ADA Accommodation Limits: No Right to an In-Place Promotion, and an Employee Who Declines the Interactive Process Cannot Prove Failure to Accommodate

Case: Michael Jezior v. City of Chicago
Court: U.S. Court of Appeals for the Seventh Circuit
Date: June 24, 2026
Author: Kolar, Circuit Judge

I. Introduction

This appeal arose from the Chicago Fire Department’s handling of a promotion opportunity for Michael Jezior, an engineer-paramedic who suffered a stroke that permanently limited his mobility. After his stroke, the Department reassigned him to a non-firefighting procurement role at O’Hare Airport. Years later, when Jezior’s name reached the Department’s lieutenant eligibility list, he sought what he characterized as an “in-place” promotion—i.e., keeping the same airport procurement duties and location but receiving the lieutenant title and pay.

The central issues were (1) whether the ADA required the Department to effectuate an in-place promotion (including, in practical effect, recreating or preserving a non-operational lieutenant role at O’Hare) and (2) whether Jezior could establish failure to accommodate or disability discrimination when he declined to submit accommodation paperwork and declined to pursue alternative placements.

The defendant was the City of Chicago. The district court granted summary judgment to the City, and the Seventh Circuit affirmed.

II. Summary of the Opinion

The Seventh Circuit affirmed summary judgment for the City on both claims:

  • Failure to accommodate: Jezior was not a “qualified individual” for a lieutenant position at O’Hare because the essential functions of existing lieutenant positions at the airport included firefighting, which he admitted he could not perform. The ADA did not require the City to create a new lieutenant job or strip essential firefighting duties. Separately, Jezior cut off the interactive process by refusing to submit paperwork needed to evaluate accommodations; his fear of a “worst-case” outcome was speculative and did not excuse nonparticipation.
  • Disability discrimination: The claim failed because Jezior could not show he was qualified for the requested position and could not establish causation or pretext. The City’s explanation—civilianization and cost-cutting leading to operational requirements for existing airport lieutenant roles—was consistent and legitimate. Jezior’s proposed comparators were not similarly situated or the argument was waived.

III. Analysis

A. Precedents Cited (and Their Role in the Court’s Decision)

1. Summary judgment posture and record inferences

  • Vesey v. Envoy Air, Inc., 999 F.3d 456 (7th Cir. 2021): Cited for the standard requirement that facts and reasonable inferences be viewed in the nonmovant’s favor on summary judgment. The court applied this lens but still found the ADA elements unsatisfied.
  • Tate v. Dart, 51 F.4th 789 (7th Cir. 2022): Used both for de novo review of summary judgment and, more substantively, for the heightened sensitivity to “essential functions” in public-safety roles, where even rarely performed duties can be essential.

2. Elements of an ADA failure-to-accommodate claim

  • Kinsella v. Baker Hughes Oilfield Operations, LLC, 66 F.4th 1099 (7th Cir. 2023): Supplied the three-element framework (qualified individual; employer awareness; failure to accommodate) and the instruction to “isolate the cause” of an interactive-process breakdown and assign responsibility.

3. “Qualified individual,” employer control over job essentials, and public safety

  • Leisen v. City of Shelbyville, 153 F.3d 805 (7th Cir. 1998): Reinforced that employers define the core qualifications for a position—an important predicate to rejecting the idea that a desired title/pay change can ignore the employer’s defined essential duties.
  • Vargas v. DeJoy, 980 F.3d 1184 (7th Cir. 2020): Quoted for the “firefighter” example emphasizing that infrequently performed, high-stakes physical functions remain essential when public safety is implicated—supporting the conclusion that firefighting requirements at O’Hare lieutenant roles were not “illusory.”
  • Schoper v. Board of Trustees of Western Illinois University, 119 F.4th 527 (7th Cir. 2024): Cited in the discrimination section for the proposition that failure to show qualification for the position defeats the ADA discrimination claim.

4. The ADA does not require creating a new job, stripping essential duties, or granting the employee’s preferred accommodation

  • Gratzl v. Office of the Chief Judges of the 12th, 18th, 19th, & 22nd Judicial Circuits, 601 F.3d 674 (7th Cir. 2010): Central to the court’s rejection of Jezior’s in-place promotion request. The decision relied on the rule that an employer need not create a new job or remove principal duties to accommodate.
  • Mobley v. Allstate Insurance Co., 531 F.3d 539 (7th Cir. 2008): Anchored the repeated Seventh Circuit refrain that an employer need not provide the requested/preferred accommodation.
  • Igasaki v. Illinois Dep't of Financial & Professional Regulation, 988 F.3d 948 (7th Cir. 2021): Cited both for the “employer need not provide preferred accommodation” theme and for the elements of ADA disability discrimination.
  • Malabarba v. Chicago Tribune Co., 149 F.3d 690 (7th Cir. 1998): Reinforced the same accommodation-choice principle as Mobley.

5. Interactive process doctrine

  • Youngman v. Peoria County, 947 F.3d 1037 (7th Cir. 2020): Cited for the requirement that both parties engage in an informal interactive process to identify an appropriate accommodation once a qualified employee requests one. The court used this to frame Jezior’s refusal to submit paperwork as a self-inflicted breakdown.

6. Causation, pretext, and comparator analysis for discrimination claims

  • Graham v. Arctic Zone Iceplex, LLC, 930 F.3d 926 (7th Cir. 2019): Provided the counterfactual causation test (“if he was not disabled, and everything else had remained the same”).
  • McCann v. Badger Mining Corp., 965 F.3d 578 (7th Cir. 2020): Used to assess pretext via inconsistent explanations; importantly, the court applied McCann to conclude the City’s explanations were not actually shifting.
  • Monroe v. Indiana Dep't of Transportation, 871 F.3d 495 (7th Cir. 2017): Framed the “similarly situated” comparator inquiry as flexible and common-sense, requiring enough common factors for a meaningful comparison.
  • Bradley v. Village of University Park, 59 F.4th 887 (7th Cir. 2023): Cited for waiver principles—arguments not properly developed/evidenced can be forfeited on appeal.

B. Legal Reasoning

1. The requested accommodation assumed a job that did not exist

Jezior’s theory depended on equating his long-standing airport procurement assignment with an available lieutenant position “with no changes.” The court rejected that premise as factually and legally deficient. Factually, the Department determined that existing lieutenant positions at O’Hare required firefighting duties. Legally, the ADA asks whether the employee can perform the essential functions of “the employment position” he “desires,” not a reimagined version of that position.

2. Public-safety essential functions are given substantial deference

Relying on Tate v. Dart and Vargas v. DeJoy, the court treated firefighting capacity as an essential function of the lieutenant roles at issue, even if procurement tasks constituted a large portion of day-to-day work at certain posts. In public safety, the employer may legitimately require readiness for emergency duties that are episodic but critical.

3. No duty to create or resurrect a lieutenant procurement line at O’Hare

The opinion’s most operationally significant move is its application of Gratzl and the “no preferred accommodation” line of cases. Jezior sought a title-and-pay change while keeping the same duties—effectively a bespoke position. The court characterized that as requiring the City to create a new job or alter the essential functions of existing lieutenant roles.

The court also found the City’s “civilianization” cost-cutting effort relevant: even Commissioner Ford’s sister had vacated a non-operational lieutenant procurement role after the Department decided not to finance it as a lieutenant position. That history underscored why an in-place lieutenant procurement role was not something the ADA compelled the City to recreate.

4. Interactive process: speculation about negative outcomes cannot replace participation

The court treated the interactive process as a practical, information-gathering mechanism. Jezior declined to submit the accommodation paperwork (including the medical questionnaire) because he feared failing medical clearance and being forced into retirement. The court held that this “Hobson’s choice” framing was speculative: without participating, neither party could know what accommodations were possible or what the medical evaluation would show.

Applying Kinsella and Youngman, the court assigned responsibility for the breakdown to Jezior because he “voluntarily cut off” the interactive process. The employer’s inability to identify a specific alternative position in advance was not treated as bad faith; the point of the process is to develop those facts.

5. Discrimination: qualification and causation failures, plus no meaningful comparators

The discrimination claim failed for two core reasons:

  • Not qualified: As with accommodation, Jezior could not show qualification for a lieutenant position at O’Hare where firefighting was essential (Igasaki; Schoper).
  • No causation/pretext: Under Graham, Jezior had to show he would have gotten the promotion absent disability. The court found the City’s rationale consistent (civilianization and operational requirements) and thus not pretextual under McCann.

Comparator evidence also failed under Monroe. The purported comparators involved exempt-rank appointments, no pay increase, movement to different roles, or undeveloped/waived factual support (Bradley). Critically, Jezior identified no similarly situated employee who received what he sought: a promotion and pay raise with unchanged job responsibilities.

C. Impact

1. Clarifies limits on “in-place promotion” theories under the ADA

Although the decision applies existing Seventh Circuit principles, it concretely rejects an accommodation theory that sometimes appears in promotion contexts: that long-term performance of a light-duty or administrative assignment entitles an employee to be promoted “in place” into a higher rank while keeping the same duties. The court treats that request as either (a) demanding a non-existent position or (b) demanding creation of a new position/stripping essentials—both outside ADA obligations.

2. Reinforces deference to essential functions in public-safety organizations

The opinion strengthens employers’ ability—especially in fire/police/corrections contexts—to designate emergency-response duties as essential, even for posts that may appear largely administrative. Plaintiffs will face an uphill climb when the requested accommodation would remove readiness for safety-critical functions.

3. Interactive process: employees assume litigation risk by refusing to supply medical/accommodation information

The decision underscores a practical litigation point: where the employee refuses to submit paperwork needed to evaluate accommodations, courts may treat the refusal as dispositive of failure-to-accommodate claims. The employee cannot rely on fears of hypothetical adverse outcomes as a substitute for engaging in the process.

4. Comparator rigor in promotion disputes

The analysis signals that, for ADA discrimination claims, comparator evidence must match the challenged action with close operational similarity—same kind of promotion, same pay consequences, same process (e.g., eligibility list versus exempt appointment), and developed evidentiary support.

IV. Complex Concepts Simplified

  • “Qualified individual”: A person who can perform the job’s essential functions with or without a reasonable accommodation. If the essential functions include firefighting, the employee must be able to perform firefighting duties (or show an accommodation that enables performance) to be “qualified.”
  • “Essential functions”: The fundamental duties of the job, not marginal tasks. In public safety, emergency duties can be “essential” even if not performed daily, because the job exists to meet rare but critical events.
  • “Reasonable accommodation”: A modification that enables performance of essential functions without imposing undue hardship. The ADA generally does not require creating a new job, granting a promotion, or removing essential duties.
  • “Interactive process”: A cooperative back-and-forth where employer and employee share information (often including medical documentation) to identify workable accommodations. If one side stops participating, that party may be held responsible for the breakdown.
  • “Pretext”: A showing that the employer’s stated reason is not the true reason. Inconsistent explanations can suggest pretext, but only if they are genuinely inconsistent.
  • “Similarly situated comparator”: Another employee similar in relevant respects (job process, decisionmaker context, type of action) who was treated more favorably—used to infer discrimination.

V. Conclusion

Michael Jezior v. City of Chicago reinforces several durable ADA principles in the promotion and public-safety context: the ADA does not entitle a disabled employee to a preferred accommodation such as an in-place promotion; it does not require an employer to create or resurrect a position or to strip essential firefighting duties; and an employee who refuses to participate in the interactive process—especially by withholding required medical/accommodation paperwork—will struggle to prove a failure to accommodate. On the discrimination side, the decision reiterates that qualification for the actual position sought and rigorous, well-supported comparators are indispensable.