Michelle Collins v. Union Pacific Railroad Company

United States Court of Appeals
For the Eighth Circuit
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No. 23-2711
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Michelle Collins
Plaintiff - Appellant
v.
Union Pacific Railroad Company
Defendant - Appellee
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Appeal from United States District Court
for the Western District of Missouri - Kansas City
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Submitted: April 10, 2024
Filed: July 24, 2024
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Before SMITH, WOLLMAN, and SHEPHERD, Circuit Judges.
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SHEPHERD, Circuit Judge.
In this employment discrimination action, plaintiff Michelle Collins appeals
the district court’s grant of summary judgment in favor of her former employer
Union Pacific Railroad Company. Having jurisdiction under 28 U.S.C. § 1291, we
affirm the grant of summary judgment on the hostile work environment claim but
reverse and remand for further proceedings consistent with this opinion on the

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discrimination and retaliation claims in light of the Supreme Court’s recent decision
in Muldrow v. City of St. Louis, 144 S. Ct. 967 (2024).
I.
We begin by summarizing the undisputed material facts found by the district
court.1 Collins is a black woman who worked at Union Pacific for 42 years. During
her time at Union Pacific, she held over twenty positions. Collins’s allegations
against Union Pacific largely focus on the conduct of several of her managers, none
of whom were minorities. For example, Collins believes that in 2010 her then-
manager Craig Mitchell discriminated against her by assigning her an unpleasant
task when she was the only black woman on the shift, and by “going along with”
another colleague “piling on” work duties. Other allegations relate to Samantha
Miller, who managed Collins between April 2017 and June 2018. Miller screamed
at Collins several times, prevented her from attending a discretionary safety training
course, increased Collins’s workload, and reworked a position-specific vacation
system under which Collins would have had preferential treatment as the most senior
employee, among other things.
Other allegations relate to Collins’s coworkers. In 2019, Collins moved to a
new position as a Yard Office Coordinator. There, Collins’s job was made more
difficult because another Union Pacific employee, Rhonda VanLew, would perform
1 In determining these undisputed material facts, among others, the district
court expressly noted that it had “excluded legal conclusions, argument presented as
fact, and proposed facts not properly supported by the record or admissible
evidence,” as well as “[i]mproperly controverted facts.” We note that Collins’s brief
on appeal alleges, among other things, that the district court “erroneously made”
certain factual findings and “improperly exclude[ed] . . . and discount[ed]” other
evidence. It is unclear from the record and Collins’s brief what facts, if any, the
district court “excluded.” To the extent that Collins challenges the district court’s
exposition of the undisputed material facts, we note that nothing in our analysis turns
on them.

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her job poorly before turning her shift over to Collins. For example, VanLew would
not reload paper into printers or would leave radio volumes turned down too low. In
2020, Collins filed an internal complaint about VanLew with Union Pacific.
Separately, VanLew submitted a complaint about Collins, alleging, among other
things, that Collins was “very rude and disrespectful.” A Union Pacific Corporate
Investigations Analyst later concluded that a conflict existed between Collins and
VanLew but that local management had appropriately resolved the matter.
Collins sued Union Pacific, asserting in her first amended complaint race
discrimination, retaliation, and hostile work environment claims, in violation of 42
U.S.C. § 1981. After the parties engaged in discovery, Union Pacific moved for
summary judgment. It asserted, among other things, that Collins could not establish
a prima facie case of race discrimination or retaliation because she suffered no
adverse employment action, and that Collins’s hostile work environment claim
failed because she could not establish that she was subjected to severe or pervasive
harassment on account of her race. The district court agreed, granting summary
judgment on the same grounds. Collins now appeals.
II.
“We review de novo the district court’s grant of summary
judgment . . . . Summary judgment is appropriate if there is no genuine dispute of
material fact and a party is entitled to judgment as a matter of law.” Xuan Huynh v.
U.S. Dep’t of Transp., 794 F.3d 952, 958 (8th Cir. 2015).
A.
We begin with Collins’s § 1981 discrimination and retaliation claims, which
are analyzed under the same framework as Title VII claims. Lake v. Yellow Transp.,
Inc., 596 F.3d 871, 873 n.2 (8th Cir. 2010). Before the district court, Collins
conceded that she did not have direct evidence of racial discrimination or retaliation.
See R. Doc. 74, at 3 (stating that “discrete acts” like “termination, failure to promote,

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denial of transfer, or refusal to hire” were not “at issue here” (citation omitted)). Her
discrimination claim must therefore be analyzed under the familiar McDonnell
Douglas2 framework. Xuan Huynh, 794 F.3d at 958. The McDonnell Douglas
framework requires the plaintiff to first “establish[] a prima facie case of” racial
discrimination, the third element of which requires that she “suffered an adverse
employment action.” Id. Section 1981 retaliation claims are likewise analyzed
under this McDonnell Douglas framework, Thompson v. Univ. of Ark. Bd. of Trs.,
52 F.4th 1039, 1042 (8th Cir. 2022), and a prima facie case of retaliation also
requires the plaintiff to prove that she suffered “an adverse employment action,”
Gacek v. Owens & Minor Distrib., Inc., 666 F.3d 1142, 1146 (8th Cir. 2012) (citation
omitted).
In clarifying the requirements of a Title VII discrimination claim, “[t]he
Supreme Court recently obviated the requirement—replete in our case law—that the
[adverse employment action] be ‘significant,’ ‘material,’ or ‘serious.’” Cole v. Grp.
Health Plan, Inc., No. 23-3050, 2024 WL 3217580, at *2 (8th Cir. June 28, 2024)
(quoting Muldrow, 144 S. Ct. at 975 n.2). Absent any materiality or significance
requirements, “[a]n adverse employment action is a disadvantageous change to the
compensation, terms, conditions, or privileges of employment.” Id.
Here, the district court resolved Union Pacific’s motion as to the
discrimination and retaliation claims by concluding that Collins could not establish
that she suffered an adverse employment action. But the district court’s analysis
hinged on our case law employing the now-proscribed “materially significant
disadvantage” language. See R. Doc. 106, at 21 (citing Charleston v. McCarthy, 926
F.3d 982, 989 (8th Cir. 2019) (“An adverse employment action is a tangible change
in working conditions that produces a material employment disadvantage.” (citation
omitted))). Accordingly, we reverse and remand Collins’s § 1981 discrimination
and retaliation claims to the district court so that it may consider them anew in light
of Muldrow. Because the district court resolved the discrimination and retaliation
2 McDonnell Douglas Corp. v. Green, 411 U.S. 792 (1973).

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claims on the adverse employment action element, it expressly declined to reach
other arguments Union Pacific offered in favor of summary judgment. On remand,
the district court will have the opportunity to consider these arguments, which are
“‘best left to [it]’ to decide in the first instance.” Cardinal Bldg. Materials, Inc. v.
Amerisure Ins. Co., 97 F.4th 562, 566 (8th Cir. 2024) (citation omitted).
B.
Finally, we turn to Collins’s hostile work environment claim.
To establish a prima fac[i]e case that she was subjected to a hostile work
environment, [Collins] must show that (1) she is a member of a
protected group; (2) unwelcome harassment occurred; (3) a causal
nexus existed between the harassment and her protected group status;
and (4) the harassment affected a term, condition, or privilege of
employment.
Hairston v. Wormuth, 6 F.4th 834, 841 (8th Cir. 2021) (first alteration in original)
(citation omitted). “The fourth element requires [Collins] to demonstrate that the
harassment she experienced was ‘sufficiently severe or pervasive to alter the
conditions of [her] employment and create an abusive working environment.’” Id.
(second alteration in original) (citation omitted).
When moving for summary judgment on Collins’s hostile work environment
claim, Union Pacific argued, among other things, that Collins failed to establish she
was subjected to severe or pervasive harassment. The district court granted
summary judgment on this basis, reasoning that the alleged incidents “concern[ed]
ordinary employee-supervisor interpersonal conflict.” On appeal, Collins alleges
that this conclusion was erroneous, pointing to several incidents which she believes,
“taken as a whole,” demonstrate severe or pervasive harassment. Union Pacific
counters that Collins waived this argument by failing to resist the severe or pervasive
harassment ground for summary judgment before the district court. It also argues
that the allegations properly before the district court do not rise to the level of severe

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or pervasive harassment. Because we agree that Collins did not resist summary
judgment based on the severe or pervasive harassment element, we affirm the grant
of summary judgment on her hostile work environment claim. See Woodworth v.
Hulshof, 891 F.3d 1083, 1088 (8th Cir. 2018) (affirming grant of summary judgment
and explaining that “we may affirm ‘for any reason supported by the record, even if
it differs from the rationale of the district court’” (citation omitted)).
As the non-moving party, Collins bore the burden to demonstrate to the
district court that there existed a “genuine dispute of material fact that would
preclude summary judgment.” Paskert v. Kemna-ASA Auto Plaza, Inc., 950 F.3d
535, 540 (8th Cir. 2020). Because “failure to oppose a basis for summary judgment
constitutes waiver of that argument,” Satcher v. Univ. of Ark. at Pine Bluff Bd. of
Trs., 558 F.3d 731, 735 (8th Cir. 2009), we have held that a plaintiff cannot survive
a defendant’s motion for summary judgment when the plaintiff “d[oes] not direct the
district court to evidentiary materials setting out specific facts showing a genuine”
dispute, Johnson v. Charps Welding & Fabricating, Inc., 950 F.3d 510, 523 (8th Cir.
2020). Likewise, we have held that a nonmovant cannot survive summary judgment
if it “fail[s] to provide meaningful legal analysis” of “how the disputed facts
support[]” the relevant claims. Id. These “shortcoming[s],” we have explained,
cannot be cured “on appeal by citing to some specific facts that support” the
plaintiff’s claim. Id. at 524.
Collins failed to carry this burden. In her response to Union Pacific’s motion,
Collins did not “direct the district court to evidentiary materials setting out specific
facts showing a genuine” dispute as to the severe or pervasive harassment element,
nor did she provide “meaningful legal analysis” of it. Id. at 523. Collins’s brief
mentions her hostile work environment claim in only one point heading. The
analysis that follows under that point heading contains one passing reference to
portions of “DSOF,” which we take to be the defendant’s proposed statement of
facts. Collins does not explain what facts that citation refers to, nor does she analyze
their legal significance. She does not mention, let alone analyze, the severe or
pervasive harassment element of a hostile work environment claim. Later in that

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same section, she states that she “will present at trial all relevant background facts
about” Union Pacific’s treatment of her, but once again fails to explain what those
facts are. Collins’s brief returns to her hostile work environment claim only three
more times in passing. She first states that the harassment supporting her hostile
work environment claim “need not be explicitly ‘racial.’” Later, she states that the
testimony of two coworkers “tends to support [her] claims of [a] racially hostile
work environment—and must be considered.” Conspicuously absent from that
passage is any explanation of what the coworkers said or how their testimony
supports Collins’s hostile work environment claim. Finally, in arguing that she
presented a triable claim of retaliation, Collins states that she may base her retaliation
claim “on a hostile work environment.” These piecemeal, cursory references to her
hostile work environment claim were insufficient to demonstrate a “genuine dispute
of material fact that would preclude summary judgment.” Paskert, 950 F.3d at 540.
Because Collins did not “direct the district court to evidentiary materials setting out
specific facts showing a genuine” dispute on the severe or pervasive harassment
element, and because she did not provide “meaningful legal analysis” of it, her claim
could not survive summary judgment. Johnson, 950 F.3d at 523. She cannot cure
these shortcomings on appeal. Id. at 524.
III.
For the foregoing reasons, we affirm the grant of summary judgment on the
hostile work environment claim but reverse and remand for further proceedings
consistent with this opinion on the discrimination and retaliation claims.
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