, ultimately taking 16 weeks of combined disability, paid parental, and FMLA leave before returning to work on March 11, 2024. During her absence, an assistant merchandiser took over some of the employee's job duties, and after her return the subordinate continued performing those functions, made business decisions without her, and excluded her from meetings and emails, leaving her role effectively diminished despite her unchanged title, salary, and benefits.

Lacation rooms? Emails exchanged between the employee's supervisor and a senior company executive shortly before her return discussed whether the subordinate could take over the employee's responsibilities on a full-time basis. Separately, because the employee was breastfeeding after her return, she sought information about lactation spaces at Harley-Davidson facilities before working on-site on four occasions but received no response to her inquiry.

Position elimination. In May 2024, Harley-Davidson directed further cost-cutting in the employee's department, and on June 28, 2024, the company eliminated the employee's position along with 11 others as part of that restructuring, prompting her to file suit alleging FMLA interference, FMLA retaliation, and a violation of the PUMP Act's lactation-accommodation requirements.

FMLA claims. Harley-Davidson's principal defense to both FMLA claims was that the employee forfeited her statutory protections by accepting four weeks of leave beyond the FMLA's 12-week minimum, meaning she was no longer entitled to FMLA protection when she returned to work in March. The court found this argument unsupported by the statutory text, noting that Congress explicitly encourages employers to offer more generous leave policies and that nothing in the FMLA suggests doing so nullifies its protections.

The court also rejected Harley-Davidson's reliance on three Seventh Circuit cases finding each factually distinguishable. Unlike the plaintiffs in those cases, the employee never requested a "light duty" return, never represented that she was disabled or unable to work, and Harley-Davidson presented no evidence that she could not have returned at the 12-week mark. The court emphasized that under Cloutier v. GoJet Airlines, LLC, 996 F.3d 426 (7th Cir. 2021), the relevant question is whether an employee could have returned to work at the end of mandated leave, not whether she actually did. The employee submitted an affidavit stating she would have returned on February 9, 2024, had her leave been limited to 12 weeks.

Equivalent position. On the interference claim, the court applied the Seventh Circuit's "strict" equivalence standard, under which a returning position must involve not only the same pay and benefits but "the same or substantially similar duties and responsibilities." While Harley-Davidson pointed to the employee's unchanged title, salary, and benefits, the employee presented evidence that her actual job functions had been absorbed by a subordinate during her leave and were never fully returned to her afterward. This evidence included the employee's account that the subordinate continued making business decisions and excluding her from meetings, testimony that the subordinate's pre-leave role managing the Collections website had ended when the website was shut down, and internal emails between the employee's supervisor and a senior vice president discussing whether the subordinate could permanently take over the employee's responsibilities. The court found this sufficient to create a jury question on whether the employee's post-leave position was truly equivalent.

Retaliation claim. The employee claimed that the motorcycle company terminated her because she took leave following the birth of her child. The company argued that the employee had not provided sufficient evidence of causation, because it provided information that it terminated the employee due to restructuring. The employee countered that she was laid off due to lack of work and restructuring, but her lack of work was due to the company’s failure to return her to her previous position.

The court found that the employee's evidence went beyond mere suspicious timing. It identified a chain of evidence permitting a reasonable jury to find that the employee's diminished role, caused by her leave, in turn caused her selection for termination during the subsequent restructuring, satisfying the requirement that her leave be a "substantial or motivating factor" in the adverse action.

After finding that the employee had presented sufficient facts to support her FMLA claims, the court denied summary judgment of those claims.

PUMP Act claim. The court granted summary judgment to Harley-Davidson on the PUMP Act claim. The statute requires an employee to notify her employer of a lactation-space violation and provide 10 days to come into compliance before filing suit. The employee conceded she never gave this notice but argued the requirement was excused because Harley-Davidson's failure to respond to her inquiry about lactation rooms showed it had no intention of complying. The court disagreed, holding that a nonresponse does not constitute an affirmative statement of noncompliance under the statutory exception. The court further noted that Harley-Davidson submitted a sworn declaration confirming lactation rooms existed at all three relevant locations, evidence the employee did not rebut.

The case is No. 2:24-cv-01091-BHL.

Judge: Ludwig, B.

Attorneys: Nicholas O. Yurk (Alan C. Olson & Associates) for Jennifer Do. Casey M. Kaiser (Littler Mendelson) for Harley-Davidson Motor Company Inc.

Companies: Harley-Davidson Motor Company Inc.

Cases: EmployeeLeave Discharge Retaliation Discrimination WisconsinNews