Sambrano v. United Airlines, 45 F.4th 877

Background

United Airlines implemented a COVID‑19 vaccine mandate; several employees objected on religious grounds to vaccines developed with aborted fetal cell lines.
United placed unvaccinated employees on indefinite unpaid leave and conditioned any return on vaccination; plaintiffs sued under Title VII seeking a preliminary injunction against enforcement.
The district court denied the preliminary injunction, finding plaintiffs had not shown irreparable injury.
A Fifth Circuit panel (unpublished) concluded that private Title VII plaintiffs may seek injunctive relief (reviving Drew), found the vaccine‑coercion imposed an irreparable injury to religious exercise, and remanded for relief.
United moved to dismiss the appeal and to vacate the panel opinion and sought rehearing en banc; the court denied both the motion and rehearing en banc (4 judges for rehearing; 13 against), leaving the unpublished panel ruling intact.
Judge James Ho concurred in the denial of rehearing (defending the irreparable‑harm holding); Judge Jerry E. Smith dissented from the denial of rehearing (arguing the panel misapplied Title VII, improperly revived Drew, waived exhaustion, and erred in publishing choices).

Issues

Issue	Plaintiff's Argument	Defendant's Argument	Held
Availability of preliminary injunction under Title VII	Private employees can obtain equitable relief to vindicate Title VII’s purposes (court may fashion injunctions)	Statutory text confines injunctive authority to EEOC/AG; private plaintiffs lack injunctive remedy	Panel held private injunctive relief is available (reviving Drew); en banc rehearing denied, leaving panel decision in place
EEOC exhaustion before seeking injunction	Drew permits equitable relief without prior EEOC exhaustion in some cases	Title VII’s exhaustion requirement is mandatory (42 U.S.C. §2000e‑5(f)(1)); courts must enforce it	Panel applied Drew and allowed injunction without exhaustion; en banc denied rehearing
Irreparable injury from religious coercion	Being forced to choose between religious conviction and employment is a spiritual, non‑pecuniary injury that money cannot remedy (Elrod principle)	Harms are economic (lost pay/routes) and thus reparable by damages	Panel and concurrence found coercion constitutes irreparable injury; dissent disagreed, viewing the harms as reparable
Use of precedent / publication and rule of orderliness	Panel invoked long‑ago Drew under the rule of orderliness to follow circuit precedent	Panel misapplied or resurrected stale precedent (Drew) and conflicted with later cases (White, Sampson, Sandoval, Ross)	Panel relied on Drew; dissent argued this upsets circuit precedent and criticized use of an unpublished opinion; en banc denied rehearing so the conflict remains unresolved

Key Cases Cited

Elrod v. Burns, 427 U.S. 347 (1976) (loss of First Amendment freedoms for even minimal periods constitutes irreparable injury)
Roman Catholic Diocese of Brooklyn v. Cuomo, 141 S. Ct. 63 (2020) (reaffirming that certain infringements on religious liberty are irreparable)
Opulent Life Church v. City of Holly Springs, 697 F.3d 279 (5th Cir. 2012) (Elrod principle applied to statutory religious‑exercise claims under RLUIPA)
Kikumura v. Hurley, 242 F.3d 950 (10th Cir. 2001) (RFRA claims satisfy irreparable‑harm analysis for injunctions)
Jolly v. Coughlin, 76 F.3d 468 (2d Cir. 1996) (statutory free‑exercise harms may be inadequately remedied by money)
Drew v. Liberty Mut. Ins. Co., 480 F.2d 69 (5th Cir. 1973) (permits equitable remedies in Title VII to effectuate its purposes; relied on by the panel)
White v. Carlucci, 862 F.2d 1209 (5th Cir. 1989) (held private plaintiffs cannot obtain preliminary injunctions and must exhaust administrative remedies)
Alexander v. Sandoval, 532 U.S. 275 (2001) (limits on judicially created remedies not found in statute)
Ross v. Blake, 578 U.S. 632 (2016) (strict approach to statutory exhaustion requirements)
Sampson v. Murray, 415 U.S. 61 (1974) (loss of income generally does not constitute irreparable injury)