The Equal Employment Opportunity Commission recently solicited public comments on its Draft Strategic Enforcement Plan. The plan is intended to help the EEOC to cope with an increasing number of job discrimination issues despite reduced resources. Among the issues to receive special attention, according to the draft plan, will be LGBT job discrimination, problems arising under the Americans with Disabilities Act, and “facially neutral” hiring practices that harm particular groups of potential employees.

The draft plan said nothing about ensuring protection for the religious hiring rights of faith-based organizations as various new enforcement initiatives are undertaken. So IRFA submitted a comment to draw attention to this important issue.

IRFA’s letter reminds the EEOC: “religious hiring by religious organizations does not constitute illegal job discrimination. Rather, religious hiring by religious organizations with respect to all positions is protected in Title VII (the religious organization exemption) and with regard to ministerial employees by the First Amendment (the ministerial exception).” Title VII is the employment provision of the 1964 Civil Rights Act. The ministerial exception, protecting the ability of religious organizations to select their ministerial leaders, was upheld by the U.S. Supreme Court earlier this year, which unanimously struck down the EEOC’s position (Hosanna-Tabor Evangelical Lutheran Church and School v. EEOC).

The letter notes that the EEOC’s website buries its information about these religious hiring freedoms, making it-erroneously-seem that the law forbids religious organizations as well as secular ones to consider religion when making hiring and firing decisions. The letter asks that the religious hiring freedoms be given more prominence on the website, that the EEOC’s compliance manual be updated to take account of court decisions concerning religious hiring (including Hosanna-Tabor), and that the EEOC staff be given extensive specific training on the religious hiring freedoms.

For more on the religious hiring freedom, see the resources on IRFA’s website.