Kloeckner v. SolisKloeckner v. Solis
Justice Kagan delivered the opinion of the Court.
A federal employee subjected to an adverse personnel action such as a discharge or demotion may appeal her agency‘s decision to the Merit Systems Protection Board (MSPB or Board). See
I
A
The Civil Service Reform Act of 1978 (CSRA),
A federal employee bringing a mixed case may proceed in a variety of ways. She may first file a discrimination complaint with the agency itself, much as an employee challenging a personnel practice not appealable to the MSPB could do. See
Section 7703 of the CSRA governs judicial review of the MSPB‘s decisions. Section 7703(b)(1) gives the basic rule: “Except as provided in paragraph (2) of this subsection, a petition to review a . . . final decision of the Board shall be filed in the United States Court of Appeals for the Federal Circuit.” Section 7703(b)(2) then spells out the exception:
“Cases of discrimination subject to the provisions of section 7702 of this title shall be filed under [the enforcement sections of the Civil Rights Act, Age Discrimina
tion in Employment Act, and Fair Labor Standards Act], as applicable. Notwithstanding any other provision of law, any such case filed under any such section must be filed within 30 days after the date the individual filing the case received notice of the judicially reviewable action under such section 7702.”
The enforcement provisions of the antidiscrimination statutes listed in this exception all authorize suit in federal district court. See
Section 7702 describes and provides for the “сases of discrimination” referenced in §7703(b)(2)‘s exception. In relevant part, §7702(a)(1) states:
“[I]n the case of any employee . . . who—
“(A) has been affected by an action which the employee . . . may appeal to the Merit Systems Protection Board, and
“(B) alleges that a basis for the action was discrimination prohibited by [specified antidiscrimination statutes],
“the Board shall, within 120 days of the filing of the appeal, decide both the issue of discrimination and the appealable action in accordancе with the Board‘s appellate procedures.”
The “cases of discrimination” in §7703(b)(2)‘s exception, in other words, are mixed cases, in which an employee challenges as discriminatory a personnel action appealable to the MSPB.
The parties here dispute whether, in light of these interwoven statutory provisions, an employee should go to the Federal Circuit (pursuant to the general rule of §7703(b)(1)), or instead to a district court (pursuant to the exception in §7703(b)(2)), whеn the MSPB has dismissed her mixed case on procedural grounds.
B
Petitioner Carolyn Kloeckner used to work at the Department of Labor (DOL or agency). In June 2005, while still an employee, she filed a complaint with the agency‘s civil rights office, alleging that DOL had engaged in unlawful sex and age discrimination by subjecting her to a hostile work environment. At that point, Kloeckner‘s case was not appealable to the MSPB because she had not suffered a sufficiently serious personnel action (e. g., a removal or demotion). See supra, at 44. Her claim thus went forward not under the special procedures for mixed cases, but under the EEOC‘s regulations for all other charges of discrimination. See
The next month, DOL fired Kloeckner. A removal from employment is appealable to the MSPB, see supra, at 44, and Kloeckner believed the agency‘s action wаs discriminatory; she therefore now had a mixed case. As permitted by regulation, see supra, at 45, she initially elected to file that case with the MSPB. Her claim of discriminatory removal, however, raised issues similar to those in her hostile work environment case, now pending before an EEOC judge; as a result, she became concerned that she would incur duplicative discovery expenses. To address that problem, she sought leave to amend her EEOC complaint to include her claim оf discriminatory removal, and she asked the MSPB to dismiss her case without prejudice for four months to allow the EEOC process to go forward. See App. 13, 50-51. Both of those motions were granted. The EEOC judge accepted the amendment,2 and on September 18, 2006, the
Discovery continued in the EEOC proceeding well past the MSPB‘s January 18 deadline. In April, the EEOC judge found that Kloeckner had engaged in bad-faith conduct in connection with discovery. As a sanction, the judge terminated the EEOC proceeding and returned Kloeckner‘s case to DOL for a final decision. Six months later, in October 2007, DOL issued a ruling rejecting all of Kloeckner‘s claims. See id., at 10-49.
Kloeckner appealed DOL‘s decision to the Board in November 2007. That appeal was filed within 30 days, the usual window for seeking MSPB review of an agency‘s determination of a mixed case. See
Kloeckner then brought this action against DOL in Federal District Court, alleging unlawful discrimination. The District Court dismissed the complaint for lack of jurisdiction. See Kloeckner v. Solis, Civ. Action No. 4:09CV804 (ED Mo., Feb. 18, 2010). Relying on the Eighth Circuit‘s ruling in Brumley v. Levinson, 991 F. 2d 801 (1993) (per curiam), the court held that because the MSPB had dismissed Kloeckner‘s claims on procedural grounds, she should have
We granted certiorari, 565 U. S. 1152 (2012), to resolve a Circuit split on whether an employee seeking judicial review should proceed in the Federal Circuit or in a district court when the MSPB has dismissed hеr mixed case on procedural grounds.3 We now reverse the Eighth Circuit‘s decision.
II
As the above account reveals, the intersection of federal civil rights statutes and civil service law has produced a complicated, at times confusing, process for resolving claims of discrimination in the federal workplace. But even within the most intricate and complex systems, some things are plain. So it is in this case, where two sections of the CSRA, read naturally, direct employees like Kloeckner to district court.
Begin with §7703, which governs judicial review of the MSPB‘s rulings. As already noted, see supra, at 45-46, §7703(b)(1) provides that petitions to review the Board‘s final decisions should be filed in the Federal Circuit—“[e]xcept as provided in paragraph (2) of this subsection.” Paragraph (2), i. e., §7703(b)(2), then sets out a different rule for one category of cases—“[c]ases of discrimination subject to the provisions of section 7702 of this title.” Such a case, paragraph (2) instructs, “shall be filed under” the enforcement provision of an enumerаted antidiscrimination statute. And each of those enforcement provisions authorizes an action in federal district court. See supra, at 46. So
Turn next to §7702, which identifies the cases “subject to [its] provisions.” As also stated earlier, §7702(a)(1) describes cases in which a federal employee “(A) has been affected by an action which [she] may appeal to the Merit Systems Protection Board, and (B) аlleges that a basis for the action was discrimination prohibited by” a listed federal statute. The subsection thus describes what we (adopting the lingo of the applicable regulations) have called “mixed cases.” See
Now just put §7703 and §7702 together—say, in the form of a syllogism, to make the point obvious. Under §7703(b)(2), “cases of discrimination subject to [§7702]” shall be filed in district court. Under §7702(a)(1), the “cases of discrimination subjeсt to [§7702]” are mixed cases—those appealable to the MSPB and alleging discrimination. Ergo, mixed cases shall be filed in district court.
And so that is where Kloeckner‘s case should have been filed (as indeed it was). No one here contests that Kloeckner brought a mixed case—that she was affected by an action (i. e., removal) appealable to the MSPB and that she alleged discrimination prohibited by an enumerated federal law. And under the CSRA‘s terms, that is all that matters. Regardless whether the MSPB dismissed her claim on the merits or instead threw it out as untimely, Kloeckner brought the kind of case that the CSRA routes, in crystalline fashion, to district court.
III
The Government offers an alternative view (as did the Eighth Circuit)—that the CSRA directs the MSPB‘s merits decisions to district court, while channeling its procedural rulings to the Federal Circuit. According to the Government, that bifurcated scheme, though not prescribed in the CSRA in so many words, lies hidden in the statute‘s timing
The Government‘s argument has two necessary steps. First, the Government claims that §7703(b)(2)‘s exception to Federal Circuit jurisdiction applies only when the MSPB‘s decision in a mixed case is a “judicially reviewable action” under §7702. Second, the Government asserts that the Board‘s dismissal of a mixed case on procedural grounds does not qualify as such a “judicially reviewable action.” We describe in turn the way the Government arrives at each of these conclusions.
The first step of the Government‘s argument derives from §7703(b)(2)‘s second sentence. Right after stating that “cases of discrimination subject to [§7702]” shall be filed under specified antidiscrimination statutes (i. e., shall be filed in district court), §7703(b)(2) provides: “Notwithstanding any other provision of law, any such case filed under any such [statute] must be filed within 30 days after the date the individual filing the case received notice of the judicially reviewable action under section 7702.” The Government reads that sentence to establish an additional prerequisite for taking a case to district court, instead of to the Federal Circuit. To fall within the §7703(b)(2) exception, the Government says, it is not enough that a case qualify as a “case of discrimination subject to [§7702]“; in addition, the MSPB‘s decision must count as a “judicially reviewable action.” See Brief for Respondent 20-21. If the MSPB‘s decision is not a “judicially reviewable action“—a phrase the Government characterizes as a “term of art in this context,” Tr. of Oral Arg. 28—the ruling still may be subject to judicial review (i. e., “judicially reviewable” in the ordinary sense), but only in the Federal Circuit.
The Government‘s second step—that the Board‘s procedural rulings are not “judicially reviewable actions“—begins
If you need to take a deep breath after all that, you‘re not alone. It would be hard to dream up a more roundabout way of bifurcating judicial review of the MSPB‘s rulings in mixed cases. If Congress had wanted to send merits decisions to district court and procedural dismissals to the Federal Circuit, it could just have said so. The Government has offered no reason for Congress to have constructed such an obscure path tо such a simple result.
And taking the Government‘s analysis one step at a time makes it no more plausible than as a gestalt. The Government‘s initial move is to read §7703(b)(2)‘s second sentence as adding a requirement for a case to fall within the exception to Federal Circuit jurisdiction. But that sentence does no such thing; it is nothing more than a filing deadline. Con
Proof positive that the Government misreads §7703(b)(2) comes from considering what the phrase “judicially reviewable action” would mean under its theory. In normal legal parlance, to say that an agency action is not “judicially reviewable” is to say simply that it is not subject to judicial review—that, for one or another reason, it cаnnot be taken to a court. But that ordinary understanding will not work for the Government here, because it wants to use the phrase to help determine which of two courts should review a decision, rather than whether judicial review is available at all. In the Government‘s alternate universe, then, to say that an agency action is not “judicially reviewable” is to say that it is subject to judicial review in the Federal Circuit (even though not in district court). Small wonder that the Government must call the phrasе “judicially reviewable action” a “term of art,” supra, at 51: On a natural reading, the phrase defines cases amenable to judicial review, rather than routes those cases as between two courts.
And even were we to indulge the Government that far, we could not accept the second step of its analysis. At that stage, remember, the Government contends that under §7702 only decisions on the merits qualify as “judicially re
Another section of the statute—§7702(e)(1)(B)—puts the final nail in the coffin bearing the Government‘s argument. That section states: “[I]f at any time after . . . the 120th day following [an employee‘s filing] with the Board . . ., there is no judicially reviewable action[,] . . . an employee shall be entitled to file a civil action” in district court under a listed antidiscrimination statute. That provision, as the Government notes, is designed “to save employees from being held in perpetual uncertainty by Board inaction.” Brief for Respondent 28. But if, as the Government insists, a procedural ruling is not a “judicially reviewable action,” then the provision would have another, surprising effect—essentially blow
Responding to this unwelcome outcome, the Government offers us an exit route: We should avoid “absurd results,” the Government urges, by applying §7702(e)(1)(B) only to “cases over which the Board continues to exert jurisdiction.” Brief for Respondent 27, 28, n. 4. But as the Government admits, that “gloss on the statute is not found in the text,” Tr. of Oral Arg. 50; the Government‘s remedy requires our reading new words into the statute. We think a better optiоn lies at hand. If we reject the Government‘s odd view of “judicially reviewable actions,” then no absurdity arises in the first place: §7702(e)(1)(B) would have no bearing on any case the MSPB dismissed within 120 days, whatever the grounds. It is the Government‘s own misreading that creates the need to “fix” §7702(e)(1)(B); take that away and the provision serves, as it was intended, only as a remedy for Board inaction.4
IV
A federal employee who claims that an agency action appealable to the MSPB violates an antidiscrimination statute listed in §7702(a)(1) should seek judicial review in district court, not in the Federal Circuit. That is so whether the MSPB decided her case on procedural grounds or instead on the merits. Kloeckner therefore brought her suit in the right place. We reverse the contrary judgment of the Court of Appeals for the Eighth Circuit, and remand the case for further proceedings consistent with this opinion.
It is so ordered.