Federal civil rights attorneys requested a choose on Monday to require California’s jail company to respect its guards’ spiritual rights and cease implementing a brand new coverage that bans Sikhs, Muslims and others from carrying beards.
Since 2022, the California Division of Corrections and Rehabilitation has banned most guards from having facial hair, saying they must be clean-shaven to put on the tight-fitting respirators that would defend them from ailments and chemical brokers.
Although state laws require employers to have a plan for shielding workers from these types of exposures, attorneys with the U.S. Division of Justice argued in a 22-page court docket submitting that the jail company hadn’t achieved sufficient to discover different lodging that might fulfill these laws with out requiring guards to violate the tenets of their faiths.
“Sikhs, Muslims and workers of different minority faiths shouldn’t be compelled to decide on between the follow of their religion and their jobs,” Assistant Atty. Gen. Kristen Clarke stated in a information launch. “Spiritual freedom and non secular lodging are bedrock ideas of our democracy. We’re taking motion to make sure that the rights of workers of minority faiths are revered and accommodated within the office.”
In an emailed assertion to The Instances, the corrections division defended its coverage.
“CDCR respects all sincerely held spiritual beliefs and strives to moderately accommodate people in search of spiritual affordable lodging to the extent doing so doesn’t battle with different authorized obligations,” spokeswoman Mary Xjimenez wrote. “Tight-fitting respirator masks are legally required below office security legal guidelines for sure features in state jail operations.”
Final yr, corrections division officers informed The Instances the coverage was not particularly focusing on facial hair however as a substitute specializing in the necessity for guards to put on masks that would cut back transmission of COVID-19.
The American Civil Liberties Union and the Sikh Coalition wrote a joint letter in 2023 criticizing the coverage, which they stated would disproportionately affect non-white officers and pressure guards to decide on between their faith and their jobs. The organizations additionally stated the coverage was discriminatory in opposition to Black officers, who’re extra probably than others to endure from pseudofolliculitis barbae, a medical situation during which shaving could cause extreme irritation of the pores and skin.
For years, California corrections officers had been allowed to put on one-inch beards for spiritual or medical causes — and plenty of did so with none issues, in keeping with the court docket submitting.
Then in 2022, the company modified its coverage and banned facial hair as a part of a brand new safety plan created to adjust to California Division of Occupational Security and Well being necessities.
Company officers introduced the change in a memo that fall, telling workers that anybody the company believed would possibly must put on a respirator as a part of their job could be banned from having “facial hair that comes between the sealing floor of the respirator and the face or facial hair which will intrude with valve operate.”
Afterward, a number of Sikh and Muslim guards requested for spiritual exemptions to the beard ban — however the company denied them, in keeping with court docket filings. Confronted with the potential for being disciplined, taking a demotion or shedding their jobs, a number of of the spiritual guards shaved their beards.
Since then, a number of the males have struggled with nervousness, disgrace, isolation and weight achieve, in keeping with court docket filings. Others stated they’d stopped attending spiritual providers or household occasions, and one reported being so heartbroken that he cried at work, in keeping with court docket filings.
After eight officers filed spiritual discrimination complaints with the U.S. Equal Employment Alternative Fee, the federal authorities requested jail officers to cease implementing the coverage whereas the fee investigated. In March, California jail officers “declined to adjust to america’ request,” in keeping with the court docket filings.
In response, attorneys with the Justice Division’s Civil Rights Division filed Monday’s request for a preliminary injunction, asking the court docket to order the jail company to cease implementing the coverage and “have interaction in good religion discussions with officers about attainable affordable lodging” similar to utilizing different varieties of respirators or evaluating whether or not some guards might not must put on them.
Comparable points have come up in court docket earlier than. In 2022, federal court docket discovered the U.S. Marine Corps was fallacious to disclaim three Sikh males entry into primary coaching as a result of they refused to shave.
