Scott Troogstad v. City of Chicago

United States Court of Appeals
For the Seventh Circuit
Chicago, Illinois 60604
Argued November 3, 2025
Decided December 9, 2025
Before
MICHAEL B. BRENNAN, Chief Judge
MICHAEL Y. SCUDDER, Circuit Judge
AMY J. ST. EVE, Circuit Judge
No. 25-1575
SCOTT TROOGSTAD, et al.,
Plaintiffs-Appellants,
v.
CITY OF CHICAGO,
Defendant-Appellee.
Appeal from the United States District
Court for the Northern District of
Illinois, Eastern Division.
No. 1:21-cv-05600
Thomas M. Durkin,
Judge.
O R D E R
In this successive appeal, we consider whether the district court correctly
dismissed claims that the City of Chicago’s COVID-19 vaccination policy violated
certain constitutional rights and a state religious freedom law, as well as whether the
court abused its discretion by denying plaintiffs leave to file a fourth amended
complaint. We affirm the district court’s decisions in each respect.
NONPRECEDENTIAL DISPOSITION
To be cited only in accordance with F ED. R. APP . P. 32.1

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No. 25-1575 Page 2
I. Background
Scott Troogstad was an employee of the City of Chicago Fire Department who
previously tested positive for COVID-19. The City promulgated a COVID-19
vaccination policy.1 Troogstad and more than 130 other plaintiffs (all City employees of
the Fire, Water, and Transportation Departments, whom we call “the Troogstad
plaintiffs”) filed suit in October 2021 challenging the policy. Although that policy
provided a religious exemption, the Troogstad plaintiffs alleged that the denial or lack
of approval of their religious exemptions violated the Free Exercise Clause of the First
Amendment and the Illinois Religious Freedom Restoration Act (IRFRA), 775 ILCS 35/1
et seq. They also alleged that the policy violated the constitutional right to substantive
due process by interfering with their fundamental rights to bodily autonomy and
privacy.
This case returns to us for a second time. In Lukaszczyk v. Cook County, 47 F.4th
587 (7th Cir. 2022), the Troogstad plaintiffs sued the City of Chicago and the Illinois
Governor challenging state and local policies requiring them to be tested for and
vaccinated against the COVID-19 virus. The Troogstad case was combined with two
others, and we affirmed the denial of preliminary injunctions against those policies. Id.
at 599–608.2 After remand, the district court granted the Troogstad plaintiffs’ motion for
leave to file a second amended complaint, in which they alleged various constitutional
and state law violations. The City and the Governor moved to dismiss the second
amended complaint with prejudice.3 In January 2024 the district court dismissed most
of the claims against the City (including for violation of substantive due process) with
prejudice, but it dismissed without prejudice those claims alleging the City violated the
Free Exercise Clause and IRFRA.
In March 2024, the Troogstad plaintiffs filed a third amended complaint against
the City. That pleading included claims of violation of the Free Exercise Clause and
IRFRA. The third amended complaint alleged:
1 Per a November 5, 2025 letter the City filed under Circuit Rule 28(j), that policy
is no longer in place.
2 One of those companion cases was also the subject of a successive appeal. See
generally Lukaszczyk v. Cook County, 137 F.4th 671 (7th Cir. 2025). Troogstad was not a
party to that appeal.
3 The district court dismissed all claims against the Governor with prejudice in
January 2024. That ruling was not appealed.

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No. 25-1575 Page 3
Troogstad’s request for an accommodation stated that he was a Christian
and that he opposed the vaccination on the basis of his religion. He further
elaborated that the gene-altering aspect of mRNA vaccinations violates his
beliefs as a Christian.
DE 89 at 5, ¶ 28.
The City again moved to dismiss. In a September 9, 2024 memorandum opinion
and order the district court granted the motion with prejudice. Judgment was entered
the same day. The next day the court amended its decision to discuss two then-recent
decisions of this court, Passarella v. Aspirus, Inc., 108 F.4th 1005, 1009 (7th Cir. 2024), and
Bube v. Aspirus Hosp., Inc., 108 F.4th 1017, 1019 (7th Cir. 2024).
Later in September 2024, the Troogstad plaintiffs asked the district court to
vacate or reconsider its dismissal decision under Federal Rule of Civil Procedure 59(e),
and they again sought leave to amend their complaint. In March 2025 the court ruled
that the Troogstad plaintiffs could amend their complaint in a separate case arising out
of the same facts as here (N.D. Ill. 23 C 14881), which alleges violations of Title VII of the
Civil Rights Act, 42 U.S.C. § 2000e et seq. But the court denied their motion to amend
the complaint in this case.
The Troogstad plaintiffs then appealed the dismissal of three claims: (1) that the
denial or lack of approval of their religious exemptions violated the Free Exercise
Clause of the First Amendment, (2) violation of IRFRA, and (3) violation of their
constitutional right to substantive due process. They also appealed the denial of their
motion to amend.
II. Discussion
A. Free Exercise Claim
To state a claim that the Free Exercise Clause of the First Amendment has been
violated, a plaintiff must plausibly allege that a government entity burdened a sincere
religious practice pursuant to a policy that was not neutral or generally applicable.
Kennedy v. Bremerton Sch. Dist., 597 U.S. 507, 525 (2022). Our court has held that to plead
a religion-based claim related to a vaccination requirement, plaintiffs must plead some
facts about their religious beliefs and how those beliefs conflict with the vaccine
requirement. See Passarella, 108 F.4th at 1005, 1009 (connecting Christian beliefs of
sanctity of the human body with objection to potentially harmful effects vaccination),

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and Bube, 108 F.4th at 1019 (connecting belief that God created the human body and that
taking vaccine would violate those religious beliefs).
Troogstad alleges “the gene-altering aspect of mRNA vaccinations violates his
beliefs as a Christian.” But he failed to allege facts about how taking the vaccine violated
his religious beliefs. He misses that step. This distinguishes his third amended
complaint from the pleadings in cases that permit a religious claim to advance.
Passarella, 108 F.4th at 1009 (“Passarella’s statement connects her objection to
vaccination with her Christian beliefs regarding the sanctity of the human body.”); Bube,
108 F.4th at 1019 (“We have no trouble concluding that … these requests are based at
least in part on an aspect of the plaintiffs' religious beliefs.”).
This is not a high standard, but Troogstad has failed to meet it. While the
pleading of a violation of the Free Exercise Clause need not be overly exacting, in
numerous rounds of pleading, including in the third amended complaint, Troogstad
did not move beyond conclusory statements. A complaint need not provide detailed
factual allegations; mere conclusions generally will not suffice. Bell Atl. Corp. v.
Twombly, 550 U.S. 544, 555 (2007). Troogstad’s failure to allege facts about how his
religious beliefs as a Christian conflict with the vaccine requirement—after numerous
opportunities to satisfy this pleading standard—dooms his Free Exercise claim.
B. IRFRA Claim
Under IRFRA, a government may not substantially burden someone’s exercise of
religion unless the government shows that burden furthers a compelling governmental
interest and is the least restrictive means to further that interest. 775 ILCS 35/15. This
statute’s language mirrors the federal Religious Freedom Restoration Act (RFRA). See 42
U.S.C. § 2000bb et seq.
To state such a claim, a plaintiff must identify the religious belief that would be
violated if the plaintiff complied with the contested requirement. Soc’y of the Divine
Word v. U.S. Citizenship and Immigr. Servs., 129 F.4th 437, 450 (7th Cir. 2025) (RFRA
claim). This follows because “we must know what beliefs the claimant contends the
regulation offends” in order to evaluate whether that requirement substantially burdens
a religious belief. Id.
Under the same reasoning as in II.A., Troogstad has not alleged specific beliefs
related to his Christian faith offended by the COVID-19 policy. Mere conclusory
statements are not enough to survive a motion to dismiss. See Ashcroft v. Iqbal, 556 U.S.
662, 678 (2009). Federal Rule of Civil Procedure 8 “does not unlock the doors of

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discovery for a plaintiff armed with nothing more than conclusions.” Id. at 678–79. A
plaintiff must also include some factual support to articulate a religious component to
an objection. See Passarella, 108 F.4th at 1011. As detailed above, Troogstad’s pleading
failed to provide specific facts to support his claim. So, the district court correctly
dismissed the IRFRA claim.
C. Substantive Due Process Claim
In the second amended complaint, the Troogstad plaintiffs alleged the City’s
COVID-19 policy violates their constitutional right to substantive due process by
interfering with their right to bodily autonomy and privacy. They appeal the dismissal
of that claim.
We have already analyzed and rejected the contention that a vaccination policy
infringes on a fundamental constitutional right, which would implicate strict scrutiny.
Lukaszcyk, 47 F.4th at 599–602; see also Klaasen v. Trustees of Ind. Univ., 7 F.4th 592, 593–94
(7th Cir. 2021). Other circuits agree. See, e.g., Children’s Health Def., Inc. v. Rutgers, The
State Univ. of N.J., 93 F.4th 66, 80 (3d Cir. 2024) (holding that there is no constitutional
right to refuse vaccination); Norris v. Stanley, 73 F.4th 431, 435–36 (6th Cir. 2023)
(upholding university’s COVID-19 vaccine policy under rational basis review).
And we have concluded that the Troogstad plaintiffs “have not met their burden
under the rational basis standard to show that the challenged policies violate their
substantive due process rights.” Lukaszcyk, 47 F.4th at 603. None of plaintiffs’
arguments, which repeat contentions we have already denied, persuade us to revisit
our previous reasoning and conclusions.
D. Leave to Amend Pleadings
The Federal Rules of Civil Procedure state that outside of one amendment as a
matter of course, “a party may amend its pleading … with the court’s leave. The Court
shall freely give leave when justice so requires.” F ED. R. C IV. P. 15(a)(2).
The Troogstad plaintiffs have had numerous opportunities to amend and
supplement their pleadings, but they have not done so. In our 2022 decision resolving
the appeal of the denial of a preliminary injunction, we noted that plaintiffs need to
show “how the religious exemption [to the City’s COVID-19 policy] is applied in
practice.” Lukaszczyk, 47 F.4th at 607. The Troogstad plaintiffs’ second amended
complaint was dismissed for failure to include such allegations. And the third amended
complaint continued to lack information about how Troogstad’s religious beliefs

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conflicted with the COVID-19 policy, as the district court recognized in its September
2024 rulings. Outside of his pleadings, Troogstad said he knew that his sincere religious
beliefs conflicted with that policy. For example, his September 2024 motion to
reconsider the district court’s decision included the full text of his religious exemption
request. Inexplicably, that information was not included in any of his complaints. So,
the district court was within its discretion to deny leave to amend yet again.
The district court’s decision to grant leave to amend in a different case filed two
years after this one—alleging violation of Title VII for failure to provide a religious
accommodation (N.D. Ill. No. 1:23-cv-05600)—has no effect on the amendment of
pleadings in this case. The Title VII case was first dismissed after the filing of only one
complaint. But that case is in a different procedural posture. Here, the Troogstad
plaintiffs had numerous chances to plead specific facts to state an as-applied religious
claim. Simply put, the Title VII case is not a vehicle to amend the pleadings in this case.
* * *
While the Troogstad plaintiffs may continue with their Title VII claims against
the City in a different case not before us in this appeal, the district court properly
dismissed with prejudice their constitutional and state statutory claims here. Further,
the court did not abuse its discretion in denying leave to file a fourth amended
complaint.
A FFIRMED.

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